One way we absolutely know AI is BS
If Trump’s all for it it’s gotta be bad.
The Trump administration is planning to use artificial intelligence to write federal transportation regulations, according to U.S. Department of Transportation records and interviews with six agency staffers…
Discussion of the plan continued among agency leadership last week, according to meeting notes reviewed by ProPublica. Gregory Zerzan, the agency’s general counsel, said at that meeting that President Donald Trump is “very excited about this initiative.” Zerzan seemed to suggest that the DOT was at the vanguard of a broader federal effort, calling the department the “point of the spear” and “the first agency that is fully enabled to use AI to draft rules.”
…The December presentation left some DOT staffers deeply skeptical. Rulemaking is intricate work, they said, requiring expertise in the subject at hand as well as in existing statutes, regulations and case law. Mistakes or oversights in DOT regulations could lead to lawsuits or even injuries and deaths in the transportation system. Some rule writers have decades of experience. But all that seemed to go ignored by the presenter, attendees said. “It seems wildly irresponsible,” said one, who, like the others, requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the matter.
(ProPublica)
People have talked about Trump pushing AI to help him consolidate power. I think that fundamentally it’s a lot more simple than that, among other things because Trump’s not capable of higher-level thinking and planning. They’re flattering him, sucking up to him, and most of all, bribing him. And, as an aside, Gavin Newsom would likely be just about as agreeable to anything the right-wing Big Tech billionaires want to shove up our butts, and without needing the flattery or bribes.
On a related matter:
After interviews, focus groups, and consultations with over 500 students, teachers, parents, education leaders, and technologists across 50 countries, a close review of over 400 studies, and a Delphi panel, we find that at this point in its trajectory, the risks of utilizing generative AI in children’s education overshadow its benefits. This is largely because the risks of AI differ in nature from its benefits—that is, these risks undermine children’s foundational development—and may prevent the benefits from being realized.
(Brookings)
From what I’ve seen Trump hasn’t been pushing a grand AI takeover of schools, yet. But at some point the wrong people will likely get his attention – again, with flattery, sucking up, and bribes – and the AI in schools crowd will get any executive orders and so forth that they want. Won’t that be wonderful.
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