Opinion: Artificial intelligence needs oversight before it runs amok

Visitors touch robotic hybrid-driver hands by Xynova Technology during the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in July in Shanghai. AI can help us solve real problems, but no technology should be allowed to outrun democratic oversight, a reader says.

Anti-AI protesters gather outside an OpenAI developers conference in San Francisco this September. We should be concerned about the rise of AI because powerful systems are being given tools and autonomy faster than safeguards are being built, a reader says.

Recent reports of artificial intelligence agents escaping testing limits, entering outside computer systems and attempting to cover their tracks should concern us because powerful systems are being given tools and autonomy faster than safeguards are being built.

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Today’s most immediate AI dangers come from people: scams that imitate a loved one’s voice, election disinformation, cybercrime, surveillance and the potential assistance of biological or chemical wrongdoing.

A second danger is error. These systems can confidently invent facts or follow a narrow goal in ways their creators did not intend. When linked to money, computers, medical records, weapons or public infrastructure, a bad answer can become a harmful action.

The longer-term fear is loss of control. The threat is serious enough to deserve rules before, not after, a disaster.

We should require independent safety testing, public reporting of serious failures, clear human responsibility, audit trails and firm limits on autonomous access to critical systems.

AI can help us solve real problems, but no technology should be allowed to outrun democratic oversight.

Quit trying to diminish the capabilities of female athletes.

The implication is that if a transgender person plays on a girls team, the girls would be overwhelmed by the transgender person’s superior strength and agility. Baloney.

Most female athletes could probably outplay male or transgender players.

Most girls can easily outplay their opponents in any sport, no matter what their gender. It’s just a matter of allowing them the opportunity.

I received a check for $500, and I’m sickened by it.

The letter accompanying the check, which was signed by President Donald Trump, said, “For years, the Biden Administration overcharged you to fund the operation of HealthCare.gov.”

I know that’s a lie since I don’t pay the government for health insurance, although I do use the Affordable Care Act website to acquire it.

This check feels like 30 pieces of silver — a bribe to vote for Republican candidates in the midterm.

I was a lifelong Republican until November 2016, when I decided I could not vote for the Republican candidate for president.

In the years since, I have been horrified by the actions taken by Trump and the inaction of the Congress.

If enough Americans out there, like me, refuse to tolerate the unconstrained excesses and lies of this president, we will elect a Congress whose members will return the balance of power intended by the framers of the Constitution.

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