AI in Government. Impact of AI on state departments, AI efficiency, AI cost-saving. AI policy decisions and global regulation of AI. Extract from Chapter 26 - new book: How AI will Change Your Life - by Patrick Dixon, keynote speaker on insurance and AI

Futurist Keynote Speaker: Posts, Slides, Videos - Government, Politics, Democracy, War - Future

WE NEED TO DISTINGUISH between government as in managing a country, which is about the civil service and ministerial departments, and government as in leading a nation, which is all about politics in a democracy, autocracy or dictatorship. (See previous chapter for wider use of AI in surveillance).

AI is already widely used by the civil service in most developed countries, supporting whoever is leading government. Key areas for AI will be developing policy options, modelling the impact of proposed policies, writing policy details and drafting legislation.

For the next five years, almost all such AI support activities will tend to be on separate systems, but by 2040 many government AI systems will be networked into one all-powerful, all-knowing AI colossus. This is despite inherent risks.

To some extent this is already happening across systems used by security services. So, for example, a security officer can access all of someone’s personal information relating to internet activity (searches, social media, purchases), location, phone logs, family and friends, employment, tax, immigration, banking, driving offences, criminal record, health records – plus other insights generated by AI-linked pattern recognition, predictive analytics. Such an entity will become a primary target for hostile countries to attack (and for ‘friendly’ countries to quietly probe).

Examples of how AI will be used by government

Treasury

• Model economic growth, including impact of AI
• Model impact of new tax proposals on economy
• Model government income and expenditure
• Assess economic risks – e.g. from AI itself
• Produce papers on reducing money laundering

Home Office

• Assess passport applications
• Process visas, measure security risks
• Process asylum and refugee applications

Education

• Write new syllabuses and write new teacher requirements
• Write new proposals for adult re-skilling

Defence

• Manage bidding, procurement
• Model impact of military commitments
• Produce war games scenarios

Foreign Office

• Write policy papers to guide relations with each country
• Write guidelines for diplomats while on foreign postings
• Write draft speeches for ambassadors

Trade and Industry

• Draft additions to anti-bribery legislation
• Model impact of subsidies for robotics
• Write policies to encourage foreign investment in UK-based AI

Department of Energy

• Model impact of replacing gas heating with green hydrogen
• Write new policies on decommissioning of nuclear reactors
• Model possible scenarios if nuclear fusion becomes more feasible

Department of Health

• Write national policies on recruitment of foreign-trained doctors
• Model impact of strikes by public sector workers
• Write proposals for faster drug approvals

* Dr Patrick Dixon is one of the world's best known keynote speakers on global trends, often described as Europe’s leading Futurist. Author of 18 books, he has advised over 400 of the world’s largest corporations, often sharing platforms with their CEOs at their most important global events. His clients include Google, Microsoft, IBM, Intel, LinkedIn and many of the world’s largest manufacturers as well as governments. Patrick is a cancer physician by first training and his first start-up company some decades years ago was an AI-simulator, using computers to talk to and diagnose patients. His website globalchange.com has had 15 million unique visitors with 9 million video views.

Daily Telegraph review (14 September UK): 

"If you need to acquire instant AI mastery in time for your next board meeting, Dixon’s your man. 

Dixon gives us plenty to think about: AI’s role in surveillance; AI’s role in intellectual freedom and copyright; AI’s role in warfare; AI’s role in human obsolescence – his exhaustive list runs to over two dozen chapters.

Business types will enjoy Dixon's meticulous lists and his willingness to argue both sides against the middle."

Read on - buy my new book NOW.  "How AI Will Change Your Life."

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