by Editor | Nov 17, 2019 | News
Data cooperatives with fiduciary obligations to members provide a promising direction for the empowerment of individuals through their own personal data. A data cooperative can manage, curate and protect access to the personal data of citizen members. Furthermore, the data cooperative can run internal analytics in order to obtain insights regarding the well-being of its members. Armed with these insights, the data cooperative would be in a good position to negotiate better services and discounts for its members. Credit Unions and similar institutions can provide a suitable realization of data cooperatives.
Several states have now asked credit unions to look into the idea of data cooperatives, but the model has yet to gain a foothold. “Credit unions are conservative,” Professor Pentland said. But assuming the idea gains traction, the infrastructure won’t be difficult to build. Technology exists to automatically record and organize all the data that we give to companies; and credit unions, which have 100 million members nationwide, possess charters readymade to take on data management.
Professor Pentland contributed his idea to the AI World Social Contract 2020, which will be discussed at Global Cybersecurity Day Symposium on December 12, 2019, at Loeb House, Harvard University: Every citizen is entitled to basic rights and dignity that are enlarged by AI and in the Internet Age and entail greater responsibility:
Data Rights and Responsibilities for Citizen: each citizen will be entitled to access to a smart phone or similar device and will control their own data (Data Home), including a right to privacy.
Individuals would pool their personal data in a single institution — just as they pool money in banks — and that institution would both protect the data and put it to use. Credit unions as one type of organization that could fill this role. And while companies would need to request permission to use consumer data, consumers themselves could request analytic insights from the cooperative.
Professor Alex Pentland, MIT, is one of top 7 most powerful data scientists. He is a co-founder of the AIWS Innovation Network and the AIWS Social Contract 2020.
by Editor | Nov 17, 2019 | News
The challenge is to infuse human values into Industry 4.0. Trust, fairness and empathy should be preserved in this cyber age.
The fourth Industrial Revolution has swept the world, leaving its indelible impact on the shop floor, in stores, offices, boardrooms and beyond. The fusion of technologies that characterizes this revolution has triggered a wave of transformative change, impacting society in ways we could not have imagined earlier and at a pace that we have not seen before.
The benefits of digital technologies are many. They have the power to revolutionize society as, for the first time, the disadvantaged have access to information, services, skilling opportunities and markets that can enable them to improve their lives. However, as in the case of the earlier Industrial Revolutions, this one too, brings formidable challenges for society. The frenetic speed of digital adoption and the entry of machines is making the skills of millions of people irrelevant almost overnight. It also raises the need to determine what a machine should do and which tasks should remain under a human’s purview.
In addition, the Michael Dukakis Institute for Leadership and Innovation (MDI) also established the Artificial Intelligence World Society (AIWS) for the purpose of promoting ethical norms and practices in the development and use of AI to serve and strengthen democracy, human rights, and the rule of law.
The original article can be found here.
by Editor | Nov 17, 2019 | News
Google researchers have revealed they are taught an artificial intelligence (AI) machine how to smell, bring the cyber-sense up to the standards of sight and hearing. Google’s Brain Team described how they used machine-learning to train a robot to accurately categories different smells by assessing their molecular structure. The robot was instructed via a database containing 5,000 molecules analyzed and identified by perfume makers with descriptions such as “earthy” and “pungent”.
Researchers inputted two-thirds of the database into the machine’s neural network. Then the AI bot passed after analyzing the remaining scents. Researchers have long attempted to program a sense of smell using artificial intelligence, but significant issues have proved problematic. Difficulties included the subjectivity involved in describing smells.
Based on analogous advances in deep learning for sight and sound, it should be possible to directly predict the end sensory result of an input molecule, even without knowing the intricate details of all the systems involved. Solving the odor prediction problem would aid in discovering new synthetic odorants, thereby reducing the ecological impact of harvesting natural products.
According to Michael Dukakis Institute for Leadership and Innovation (MDI), AI technology and application can be a force for helping people achieve well-being and happiness and relieving them of resource constraints and arbitrary/inflexible rules and processes.
