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Steven Pinker shares his "relentless optimism" about human progress
If you follow the news closely, chances are your view of the state of the world is not super optimistic. From war in Ukraine to a warming planet to global poverty and hunger, there's plenty to get upset about. But what if things are actually getting...better? That's what Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker asks in his interview with Ian Bremmer for the latest episode of GZERO World.
"If you compare the number of wars and the number of people killed in wars in the sixties and the seventies and even the eighties, we're actually much better off today" Pinker argues. "And so if you don't look at data, if you look at headlines, since as long as bad things haven't vanished from the face of the earth, which they never will, you can get the impression that things are unchanged or even are worse than ever, even when they're improving. It's only when you count the number of wars, number of deaths in war, longevity, child mortality, extreme poverty, number of leisure hours, that you see that there actually has been improvement. "
Watch the GZERO World episode: Is life better than ever for the human race?
Catch GZERO World with Ian Bremmer every week at gzeromedia.com/gzeroworld and on US public television. Check local listings.
- Podcast: The case for global optimism with Steven Pinker ›
- Why is America punching below its weight on happiness? ›
- Is life better than ever for the human race? ›
- Why human beings are so easily fooled by AI, psychologist Steven Pinker explains ›
- Ian Explains: Will biotech breakthroughs lead to super humans? - GZERO Media ›
- Podcast: Tracking the rapid rise of human-enhancing biotech with Siddhartha Mukherjee - GZERO Media ›
- From CRISPR to cloning: The science of new humans - GZERO Media ›
- Yuval Noah Harari: AI is a “social weapon of mass destruction” to humanity - GZERO Media ›
Digital natives: Redefining youth digital literacy
Contrary to the common notion that today's young people are inherently digital-savvy due to their exposure to technology, chief innovation officer of USAID, Mohamed Abdel-Kader says that simply knowing how to navigate social media or use a smartphone does not equate to digital literacy. In a recent GZERO livestream presented by Visa, Abdel-Kader expressed how young people are not innately able to understand the broader implications of their digital actions, including being aware of the consequences of their online posts, critically evaluating information discovered, and navigating a digital world of “fake news.”
Education is the key, says Abdel-Kader. Digital education is essential to prepare the youth for the ever-evolving digital age, to equip the next generation to be active but responsible participants in the growing digital world.
To hear more about the challenges and opportunities that nation-states face when it comes to digitization, and how it could shape a more inclusive and resilient future, watch the full livestream here:
What Ukraine's digital revolution teaches the world
- What Ukraine's digital revolution teaches the world ›
- The Graphic Truth: Twitter doesn't rule the social world ›
- Exclusive GZERO/Maru Poll: With hate speech rising, Americans want a crackdown on social media ›
- Empowering small businesses in the digital age ›
- The weaknesses of a digital economy - GZERO Media ›
Be very scared of AI + social media in politics
Why is artificial intelligence a geopolitical risk?
It has the potential to disrupt the balance of power between nations. AI can be used to create new weapons, automate production, and increase surveillance capabilities, all of which can give certain countries an advantage over others. AI can also be used to manipulate public opinion and interfere in elections, which can destabilize governments and lead to conflict.
Your author did not write the above paragraph. An AI chatbot did. And the fact that the chatbot is so candid about the political mayhem it can unleash is quite troubling.
No wonder, then, that AI, powered by social media, is Eurasia Group’s No. 3 top risk for 2023. (Fun fact: The title, “Weapons of Mass Disruption,” was also generated in seconds by a ChatGPT bot.)
How big a threat to democracy is AI? Well, bots can't (yet) meddle in elections or peddle fake news to influence public opinion on their own. But authoritarians, populists, and opportunists can deploy AI to help do both of these things better and faster.
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. relied heavily on his troll army on TikTok to win the votes of young Filipinos in the 2022 election. Automating the process with bots would allow him, or any politician with access to AI, to cast a wider net and leap into viral conversations almost immediately on a social platform that already runs on an AI-driven algorithm.
