Editorial | Taming the excesses of AI

The European Union wants to regulate artificial intelligence (AI) with the first step being the European Parliament’s approval of the AI Act on Wednesday.

The overwhelming vote in favour of the proposal put forward by co-rapporteurs Brando Benifei and Dragoş Tudorache sets out the EP’s negotiating position for talks on the final form of the law that will begin with EU countries in the Council.

The EU aims to reach an agreement by the end of this year, putting the bloc at the global forefront of AI regulation.

In the words of European Parliament President Roberta Metsola, the legislation will be setting the “global standard” for years to come.

“All of this is perfectly consistent with our will to be world leaders in digital innovation, based on EU values, such as privacy and respect for fundamental rights,” Metsola told a press conference after the vote.

The EU wants to enable the development of AI in such a way that it benefits society. There are many areas where AI can bring vast improvement to everyday life but like all such technology it comes with its problems and challenges.

Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager told the BBC that discrimination is a more pressing concern from advancing AI than human extinction.

She argued that “guardrails” were needed to counter the technology's biggest risks like when AI is used to help make decisions that can affect someone's livelihood, such as whether they can apply for a mortgage.

Vestager said AI's potential to amplify bias or discrimination, which can be contained in the vast amounts of data sourced from the internet and used to train models and tools, was a more pressing concern.

Similarly, Alexiei Dingli, a University of Malta professor specialising in AI, in an interview with MaltaToday last Sunday insisted humans could not be kept out of the loop.

While extolling the importance and usefulness of AI, he argued that where AI is used to take decisions that have a real impact on humans – such as using algorithms to identify suspect banking relations and proceeding to terminate an account – the systems should not be believed blindly with no humans to check on the outcome.

“Ultimately, you always have to keep humans in the loop; because these are things which will affect people, in the end… The second [concern] is that I think we are still lacking the sort of basic rights that should accompany AI: such as the right to full disclosure, on how a decision about my future was actually taken,” Dingli said.

AI can create many benefits, such as better healthcare; safer and cleaner transport; more efficient manufacturing; and cheaper and more sustainable energy. Resisting it is pointless. Embracing AI is necessary but its pitfalls cannot be ignored, which is why the EU’s efforts to introduce regulations are commendable.

AI can be a powerful tool for human improvement but it can also lead to doomsday scenarios if applied wrongly.

Finding the balance between embracing technological innovation and taming its excesses is not easy, especially in a field that is developing rapidly… but it can be done.

However, regulation will not be enough. AI has the potential of impacting employment. Some jobs will become obsolete and workers will have to be retrained, reskilled or helped to transition into completely different sectors.

This puts the onus on the education system to get up to scratch and prepare students for a different world. It is a tall order but with the educational authorities currently carrying out a consultation process to develop a national education strategy, they would do well to keep AI and its impact on society, students and learning in mind.