The “news” is almost always about what’s happening “today.” Yet, when historians and the public look back years later, this distancing perspective offers a completely different picture. So while right now Israelis are into the upcoming elections (as are Americans in the US), years hence the main development of the mid-2020s will be something else entirely: Artificial Intelligence. Which doesn’t mean that today we know how this will turn out; quite the opposite! Here’s why.

Like most revolutionary technologies, AI can be different things for different people or sections of society – and it’s not always clear at the start who wins and who loses. Take the Gutenberg print revolution for example. The Church thought that print would be terrific as then relatively inexpensive, printed prayer books could be distributed to the masses, enabling more people to participate in church services. But it didn’t take long (about 70 years later) for Martin Luther to exploit print and widely disseminate his theses through posters on church doors to start the Protestant Revolution that split Christianity in two (or more).

So do take my analysis here with a grain of salt or two. Nevertheless, once in my academic career I succeeded to be well ahead of the game: 45 years ago in 1981 I published the first-ever academic article on the legal ramifications of AI harm (https://www.researchgate.net/publication/229067941_Frankstein_unbound_Towards_a_legal_definition_of_artificial_intelligence).

Who wins and who loses with AI? At this stage it can be........

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