So it's subjective right? The balance.

Since a company is usually harmed by increased regulation their opinion is biased.

But there's no oppposite to this. Governments don't benefit if companies leave and in fact they lose out. This also includes the population (jobs etc) that means the opinion of the government isn't biased.

> Since a company is usually harmed by increased regulation their opinion is biased.

I know this is the prevailing point of view in business, but is it actually true? How many bank failures would have been avoided if US banking regulations hadn't been slackened so much?

When the government covers your loses and even let's you take bonuses for fucking up and causing a recission why wouldn't you think regulations slows you down.

how many guns would get sold if the government didn't created laws that protects the industry from liability.

or section 230 which shields websites from the rent seeking of the cable companies but allows them to rent seek advertisers.

Common sense is what protects gun manufacturers from liability. If you run someone over with your car, Ford is not liable either.

> How many bank failures would have been avoided if US banking regulations hadn't been slackened so much?

Most of the failures after 2000 would have been prevented. All of the 2008 financial crisis was caused by removing regulation.

Prior to Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000 [0], several states ruled that credit default swaps were insurance and thus regulated CDS as insurance. Some states ruled that CDS were gambling and regulated it as gambling. The CFMA basically said "credit default swaps are now a federal issue and it will be regulated at the federal level" and set up a poorly funded agency that had no teeth until after the bailouts in 2008.

During the 1920s, many banks got involved in both commercial banking (taking deposits and making loans) as well as investment banking (arranging IPOs). In 1933, the Glass-Steagal Act [1] said that banks may do one or the other, but cannot do both. In 1999, Glass-Steagal was later repealed by GLBA [2] as CitiCorp was doing both (due to mergers) while daring the regulators to do anything about it.

0 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodity_Futures_Modernizatio...

1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1933_Banking_Act

2 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gramm%E2%80%93Leach%E2%80%93Bl...

Regulatory moats can be pretty powerful - not sure regulations always harm all companies.

The regulation is meant to protect the EU citizens which couldn't care less about the financial incentives of a US company or their hype du jour. If hypothetically no AI can be created with respecting the citizens, what should the choice be, block or accept Skynet? (I said "hypothetically")

Suppose a new generation of AIs results in a big economy boost. Then a country might be put in a position to choose between some risks to privacy etc and a risk of being left behind.

A similar situation would be a country that in 1900 decides whether or not to outlaw cars.

Nobody outlawed cars.

There were preciously little regulations in the 1900s though. Don't you think if cars were invented today they would face a whole lot of regulations?

Cars do face a ton of regulations today. You can’t sell a car if it doesn’t meet or exceed hundreds of regulations.

1900s also had child labor and black lung. Not a standard to aspire to.

In the UK we did mandate that a pedestrian must walk in front of the car with a red flag to warn of the approaching vehicle though for a while!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_flag_traffic_laws#Red_flag...

> If hypothetically no AI can be created with respecting the citizens

The problem is you're assuming the people writing the regulations are perfect. It's not that bad AI should exist, it's that we're probably at least a decade away from regulators even having a hope of starting to understand what's going on.

Why should I assume anything? We are what we are and we do what we can with what we have - imperfect as it is. Inactivity is way worse. By the way understanding all things (AI or whatever) is definitely not a requirement for the legislators. I'm sure you remember they have hordes of specialists in their staff and those will understand the aspects at hand to sketch recommendations.

It's not legislators, although I disagree with your assessment there. The people actually doing assessments and inspections of companies do not have much expertise at all. Even for far simpler technical tasks than assessing AI.

As an EU citizen I think it's about joining SkyNet or falling behind in productivity. I prefer joining SkyNet.

If, hypothetically, a SkyNet like AI actually existed, how much damage to humanity would you be ok with as long as productivity and quality of life went up went up for those who were spared? Let's assume that you and your loved ones are among those who have been guaranteed safety by this AI.

I am sorry if the tone comes across as snarky. Not my intention. Genuinely curious.

My comment was about if it's starting to exist, EU regulatation won't stop its power and influence.

If everyone uses ChatSkyNet for programming (or even ChatGPT-4), but EU is not allowed, EU will simply lose its competitiveness in creating products.

> My comment was about if it's starting to exist, EU regulatation won't stop its power and influence.

it... might?

it possibly existing in the future is not a good reason to lay down and just surrender control of world governance to ChatGPT today

Sadly, the EU has already lost that competitiveness through many other similar regulatory situations. The real risk is not competitiveness in creating products, that's a lost battle already :( The real risk is losing competitiveness in even being able to work for the American companies that are creating products.

I am curious, do you think SkyNet, if it's really "SkyNet", can be blocked within the confines of the country in which it appears first?

And if it's not SkyNet but just an awesome tool like ChatGPT is today, do you think regulators will manage to take into consideration the advantages lost making this tool illegal while protecting us from a potential SkyNet?

> Conversely if the AI system is reasonable, but the regulations are making them illegal, then the blame is on the regulations.

have you read the EU's proposed approach to regulating AI?

https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/regulatory...

it seems to be an extremely reasonable approach to me, if anything a little too lax

the problem for OpenAI is its products can't easily be segregated into the different risk buckets...

and they want ChatGPT wired into the high risk areas as that's where the profit is

I think the proposal is reasonable provided ChatGPT is classified as moderate risk.

One thing I don't quite understand is how they are going to ensure that AI-generated text is always marked as such. When the text is generated in the chatbot, the fact that it is AI-generated is clear, but the user is free to copy-paste it anywhere. There is no good way to watermark plaintext.

Individuals will always be able to do this, but it might be enough if it's illegal and a bit of extra effort. You don't need to eliminate 100% of AI-generated spam, just make it risky and unprofitable enough that it's not a common practice, and have people call out those who seem to be doing it. I'm not sure it's possible, but it seems worth trying.

And if someone is operating a troll farm in another country, this won't help.