California Governor Gavin Newsom recently vetoed the state Senate bill designed to make AI safer.
Part of his reasoning was that the bill was too narrow, focusing only on large scale, expensive artificial intelligence (AI), and not addressing less expensive, smaller implementations the bill, which might provide consumers with a false sense of security about AI.
Newsom's other reason for the veto was that it would stymie competition in Silicon Valley. Big tech companies, including Google and Meta, have been virulently opposed to this law, and indeed, any regulatory oversight. Plus, Newsom has a cozy relationship with many of these companies.
There are seven ways AI could result in the end of the world. You can look them up. Most likely is a failure of critical infrastructure. A U.S. Congressional Commission found that a failure of the electrical grid could result in the death of 90% of the population by starvation, disease and societal collapse.
Well, given these risks, is it really sensible to allow the AI industry to continue to operate without any safeguards, just because the tech bros in California say they know what's best for us? We don't let the nuclear industry police itself, and AI is exponentially more dangerous.
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