A new declaration focusing on "Human Rights in the Age of Artificial Intelligence" was released this week, bringing together a group of prominent figures from the business, religious, government and academic circles with different political stances to sign, calling for a human-centered approach as artificial intelligence develops rapidly. Signatories include former Trump administration senior adviser Steve Bannon, conservative commentator Glenn Beck, billionaire entrepreneur Richard Branson, as well as consumer activist Ralph Nader, former Biden administration national security adviser Susan Rice and Nobel Prize winner Daron Acemoglu.
The document, called the Pro-Human AI Declaration, was released on Wednesday and received support from more than 40 institutions, emphasizing that as artificial intelligence becomes more and more powerful and closer to "human-like" in some aspects, the importance of humans and their values cannot be ignored. The preamble of the declaration points out that currently, major companies are competing to develop and deploy artificial intelligence systems, and mankind is standing at a "fork in the road": one road is a "race with the goal of substitution". Human beings are replaced by machines in their roles as creators, consultants, caregivers, companions, etc., and eventually give way to algorithms in most professional and decision-making positions, and power continues to be concentrated in the hands of a few unfettered institutions and their machines.
The declaration also proposes "another, better path" through "trustworthy and controllable artificial intelligence tools" that enhance rather than diminish human potential, empower individuals, promote human dignity, protect individual freedoms, strengthen family and community bonds, safeguard self-governance, and help create unprecedented health and prosperity. The drafting effort was undertaken by a range of organizations across the political spectrum, including the Christian Leadership Conference, the American Federation of Teachers, and Progressive Democrats of America, reflecting broad political and social coverage.
According to reports, the non-profit organization Future of Life Institute took the lead in convening relevant parties and promoting the drafting process of this declaration. The agency is committed to guiding the development of advanced technologies in directions that benefit humanity while avoiding the large-scale risks they may bring. The text of the declaration was repeatedly refined through multiple offline meetings, and was finally finalized at a larger ratification meeting held in New Orleans in January this year.
The declaration consists of five major themes, with titles including "Ensuring Humanity Maintains Dominance" and "Responsibility and Accountability of Artificial Intelligence Enterprises". Under each major theme, more detailed propositions are also listed to explain the "human-supportive" artificial intelligence concept advocated by the signatories. For example, under the theme of "avoiding concentration of power", the declaration proposed specific principles such as "opposing artificial intelligence monopoly", "retaining democratic decision-making rights for major technological transformations" and "sharing prosperity", emphasizing that control of key technologies cannot be concentrated in the hands of a few technology giants.
Artificial intelligence pioneer Joshua Bengio is also among the signatories, further underscoring the manifesto’s representativeness in the technology community. Joe Allen — a senior fellow at Humanity First and the former technology editor of Steve Bannon’s podcast “The Situation Room” — said in an interview that the declaration was “the product of difficult negotiations among intellectuals and activists who have been thinking about the dangers and negative impacts of artificial intelligence for years.” In his view, the participants spanned a broad axis, with “at the top are the rational technological optimists, and at the bottom there are people like us who are a little bit ‘anti-technological’.”
One of the core initiatives advocated by the declaration is to adhere to the principle of broad participation in the governance of artificial intelligence. Allen noted that, like free speech or freedom itself, "ideally, everyone - including one's ideological opponents - should have a say in how to respond to this potentially 'anti-human' technology."
The background of the declaration is the "leap-forward" improvement in the capabilities of artificial intelligence systems in recent years. Various large models have reshaped or even replaced some software development positions in a short period of time, and have continuously refreshed the upper limit of human design benchmarks in tests in fields such as mathematics, triggering widespread employment and safety concerns. “Tech giants are in a race to build artificial intelligence that is smarter than humans,” warned Brendan Steinhauser, director of the Alliance for Safe Artificial Intelligence, a Washington-based advocacy group whose mission is to ensure that “humans control artificial intelligence rather than AI controlling humans.” He emphasized that if we want artificial intelligence to truly benefit mankind and not just Silicon Valley CEOs, "we must join hands to defend our future."