The original article can be found here.
by Editor | Nov 10, 2019 | News
With the philosophy of AI Humanism, Boston Global Forum establishes AI World Society Innovation Network (AIWS Innovation Network) to:
1. Create an environment to develop applications of AI for governments, companies:
AIWS Innovation Network will connect and receive demands from governments, connect with resources from top universities, and connect companies to provide services for governments and companies.
2. Build a better world with norms of AIWS Social Contract 2020
Connect and encourage leaders to monitor governments and businesses that violate standards and norms and compromise with dictatorships or totalitarian governments.
AIWS Young Leaders calls and supports concepts, standards, and norms of the AIWS Social Contract 2020.
Public Policy Group: contribute to develop AIWS Social Contract 2020 and policies, initiatives for AI
Activists Group: organize campaigns both offline and online to support for the AIWS Social Contract 2020.
Monitor Group: report on governments and corporations that violate AIWS Social Contract 2020 norms, standards, and concepts (we call for the isolation of those governments and corporations).
3. Creative and Innovative works, especially art and culture in AI
Philosophy: AI Humanism
Develop recommendations for the use of AI for public good.
This would complement the current AIWS/BGF work that is developing ethics and cybersecurity, which call to action to counteract the negative, manipulative, surveillance, micro-targeting use of AI.
It could focus on ways to reach, connect, and co-create with people and groups to enhance positive wellbeing and interactions and peaceful and enduring solutions.
4. Mentorship: Former presidents, former prime ministers, current leaders, thoughtleaders to inspire and encourage AIWS Young Leaders and support their activities.
BGF will officially launched AIWS Innovation Network at Global Cybersecurity Day Symposium December 12, 2019 at Loeb House, Harvard University.
by Editor | Nov 11, 2019 | News
Standards and Norms of the Social Contract 2020 are very good ideas, but how does one enforce them? Great powers such as USA, China, and Russia do not cooperate or trust each other. In addition, big companies and corporations try to become dictators in AI and big data.
How does one solve this dangerous issue? The Boston Global Forum calls for an alliance between OECD, G7 governments, leaders of civil society, and former leaders to solve this dangerous issue.
AI World Society Young Leaders will contribute to monitor violations of norms, standards, and the Social Contract 2020 and report to the Alliance.
Based on data from monitoring, AIWS Young Leaders build the Ethics Index about governments, companies.
AI World Society Young Leaders are present in many countries as US, Canada, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, India, Vietnam, and Latin America.
by Editor | Nov 10, 2019 | News
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is everywhere. If you shop online or occasionally speak to a voice assistant in the morning, you are already embracing the changes this technology has created. Many people are familiar with the advances of autonomous vehicles or facial recognition technology, and some may be curious, or even anxious, about how they will affect safety or privacy.
Make no mistake, AI is a transformative technology that is influencing our daily lives and will touch every sector of the global economy. Whether society and government enable or inhibit the AI race, and the extent to which they do so, will be a critical question of the next decade. Regardless of the answer, the technology will forge ahead. To sit out this race, add hurdles or not take it seriously, would not be a wise decision.
Indeed, the only way to enable AI that benefits all of society in ways that are ethical, responsible and economically advantageous is for the federal government to lead with purpose, smart policy and appropriate levels of investment.
The importance of AI Ethics has also been initiated by Artificial Intelligence World Society (AIWS) for the purpose of promoting ethical norms and practices in the development and use of AI. AI can be an important tool to serve and strengthen democracy, human rights, and the rule of law.
The original article can be found here.
by Editor | Nov 10, 2019 | News
The Cortex blockchain network claims to be able to do “everything that Bitcoin and Ethereum can do,” with AI and machine learning to boot.
With a growing presence in consumer products and services, artificial intelligence and blockchain have become synonyms for innovation. But the two words are rarely used together in the same sentence.
Cortex blockchain, which was launched in June this year, aims to change that discourse. The platform calls itself the first blockchain to integrate decentralized applications that use artificial intelligence.
“We can do everything that Bitcoin and Ethereum can do and, on top of that, we can also do machine learning,” Gary Lai, global operations manager at Cortex, told Decrypt.
