CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — Many people catch themselves using AI each and every day. Whether it’s to help consolidate everyday to-do lists, assist with research, or even help with coding.
With recent calls for regulation on both Capitol Hill and from AI tech giants themselves, like the CEO of Anthropic, some are starting to question the role of AI in their lives and whether or not guardrails are needed on the fast-developing technology.
On and around the Massachusetts Institute of Technology campus, we caught up with those using AI.
From programmers to students to researchers.
“I’m a software engineer, so AI helps me a lot on the day-to-day work. It can be really helpful,” CJ Zhong, a software engineer, said.
“I’m a programmer, so we are using it to write all the code all the time now and how to make that process feel good, but it’s still very experimental right now, Drew Abraham, a programmer, said.
Inside MIT’s Media Lab on Amherst Street, there’s a team learning more and more about the power of AI.
“How AI can help communities so not just building things but also deploying it out in the world,” Anku Rani, an MIT Media Lab PhD Student and member of the Multisensory Intelligence Group, said.
This, as others acknowledged while helpful, but there are some serious privacy concerns at play too.
“Yeah, a bit concerned about that, you know, sometimes we give them access to our computers, so sometimes they could omit something really important, so that might be a problem,” Nicole Hu, a student, explained.
Another tech employee, admitting it’s even something he’s asked AI about.
“I asked is it safe to search some confidential information itself, saying, ‘No, no, don’t do it,” he said.
AI giant Anthropic recently flagged the fast-moving tech with it’s CEO writing a letter advising other industry leaders to practice “pacing” their development.
“I think they are fearmongering a little bit to get the hype and excitement going a lot more than it’s really worth,” Abraham said.
“I think we just have to be careful and add, you know add common sense guards on it, but I also think that there is also think there is also a lot of interesting and potentially lifesaving things you can do with it, so you don’t want to cap that innovation,” Owen Dreikosen, who also works closeby, said.
Representative Jake Auchincloss is working on a balance of guardrails right now on Capitol Hill.
“It’s Prometheus and fire, one of the oldest stories of humanity. It can cook food, but it can burn your hand, and so we have to ensure that technology is a servant of the American public, not the other way around,” he said.
He says his bipartisan bill, The Deep Fake Liability Act, is a start, and he stands firm that any regulation needs to come from Congress, not these tech giants themselves.
“I think Congress has to take a skeptical eye of what the big tech companies want to do and start from first principles on AI regulation, that means liability for harms cause like every other technology has out there, that means transparency and third-party auditing, and that means that we should adopt AI where it can lower prices,” he said.
One example he gave, Boston 25 with Massachusetts in mind, is that he believes if regulated and used for good, AI could help take the cost out of healthcare, especially when it comes to rising premiums. He also spoke about using AI to improve human intelligence and education.
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