THE FACT OF THE MATTER
BY PAUL HOPKINS
Three things will predominate this new year, and they are global politics — general elections, effectively — the further rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and further advances in space travel and revolutionary advances in medical science.
Over Christmas, as I watched two of my four granddaughters joyfully play away with what Santa had brought them, I began to picture how AI will play a huge role in their lives. The ‘tools’ they will use; how they will keep in touch with each other and their cousins in America. We are beginning to get a better idea of what AI can do for their coming generation — in Dublin’s Mater Hospital, last year alone 1,000 operations were carried out with the aid of AI — and, also, where the new science will need my girls as ‘co-pilots’. In short, jobs will be lost but new ones created.
Microsoft founder Bill Gates says he hopes this technology “helps reduce — and doesn’t contribute to — the awful inequities we see around the world… the power of innovation to offer every child an equal chance to survive and thrive. AI is no exception”.
Next up are general elections around the world. The UK is set to hold one, the US has a contentious presidential election in November, and the world’s most populated country, India, will vote for its next prime minister in May. If not 2024, then the following year will see our own general election. The governing of more than a quarter of the world’s population will be at stake in elections this year, including Taiwan next month and Russia in March.
This year will be the first time some of the world’s biggest democracies have held a national vote since generative AI tools went mainstream. Martina Larkin, chief executive of Project Liberty, a non-profit global alliance seeking to promote internet safety, has warned politicians were “at the top of the pyramid” when it comes to AI-driven misinformation.
Deepfakes, where high-profile figures are digitally cloned in realistic videos, are of particular concern. US President Joe Biden, opponent Donald Trump, and Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy have already repeatedly fallen victim to such clips, while in the UK Labour leader Sir Kerr Starmer’s voice was cloned for nefarious purposes. Is that really Mary Lou McDonald we’re watching spout away on the internet?
Ms Larkin said such misinformation could spread “at a much bigger scale” in the run-up to the world’s 2024’s elections. Governments are considering how to regulate the technology, but some are moving faster than others. President Biden unveiled proposals last October, mandating that AI-generated content be watermarked, while the EU has reached a deal on such, though it won’t take effect until 2025 at the earliest as the bloc holds parliamentary elections this year. Taoiseach Leo Varadkar is very much on board and has been vociferous about the matter.
The UK government has been cautious about the need for regulation, fearing it will stifle innovation.
Politically too, I see a further shift to the right in many EU countries and elsewhere. In the debate over whether liberal democracy is losing to authoritarianism, Africa also has a voice. Coups in Niger and Gabon last year have extended the retreat of democracy in Africa, where there have been eight coups since 2020.
Next up, the climate crunch. Even as global wildfires, heatwaves and hurricanes increase in frequency, a striking lack of urgency, as COP 27 showed, prevails among policymakers when it comes to tackling climate change. Moreover, decarbonisation requires the West and China to co-operate, but their geopolitical rivalry is actually deepening.
According to The Economist, 2024 will see more people go into space as paying passengers, carried afar by rival space-tourism companies. However, I believe that space travel and other matters concerning emerging technology are not going to change all of a sudden in just one year but over a longer period.
Meantime, imagine your train hurtling down a tunnel at the same speed as a jet airliner. That’s the ongoing dream of PayPal, Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk. His Hyperloop system would see commuters travel at maxed-out speed through a vacuum tube, propelled by compressed air and induction motors. A site has been chosen to begin test runs, most likely this year. Once built, the loop will carry passengers between, say, San Francisco and LA in 35 minutes, compared to 7.5 hours by train.
Finally, and sadly, we can expect global conflicts — like Ukraine and Gaza and elsewhere — to continue, with all the human suffering such entails.
