Thursday 20 September 2018

The Digital Ape: how to live (in peace) with smart machines by Nigel Shadbolt and Roger Hampson

The Digital Ape: how to live (in peace) with smart machines
by Nigel Shadbolt and Roger Hampson

Professor Sir Nigel Shadbolt is well known to DMossEsq's millions of readers as the prophet of the magic of open data. He's the chairman and co-founder of the Open Data Institute and Roger Hampson is one of the ODI's four non-executive directors.

The title "The Digital Ape" is inspired by Desmond Morris's The Naked Ape and extends his evolutionary approach to artificial intelligence. Man has always used tools to overcome his original shortcomings. First there was the hand axe. Now there's artificial intelligence. Messrs Shadbolt and Hampson's argument is that the hand axe didn't destroy the human race, so artificial intelligence won't either.

What can we digital apes look forward to in the brave new artificial intelligence world where we are at peace with our smart machines?

This is a question Professor Sir Nigel has tackled before in conversation with the much lamented journalist, Steve Hewlett:
Just imagine a new world where you look out of the window and see the blue flashing lights, and then someone flies through the door and says "we're here to prevent you from having a heart attack".
Flint hand axe found in Winchester
Nothing as exciting as that in The Digital Ape, where Messrs Shadbolt and Hampson content themselves instead with a relatively dull vision of the fridge automatically ordering butter for you when stocks run low. Also, "the floor will phone social services if Granny has a fall [but will social services answer?]". (This is at Loc 3052 of the Kindle edition of the book which doesn't have page numbers, just Locs/locations.)

Professor Sir Nigel is or at least was in charge of the government's midata programme which he amusingly claimed, five years ago, would allow us to "get to the future more quickly". No sign of that. The apps haven't been developed ...

... and the obvious problems remain unsolved. In a digital ape world where we're permanently under surveillance and all data is open including personal information, Steve Hewlett wanted to know, what happens to privacy? We look to our eminent authors for guidance. In vain:
On the face of it, open data is an idea too simple and right to fail. Assuming that the correct safeguards around private and personal information are in place ... (Loc 3802)
What are the "correct safeguards"? No answer.
Public datasets should definitely be open to all comers, subject to privacy and security concerns ... (Loc 3919)
How "definitely"? What is a "public dataset"? Which datasets would be "subject to privacy and security concerns"? What access if any would there be to these concerning datasets? No answers.
The digital ape needs urgently to debate and define the reasonable boundaries for the collection and analysis of information by government agencies in the age of terror. Restraints and accountability are essential ... (Loc 4023)
Surely this book is the place for that debate. This is the debate that the leaders of the Open Data Institute should be ideally placed to contribute to. What "restraints and accountability"? No answer.
... we badly need conventions that curb the continued weaponisation of the digital realm ... (Loc 4032)
What "conventions"? No answer.
There is no contradiction between the desire to live in a society that is open and secure, and the desire to protect privacy. Open and private apply to different content, handled in appropriately different ways ... (Loc 4069)
What "appropriately different ways"? No answer.
The personal data model is one way to produce a viable alternative [to the Orwellian implications of building one huge public database]. There are obviously problems ... We are certain these are solvable problems ... (Loc 4081)
Why are the authors "certain"? Their certainty doesn't make the reader certain. What are the solutions? No answer.
If we want people to pay the tax they owe, we need some system of collecting it [we already have one, courtesy HMRC, quite an extensive one], and some way of knowing collectively that we have done so. Imagination will be needed to turn all these into data stores held by individuals ... (Loc 4139)
"Some system"? What system? "Some way"? What way? "Imagination" is no answer.
There need to be clear rules for the transparency of algorithmic decision-making, the principles and procedures on which choices about the lives of individuals and groups are being made ... (Loc 4512)
What "clear rules"? What "principles and procedures"? No answers.
We need a new framework to govern the innovations, which might enable individuals, en masse, to temper the continued concentration of ownership and power ... (Loc 4582)
What "new framework"? No answer.

All these questions. We all knew them. That's why we bought the book. To benefit from the experts' ideas. But no. No answers.

So much for "on the face of it, open data is an idea too simple and right to fail ... (Loc 3802)". Nothing "simple" about it. Nothing obviously "right" about it.

How to live (in peace) with smart machines? No idea. Not a clue.