Another problem is deepfakes, videos of people whose faces or bodies are altered to make them appear as if they are someone else, typically intended for political disinformation (check out Jordan Peele's Obama). AI now makes them so well that they are very hard to spot. Indeed, DARPA — the same Pentagon agency that brought us the internet — is perfecting its own deepfakes in order to develop tech to help detect what’s real and what’s fake.
Still, the "smarter" AI gets at propagating lies on social media, and the more widespread its use by shameless politicians, the more dangerous AI becomes. By the time viral content is proven to be fake, it might already be too late.
Imagine, let's say, that supporters of Narendra Modi, India's Hindu nationalist PM, want to fire up the base by fanning sectarian flames. If AI can help them create a half-decent deepfake video of Muslims slaughtering a cow — a sacred animal for Hindus — that spreads fast enough, the anger might boil over before people check if the clip is real, if they even trust someone at all to independently verify it.
AI can also disrupt politics by getting bots to do stuff that only humans, however flawed, should. Indeed, automating the political decision-making process "can lead to biased outcomes and the potential for abuse of power," the bot explains.
That’s happening right now in China, an authoritarian state that dreams of dominating AI and is already using the tech in court. Once the robot judges are fully in sync with Beijing's Orwellian social credit system, it wouldn’t be a stretch for them to rule against people who've criticized Xi Jinping on social media.
So, what, if anything, can democratic governments do about this before AI ruins everything? The bot has some thoughts.
"Governments can protect democracy from artificial intelligence by regulating the use of AI, ensuring that it is used ethically and responsibly," it says. "This could include setting standards for data collection and usage, as well as ensuring that AI is not used to manipulate or influence public opinion."
Okay, but who should be doing the regulating, and how? For years, the UN has been working on a so-called digital Geneva Convention that would set global rules to govern cyberspace, including AI. But the talks have been bogged down by (surprise!) Russia, whose president, Vladimir Putin, warned way back in 2017 that the nation that leads in AI will rule the world.
Governments, the bot adds, “should also ensure that AI is transparent and accountable, and that its use is monitored and evaluated. Finally, [they] should ensure that AI is used to benefit society, rather than to undermine it."
The bot raises a fair point: AI can also do a lot of good for humanity. A good example is how machine learning can help make us live healthier and longer by detecting diseases earlier and improving certain surgeries.
But, as Eurasia Group's report underscores, "that's the thing with revolutionary technologies, from the printing press to nuclear fission and the internet — their power to drive human progress is matched by their ability to amplify humanity's most destructive tendencies."
- AI at the tipping point: danger to information, promise for creativity - GZERO Media ›
- Senator Mitt Romney on Tiktok: shut it down - GZERO Media ›
- Can the US stay ahead of China on AI? - GZERO Media ›
- Toxic social media & American divisiveness - GZERO Media ›
- Politics, trust & the media in the age of misinformation - GZERO Media ›
- Podcast: The past, present and future of political media - GZERO Media ›
- Can we trust AI to tell the truth? - GZERO Media ›
- Ian Bremmer: Algorithms are now shaping human beings' behavior - GZERO Media ›
- How AI can be used in public policy: Anne Witkowsky - GZERO Media ›
- AI's role in the Israel-Hamas war so far - GZERO Media ›
- UK AI Safety Summit brings government leaders and AI experts together - GZERO Media ›
- AI in the hands of evil masterminds - GZERO Media ›
- How is the world tackling AI, Davos' hottest topic? - GZERO Media ›
- This year's Davos is different because of the AI agenda, says Charter's Kevin Delaney - GZERO Media ›
- Podcast: Talking AI: Sociologist Zeynep Tufekci explains what's missing in the conversation - GZERO Media ›
Trump’s comeback tour
Donald Trump may have lost the 2020 election, but his greatest hits still draw a big crowd.
