Prioritise human values in AI
In the media
'There’s little critical reflection on AI and the direction it’s taking,' says Reijer Passchier, Professor of Digitalisation and the Democratic Rule of Law at the OU and Assistant Professor of Constitutional Law in Leiden, in an opinion piece in ‘de Volkskrant’.
Passchier is responding to a recent call in de Volkskrant by various AI experts, including Jelle Prins and others, for greater investments in AI. This is needed to prevent the Netherlands from becoming too dependent on American tech companies and to help us catch up with developments abroad.
Instead of putting the technology at the heart of the AI debate, Passchier says the discussion should focus on who controls the technology and the values it is serving. We shouldn’t blindly adopt the technocentric Silicon Valley ideology. The economic benefits of manufacturing in the services sector cannot be refuted. Who will safeguard people's security of livelihood when work becomes scarcer due to AI, and when the wealth generated by labour increasingly flows to capital as a result of AI? How will we deal with mass surveillance? How do we prevent AI in Europe from falling back into the hands of a small elite? These are among the questions that arise in the AI debate, in which Passchier calls for 'freeing us from current digital colonialism' and encouraging critical thinking.