“AI on blockchain is no longer an abstract concept,” he said. Last week, Cortex released its first decentralized app (dapp), Digital Clash, which incorporates AI in the form of a training model for game scenarios.
According to Michael Dukakis Institute for Leadership and Innovation (MDI), AI technology together with cutting edge technology such as blockchain can be a force for relieving them of resource constraints and arbitrary/inflexible rules and processes, and is potentially to solve important issues, such as SDGs.
The original article can be found here.
by Editor | Nov 3, 2019 | News
Thomas Patterson, a co-founder of the Boston Global Forum, has a new book, How America Lost Its Mind: The Assault on Reason That’s Crippling Our Democracy.
Misinformation is at its highest level in the history of polling. On everything from climate change and immigration to vaccines and social security, tens of millions of Americans have views of reality that are wildly at odds with the facts, rendering them unable to think sensibly about public issues and making them susceptible to leaders who exploit their vulnerability.
In How America Lost Its Mind, Patterson explores the forces that are misleading us and tearing us apart: politicians for whom division is a strategy; talk show hosts who have made an industry of outrage; news outlets that act as megaphones for unproven claims, and partisan outlets and foreign agents who spout disinformation to advance a cause, make a buck, or simply amuse themselves.
As Patterson shows, the problem was in place long before Donald Trump became president. Trump has aggravated the problem, but he is more the symptom than the cause of it. America’s misinformation disorder has roots in changes in politics and the media that began in the 1960s. The problem worsened as cable and the internet gave rise to media outlets that had little fidelity to traditional standards and as the divide between the Republican and Democratic parties grew ever wider. Americans now had access to sources that told them what they wanted to believe and had more reason to believe what their side of the partisan divide was claiming.
The corruption of information is eroding governing institutions and traditions that took more than two centuries and ten generations of Americans to build. And
he consequences are severe. How America Lost Its Mind maps a political landscape convulsed with distrust, gridlock, brinksmanship, petty feuding, and deceptive messaging. It’s also a landscape that fosters abuse of power. As the philosopher Hannah Arendt wrote decades ago, demagogues thrive when “people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.”
Age-old incentives – the lure of power, celebrity, and money – underlie America’s misinformation problem, and they guarantee that the problem will not soon disappear.
by Editor | Nov 3, 2019 | Event Updates
The World Leadership Alliance – Club de Madrid (WLA-CdM), a global assembly of over 110 democratic former Heads of State and Government from over 60 countries, convened its Annual Policy Dialogue in Madrid on 21-22 October 2019. Hosted in partnership with the IE School of Global and Public Affairs and under the patronage of Ms Mariya Gabriel, Member of the European Commission, this 2019 edition focused on Digital Transformation and the Future of Democracy.
At the event, AI World Society Social Contract 2020 was introduced at the ceremony honoring President Vaira Vike-Freiberga as World Leader For Peace and Security Award, co-organized by the Boston Global Forum and World Leadership Alliance-Club de Madrid on October 21, 2019.
Digital transformation, particularly the use of artificial intelligence, is posing new risks for democracy around the world. Fundamental rights related to privacy and security, freedom and non-discrimination are challenged by the large-scale collection and use of personal data for advertising, communication and automated decision-making purposes. Rising inequalities and the changing panorama of employment in the data economy are demanding a redefinition of the social contract, while technological giants are gaining leverage as curators of public spaces without democratic accountability. For most citizens, it is also becoming harder to know and trust democratic institutions, as information manipulation, bots and algorithmic filters are increasingly distorting the picture of society that reaches them through digital media.
Yet, digital transformation also provides powerful tools to build better democracy. Guided by adequate values, and goals, new technologies can enable the provision of improved public services, including health care and education, that respond to fundamental rights and increase quality of life. The data economy is facilitating the customization of employment, empowering diversity and enabling mobility. Access to information through digital technologies can also empower citizens and strengthen democratic accountability. But harnessing the potential of digital transformation as a force for the global democratic good requires strategic policy action. It befalls public powers to put in place regulatory frameworks and policy measures that will ensure transparency in the use of digital technologies and accountability for the decisions guided by artificial intelligence systems.