AI-Politicians: A Revolution In Politics
This article is adapted from a chapter in Abishur Prakash's forthcoming book "Go.AI (Geopolitics of Artificial Intelligence)" which will be launched in Fall 2018.
During the recent presidential elections in Russia, a person named “Alice” ran as a candidate. She ran her campaign using slogans like “the political system of the future” and “the president who knows you best.” While Alice didn’t win, she did receive 25,000 votes.
To be correct, Alice wasn’t a she, it was an it. Alice was an artificial intelligence (AI) system created by Yandex, Russia’s equivalent to Google. Considering Alice’s campaign page is still up, Alice may still exist to some degree.
What happened in Russia’s presidential election is reflective of how politics is changing in the age of AI. In the past, humans ran for office. Tomorrow, AI will. And, AI may win, as people become increasingly frustrated with “human politicians.”
Alice isn’t the only AI to run for office.
In April, 2018, during a mayoral race in a part of Tokyo, an AI named “Michihito Matsuda” placed third with 4,000 votes. His campaign slogan: ”Artificial intelligence will…
