We can’t shut the door once the horse has bolted: Reflections from a People's Panel on AI member

Here we have a guest blog from June, a member of the People’s Panel on AI reflecting on her experience as part of the Panel and her engagement with AI since.

I never would of imagined myself spending 4 days alone in London discussing with 10 other strangers and being involved in everything around Artificial Intelligence. I had some basic knowledge of this ‘ futuristic’ invention, and felt wary and slightly frightened how it was already and would impact in our lives, so when I had the invitation to take part in the Safety Summit on AI, although I hesitated and doubted how my contributions would be be of any use, I saw this as a once in a lifetime opportunity. I have Grandchildren that will have more technology forced upon them in years to come and I felt a slight duty to learn and have an understanding for them. I have since had an inner ear that seems to tune in and listens out for anything A.I, and anything of any relevance I get sent links, emails and YouTube clips, and I’ve had some wonderful discussions and debates around the subject. I don’t pretend to understand much more than I did this time last year, but I have a concern I never had before, that is, we’re having to put trust into the hands of people who (think they) know better than the majority of the people it will end up being used and effected by I imagine. AI is has been in our lives for a long time and is used much more than I knew, and probably that goes for the majority of the population knows, yet we aren’t asked for our opinions.

I have a few friends whose jobs are closely used with AI and presume there job will be taken over but are not worried about being made redundant, but they will probably be closer to retirement age when this happens and won’t be so concerned. For many, AI will make their jobs so much easier and less monotonous and it will be a benefit. We already see the benefits within the medical sectors, and I certainly came away from London feeling optimistic and positive and hopeful.

However, I am gravely concerned that not every sector behind AI will be using, producing and selling their Artificial Intelligence with their best intentions and the power, money and greed behind the scenes may take presidence over the good of human kind, if not the planet. There is no doubt of the pros, cons, hopes and fears for this next shift in the worlds timeline of industrial and technological revolutions, there are many who care about the way we leave the earth for our children’s children and all the future generations, but also many who have selfish attitudes that only care about themselves and how their lives can be made perfect, easy and wealthy. Some may be in very high powerful positions in their workplace, more than likely influential, manipulative and motivated by greed and power. These are the people who I worry about. Being involved with Connected By Data and the Peoples Panel since November I feel AI is moving along much faster than perhaps we first thought, do the ‘experts’ have concerns the world of AI is moving faster than they can keep up? Are there sufficient safety policies in place to ‘pull the plug’ if things get out of hand and like I mentioned on the Three Hands discussion, “we can’t shut the door once the horse has bolted” I am just a tiny voice that had a wonderful experience and opportunity to have a say, and I really hope we have all said something that I those high up in the AI world were not concerned about, and have now taken some thoughts on board. But we must somehow keep the pressure on for a Peoples Panel to have a voice so our opinions and thoughts about things that matter to us, can be heard.