Challenges of Artificial Intelligence Review in a Soft Law Environment

If artificial intelligence (AI)
lives up to the claims of journalists, futurists, and tech companies, then AI stands to disrupt the landscape of human cognition, social order, and political power. Within a week’s span, AI can be discussed in both positive and utopian terms as well as in negative, even apocalyptic, terms. On the positive side, AI is described as an extraordinarily confident and capable F-16 pilot
[2]
, a panoptic gastroenterologist who misses no part of a colonoscopy
[3]
, the all-seeing solution to mapping climate change affected regions
[4]
, and a smartphone application able to show your body with 12% less fat and give dieting advice to achieve that goal
[5]
. Conversely, in a similar one-week period, AI is described as a tool for the surveillance of a minority population
[6]
, a technique for identifying the whereabouts of political protestors or dissidents
[7]
, a rogue system that delivers arbitrary scores on high-stakes examinations
[8]
, and a harbinger of decline for reasoning, resilience, and emotional intelligence
[9]
. Each of these assertions rests on the interpretation of both basic and applied AI research that may or may not be deployed into the production environment of normal human lives.