Will You Vote for a Machine
I want to talk about machinesâmachines that take input, do some calculations, get a result, and execute.
Machines are great at the tasks we design them for. They clean our dishes. They explore Mars and collect rock samples. They diagnose our diseases. Theyâve been great housekeepers, skilled research assistants, and even trusted medical consultants.
So⌠how about having a machine become our prime minister and run the country we live in?
I knowâit sounds scary and alien. But please be patient; let me make the campaign pitch.
Whatâs the goal of running a country? To maximize the happiness and well-being of its people. And what does that take? Youâve got to do the mathâyou need to solve a massive optimization problem with millions of shifting variables: safety, housing affordability, healthcare quality and accessibility, jobs and economic stability, and many others. Is Albanese great at math? I donât think soâbut machines definitely are.
Machines are logical and excel at problem-solving. They process data without bias and never need campaign donations. They can analyze patterns in seconds and find the best solutionâwhile we sometimes canât even get a vote count right. Take the Bradfield vote this year: officials thought they had a winner, then re-counted, then re-counted againâand still doubted the result. By the time people were arguing over who would sit in Parliament, a machine wouldâve nailed it on the first try.
Machines are selfless. They donât get bribed, and they never sit on their hands just because a decision conflicts with their own interestsâbecause they simply donât have any. By contrast, Australiaâs house prices have been increasing uncontrollably, yet our politicians barely lift a fingerâbecause rising property values help them accumulating their wealth.
I am just not criticizing government not doing their job, I am just thinking if it is possible at all to find a human leader who always makes every decision without a single thought for personal gain? I canât think of one. Maybe that is why there are religion, there are images like god that people believe in, as god will always act without a bias as his interest is not going to be conflicted in this world. So if we want someone who truly puts the publicâs well-being first, who do we trust more: a machine designed to serve, or a human who might serve themselves?â
Now, Iâm almost convinced that a machine could be a better prime ministerâexcept for one thing: the word âhumanityâ doesnât have âmachineâ in it; it has âhuman.â I guess many of you are wondering: how could a machine possibly act like a human? So I looked it up âhumanityâ in dictionary, it is defined as compassionate, sympathetic, or generous behavior.Hmm.. Who in this room has found ChatGPT to be more approachable, patient, encouraging, and tolerant than your boss? And Iâll bet no one has ever said, âWow, my boss is a great leader because heâs mean, abusive, and completely unpredictable.â Maybe humanity isnât about being human or even about feelingâitâs about making others feel cared for. And if a machine can do that better than we can, does it really matter what itâs made of?
When I rehearsed this speech for a very smart friend,he pointed one potential risk of having a machine run the country: âWhat if the machine gets hacked?â. This has been a popular storyline for many movies, and people are generally feared that the powerful machine may fail into the wrong hand. Luckily, a machine doesnât thirst power or dream of dictatorship, it just does its job. Every decision it makes is logged, transparent, and open to inspection. If something starts to go wrong, we are able to detect it and fix it, or vote it out in the next round. While compare to a human ruler, Putin, where lies and propaganda can hide abuses of power for years. With a machine, its much simpler, when it misbehaves, you see the error, and you correct it.
So, will you vote for a machine?