AI Is Baking In Political Bias

There has been a lot of talk about the potential impact of Artificial Intelligence on our society in the future. 

People are worried about everything from loss of employment for biologicals like us to the potential extinction of the human race. 

Recent layoffs at UPS and PayPal seem to indicate that White Collar workers will be feeling the pinch, and given AI’s business possibilities that is utterly unsurprising to me.

PayPal lays off 2,500 as AI begins to replace jobs and boost profits @BruceC_Inc https://t.co/qTIXM5933j

— Inc. (@Inc) February 1, 2024

Frankly, I have no idea what impact AI will have, but I do know at least one impact its creators are hoping for: the entrenchment of Left-wing ideology in Western society. 

I have written before about how politically biased ChatGPT is, and Jazz has written many articles about its potential to change our lives. But as Jazz plays with it much more than I, it makes sense for me to defer to him on most matters. 

It isn’t just ChatGPT. It is Google and Microsoft as well. 

Greg Lukianoff of FIRE testified before the House Weaponization of Government Committee about this very issue, labeling it the most disturbing of the many concerns that people have about AI. 

WATCH: @RepArmstrongND asked @glukianoff what his greatest concern with AI is as it relates to censorship on college campuses. pic.twitter.com/3nbtwJbVi1

— Weaponization Committee (@Weaponization) February 6, 2024

The problem isn’t even subtle. In this case, ChatGPT was asked to speak highly of politicians on the Committee and it was happy to do so for Democrats but declined to praise Republicans. 

This mirrors my own experience from last year when I asked the AI about Trump, Hillary Clinton, AOC and others. ChatGPT was happy to be effusive about the liberals but refused to say nice things about conservatives. It claimed that it wanted to stay away from controversial politicians, but in itself this revealed its bias: AOC and Clinton apparently aren’t controversial politicians. 

AI is creeping into our lives everywhere, and the actual chatbots are just the tip of the iceberg. Internet searches, for instance, are now often driven by AI, and as noted the management practices of companies are being taken over as well. 

AI is a huge growth industry. As Big Tech downsizes, it keeps pouring billions into its AI research and implementation. 

The drumbeat of job cuts in the tech industry continued when DocuSign became the latest company to announce layoffs this year, as Silicon Valley signals its intention to keep a grip on costs while pouring more cash into AI https://t.co/EQ3BhhRjmB https://t.co/EQ3BhhRjmB

— The Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) February 6, 2024

The implications are mind-blowing. Corporations and governments can hide changes in internal policies by simply baking ideology into the algorithms. No need to distribute memos, risk Zoom calls that can get recorded, or take risks to push an agenda. 

All it will take is some programmers in the background giving the AI some Left-wing propaganda in its training program. 

It’s happening already, as Lukianoff demonstrated in his testimony. 

In the past, it took entire bureaucracies and secret police to impose a totalitarian ideology on society. Now all it takes is some government regulations and some training material pushed into the massive stack of reading that the AI models ingest. 

AI is already a massive tool being used by the “disinformation complex.” AI can comb through what people say at blazing speed and target individuals and ideas for cancellation. 

WATCH: @katesrichardson with the @DailyCaller testifies about the threat of artificial intelligence and censorship ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/JRZPDMr1FU

— Weaponization Committee (@Weaponization) February 6, 2024

It is Orwellian. And I don’t see how we can stop it. 

“The Weaponization of the National Science Foundation: How NSF is Funding the Development of Automated Tools to Censor Online Speech ‘At Scale’ and Trying to Cover Up its Actions.”

Read our latest @Weaponization report: https://t.co/2WcP6TFhPX

— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) February 6, 2024