Watch more PUPPET REGIME!
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Social media’s responsibility in American politics
Former US Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes argues that one of the biggest issues in American political discourse at the moment is the lack of regulation on social media platforms. Americans believe fake news, not because they are all crazy, but because this information is being effectively presented to them as though it is fact. Biden should work with Big Tech to regulate social media, Rhodes tells Ian Bremmer on GZERO World, because the situation is worsening. "Part of what's different is the way in which social media and technology has literally made it possible for a very large chunk of this country to live in an alternative reality."
Watch the episode: Is American democracy in danger?
On Dr. Seuss and cancel culture
Ian Bremmer's Quick Take:
Hey everybody. Ian Bremmer here. Welcome to your week, life looking better every day in the United States, coronavirus land. But I thought I'd talk about, this week, all of this cancel culture that everyone's talking about right now. If you're on the wrong political side, your opponents are trying to shut you down and you take massive umbrage. I see this everywhere, and it's starting to annoy.
Last week, maybe, the biggest story was about Dr. Seuss and the fact that a few books were taken down, no longer being published by the Seuss Foundation, the publisher of those books, because of ethnic and racial stereotypes that were promoted in those books from decades and decades ago. Publishers in the private sector have the right to publish whatever they do and don't want that they have intellectual property control over. One thing that seemed silly on the back of it was all of these people then deciding to spend massive amounts of money, pushing Dr. Seuss to the top of the charts, for a whole bunch of books that were not getting canceled, that were still being published, money of which would be going to the same publisher that had decided to cancel the few books in the first place.
So very bizarre, and maybe makes everybody happy or everybody unhappy at the same time. But of course, the big story is that you had, then, this huge fodder for people on the left and right to come after each other. If you're on the left, of course, these books are horrible and need to be removed from the public dialogue. That of course also means that you're smearing Dr. Seuss as a whole, who, from many of our perspectives, were children's books that we grew up on and were just fine.
Then on the conservative side, you have people saying, "This is an outrage. Can you believe that they're trying to burn books and ban books? It's the beginning of authoritarianism and we're being canceled." Kevin McCarthy doing a reading of Green Eggs and Ham, which is perfectly fine, and you can still buy... A lot of people like to stand up and read perfectly innocuous Dr. Seuss books, but now there's strong politics behind it.
The problem is that any political issue, at a period of time that the United States is more politically divided, more politically dysfunctional, where political opponents are not just political opponents but are considered to be bad, fundamentally evil, means any issue that can be made into tribal warfare inside politics in the United States becomes precisely that. It drives people kind of batshit, right? We saw that with the Muppets, too. Those of you that know me know that I am a big fan of the Muppets, both as a show and puppets as a concept, so much so that it's like Hair Club For Men. I decided to become an owner.
Now, because done it back in the '70s, a lot of the skits that were done are now considered insensitive. So, Disney has decided to put a warning label on all of the Muppet shows from back then, warning of negative depictions and or mistreatment of people and cultures. To be fair, this is like the warning symbol that you see on your McDonald's apple pie that contents are indeed hot and could hurt you. It's because the United States is an incredibly litigious society and overly litigious society. This is corporate speak for, please don't sue us. We've done what we needed to do," but anybody that wants to watch the Muppets can still watch the Muppets.
It should not be a big deal, but of course you see Donald Trump Jr. coming out and saying, "They're banning the Muppets," and all of these other folks on the right saying, "How dare they. How can they possibly be banning the Muppets?" Which, of course, no one is actually doing. So, you see how we have a lot of folks' partisan ship on the right going crazy about cancel culture.
But what about on the left? Yeah, it's happening on the left, too. I saw this last week when Governor Abbott in Texas came out and said he's opening everything. So, 100% businesses are being open and no more mask mandate, which struck me as... I understand the business opening because there is an economic tradeoff between opening businesses and having quarantines, and when people are getting vaccinated, there's a much greater move in favor of economic openings. But saying you're ending the mask mandate is stupid and just playing politics. So, I was annoyed about that.
