Melinda French Gates explains why she is ‘very nervous’ about AI

Melinda French Gates, the former wife of billionaire Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, is worried about artificial intelligence. 

The co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation – one of the world’s largest non-profits – said Friday that she was “very nervous” about the potential for bias in the foundations of the field.

“I’m very nervous because we don’t have enough women, again, who are computer scientists and who have expertise in artificial intelligence, And, without that, we will bake bias into the system,” she said in a CNN interview. “Again, the system needs to take all peoples’ points of view in and see society and, quite frankly, see the world writ large as it is.”

“When you have women at any of these places, when you’re creating something, when you’re making this decision, when you’re setting a law, you’re bringing that perspective of society that is just so vitally important,” Gates noted. 

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Gates said in the interview that “women should have their full power and influence in the United States.” 

“I’m just seeing that we aren’t there yet,” she said. “Too often, we have decisions being made for women, not by women.” 

Gates said one of those examples was the June 2022 reversal of Roe v. Wade, stating Americans believe the law should be in place. 

“So, to me, it was a decision, again, where – a decision made for women, not by women,” she noted. “We should never roll back a law like that that has to do with women’s health.” 

Gates said the government shouldn’t be involved in that decision. 

In a recent op-ed published in Time, Gates said she is “stepping up [her] investments in systems-wide efforts to build women’s political power.”