Can we trust AI?
AI’s impact on the environment
By default, the generation of new technologies has an environmental impact. Training a large language model just once involves the emission of much more carbon than a car does over its lifetime. However, AI can also bring benefits, such as empowering the monitoring of compliance with climate-related treaties.
AI’s impact on health
The use of AI in healthcare could see revolutionary treatments for patients as long as algorithmic biases in datasets can be managed and AI technologies are integrated into existing systems with careful planning.
AI in medicine is an exciting new frontier and researchers are working out how to safeguard its use and build wellbeing into AI technologies.
AI’s impact on society
AI is set to influence every aspect of our lives. With that comes a need for public policy overseeing the ethics and governance of AI implementation and use.
The ease of access to the Internet, combined with the ability through AI technologies to generate fake content at scale and push personalised propaganda, threatens democracy.
On the upside, AI technology is also exposing biases in the political system, which may result in some institutions of democracy becoming fairer and more transparent than before.
AI’s impact on governance
AI tools can attract bad players as well as good. Good governance plays a critical role in overseeing legal, ethical and technical considerations to ensure that AI technologies are used for the benefit of society.
Academia has an integral role to play in good governance. Researchers can give policymakers the knowledge to make evidence-based decisions about such technologies as generative AI and what is to follow so that they can draw up sound policies.