But then I saw people with millions of followers from the left on social media, like Michael Moore and Keith Olbermann, who were so angry with Abbott that they said, "This is Texas, and you see what they're like in Texas. If that's the way you feel well, then we shouldn't be sending Texas any vaccines." Who the hell is we? We're Americans. First of all, Texas is a diverse state that has both Democrats and Republicans. It's increasingly purple. It's not red or blue. Even if it was red, everybody needs vaccines. The entire country is rolling vaccines out and it's really important for us to do that in the US and do it around the world.
But there is such incredible dysfunction psychologically in this us versus them, bad versus good, black versus white, that you have partisans that have just lost their minds, that have lost their humanity in the spirit of being on the same team. The one that bothered me from the left the most in the last week was about CPAC. Some of you may have seen that when the CPAC Conference occurred down in Orlando, Florida at the Hyatt hotel, there was a stage and the design of the stage looked like, design-wise, a rune. They're not the swastika, but a rune that was worn by some Nazi officers.
Of course, everybody on the left goes crazy. Not everybody. A lot of people on the left go crazy, that it must've been intentional, this is a dog whistle for white nationalists and white supremacists. So, you have people with significant followings on the internet intranet saying that this is a Nazi support, and that you should be banning the GOP and banning Hyatt, which was hosting all of us. Alyssa Milano, with well over three million followers on Twitter, saying, "Hyatt is totally fine hosting Nazis. Boycott Hyatt."
Of course, anyone could understand that this was vastly overdone. This is conspiracy thinking that no one is doing research into figuring out what the actual stage looks like and this obscure rune from the Nazi-era Germany. Then we find out, we get the actual facts, which is it was a design, an event design company, that came up with the stage design for a fairly awkward space to do something that large. Company was called Design Foundry based in Maryland. Small company, 98%, more than 98%, of their political donations from their employees in the last year went to Democrats, not Republicans. They were the ones that came up with the design and they apologized.
The GOP said they're not going to use them for further events and all of that. Well, you would think on the back of that that, of course, Alyssa and others are going to take down their posts and they're going to say, "We got it wrong," and apologize. No, no. As of today, that post is still up there with thousands and thousands of retweets saying to boycott Hyatt, and Hyatt losing money on the back of this.
A small piece of advice if anyone sees this, post this out for Alyssa. Alyssa, do them a favor. Go stay at a Hyatt and take a post of yourself at the Hyatt and tell your fans the next time they're going to a hotel, they should stay at a Hyatt. Why? Because you caused economic damage out of political lunacy. It was completely wrong. It was completely without merit. They did nothing wrong. This is hurtful. It's hurtful to the country. It's hurtful to the corporation, but most importantly, it's hurtful to us. It's hurtful to the people who are no longer looking at each other as human beings, but instead as political sport, as scoring a point.
It doesn't matter if more of this is being done by one side or the other. What matters is that it's lunacy. It's fake news. It's not facts. It's conspiracy thinking. It's really going to cause much more damage to our polity, something that, I think, deeply, we all still want to believe in, and we want to make better.
So that is my little rant for today, for Monday, for kicking off the week. I hope everyone does well, and increasingly we aren't going to need to avoid people. Just a little bit longer. Looking forward to that. Take it easy. Be good.
Activists question Malaysia's clampdown on spoof sites
KUALA LUMPUR - The shutting down of parody Twitter accountBermanaTV has raised concerns among human rights groups in Malaysia, which claim that the suspension of parodical and satirical sites fits thealarming pattern of increased censorship and restrictions on freedom of expression by the Malaysian government.
Twitter suspends Thai royalist account linked to influence campaign
There were tens of thousands of tweets appeared to be from accounts amplifying royalist messaging.