Artificial intelligence will bring great benefits to all of humanity. But do we really want to entrust this revolutionary technology solely to a small group of US tech companies?
Silicon Valley has produced no small number of moral disappointments. Google retired its "don't be evil" pledge before firing its star ethicist. Self-proclaimed "free speech absolutist" Elon Musk bought Twitter in order to censor political speech, retaliate against journalists, and ease access to the platform for Russian and Chinese propagandists. Facebook lied about how it enabled Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election and paid a public relations firm to blame Google and George Soros instead.
These and countless other ethical lapses should prompt us to consider whether we want to give technology companies further abilities to learn our personal details and influence our day-to-day decisions. Tech companies can already access our daily whereabouts and search queries. Digital devices monitor more and more aspects of our lives: We have cameras in our homes and heartbeat sensors on our wrists sending what they detect to Silicon Valley.