The Digital Ape: how to live (in peace) with smart machines by Nigel Shadbolt and Roger Hampson

The Digital Ape: how to live (in peace) with smart machines
by Nigel Shadbolt and Roger Hampson

Professor Sir Nigel Shadbolt is well known to DMossEsq's millions of readers as the prophet of the magic of open data. He's the chairman and co-founder of the Open Data Institute and Roger Hampson is one of the ODI's four non-executive directors.

The title "The Digital Ape" is inspired by Desmond Morris's The Naked Ape and extends his evolutionary approach to artificial intelligence. Man has always used tools to overcome his original shortcomings. First there was the hand axe. Now there's artificial intelligence. Messrs Shadbolt and Hampson's argument is that the hand axe didn't destroy the human race, so artificial intelligence won't either.

What can we digital apes look forward to in the brave new artificial intelligence world where we are at peace with our smart machines?

This is a question Professor Sir Nigel has tackled before in conversation with the much lamented journalist, Steve Hewlett:
Just imagine a new world where you look out of the window and see the blue flashing lights, and then someone flies through the door and says "we're here to prevent you from having a heart attack".

Saturday 1 September 2018

The Sham ID, called 'Aadhaar': Hoax of the Century

The Sham ID, called 'Aadhaar': Hoax of the Century
by Mathew Thomas

"Achche din is finally here", says the condemned man on the front cover of Mathew Thomas's book.

"Achhe din aane waale hain" was the campaign slogan of Narendra Modi's BJP party in India's 2014 election, "happy days are coming".

For years Mr Modi had opposed Aadhaar. Bad news. That's while he was in opposition. Then he became Prime Minister and now he's a fan. Happy days are here again.

"Stop! He has no Aadhaar card", says the lawyer on the front cover of Mathew Thomas's book.

The funny thing is, no-one does. There is no such thing as an Aadhaar card. Aadhaar cards are part of the extraordinary Indian delusion that is the subject of Mr Thomas's book.

UIDAI, the Unique Identification Authority of India, the people in charge of Aadhaar, have pulled off "the hoax of the century". Not only are there no Aadhaar cards, there is no unique identification either.

Aadhaar doesn't work. One big broken promise, it was meant to help the poor to claim state benefits and it doesn't. It can't.

The politicians know that. The civil servants know that. The media know that. So do the lawyers and so does everyone else. Not least because Mathew Thomas has spent 10 years or so patiently telling them.

And yet ...

... UIDAI goes from strength to strength.

Aadhaar was meant to be a voluntary scheme. First it morphed into being mandatory for state benefits and now it's trying to insert itself into more and more walks of life. You want a passport? Give us your Aadhaar number. You want a mobile phone? Give us your Aadhaar number. You want a bank account? Give us your Aadhaar number. Etc ...

What's going on?

It's baffling.

The politicians and the civil servants et al aren't stupid. And yet they connive in funding Aadhaar.

Alice in Wonderland? The emperor's new clothes? Tulipmania? Pick your metaphor. Whichever you choose, India is undeniably in the grip of some sort of of an extraordinary delusion, a nightmare from which it will finally wake up.

For years, India's Supreme Court has been hearing the tireless Mathew Thomas's cases asserting that Aadhaar is unconstitutional. The court is due to promulgate its latest decision soon. Independent of political parties and of business interests, the judges have the opportunity to rouse India from its slumbers, to say achhe din aane waale hain and to put an authoritative stop to this Aadhaar nonsense.

The Sham ID, called 'Aadhaar': Hoax of the Century

The Sham ID, called 'Aadhaar': Hoax of the Century
by Mathew Thomas

"Achche din is finally here", says the condemned man on the front cover of Mathew Thomas's book.

"Achhe din aane waale hain" was the campaign slogan of Narendra Modi's BJP party in India's 2014 election, "happy days are coming".

For years Mr Modi had opposed Aadhaar. Bad news. That's while he was in opposition. Then he became Prime Minister and now he's a fan. Happy days are here again.

"Stop! He has no Aadhaar card", says the lawyer on the front cover of Mathew Thomas's book.

The funny thing is, no-one does. There is no such thing as an Aadhaar card. Aadhaar cards are part of the extraordinary Indian delusion that is the subject of Mr Thomas's book.

UIDAI, the Unique Identification Authority of India, the people in charge of Aadhaar, have pulled off "the hoax of the century". Not only are there no Aadhaar cards, there is no unique identification either.

Aadhaar doesn't work. One big broken promise, it was meant to help the poor to claim state benefits and it doesn't. It can't.