How best to regulate AI

As AI can refer to many types of rapidly evolving technologies, it's better to focus on regulating specific applications of it

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Artificial intelligence (AI) is everywhere now and there are growing calls for its regulation. There is, for example, the debate over whether AI should have its own legal personality and be subject to criminal law and punishment.

But AI is currently very far from reaching sapience, the ability to think and reflect in the manner of a person. Killer robots like HAL 9000 from Arthur C. Clarke's novel 2001: A Space Odyssey remain strictly science fiction.

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A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on December 23, 2021, with the headline How best to regulate AI. Subscribe