Technology has posed threats before. AI can be managed, too, historian says.

This week, democratic socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders and former Trump adviser Steve Bannon headlined an event in Washington where they and others urged Congress and the White House to regulate artificial intelligence companies that have been warning their products could escape boundaries and cause widespread harm.Senator Sanders, an independent from Vermont, and Mr. Bannon, a right-wing commentator, represent a broad spectrum of people calling for a slowdown in AI development amid growing public concern about the technology’s capabilities. A Politico poll released Sept. 16 found that nearly 2 in 3 Americans believe there is a risk that AI will destroy humanity. Historian Margaret O’Mara says she understands where they are coming from, but has a request for those who fear a doomsday scenario: look to history. Photo Courtesy of Margaret O'MaraMargaret O'Mara is an author and a professor of history at the University of Washington in Seattle. She focuses her research on the intersection of the American presidency and technology. By examining how America met challenges with other potentially threatening technologies, Dr. O’Mara believes we might be able to figure out how to find a balance between AI innovation and safety.Dr. O’Mara, the director of graduate studies at the University of Washington, focuses her research on the intersection of the American presidency and technology. She was a policy aide in the White House and Department of Health and Human Services during the Clinton administration, and is the author of “The Code: Silicon Valley and the Remaking of America.” She spoke with the Monitor recently about what Americans can take from history, patterns of capitalism, and current political tides as the nation grapples with the AI question. (Note: This article has been edited for length and clarity.)Do you think there is a historical precedent for stopping or significantly slowing the development of AI?There are a lot of things that can slow it down, including just a market correction, where the capital is no longer available to do what it’s doing at the same scale. I mean, you can think about other developments of technologies – I think the analogy that comes immediately to mind is military technologies like chemical warfare. After [World War I], there were international treaties placing limits on the use of chemical warfare in battle. This is after the mustard gas and all of the consequences of that. ... And then, nuclear nonproliferation, and bans on nuclear testing. Think about environmental regulations, and limits on and banning certain pesticides. Regulation in many forms has kind of been a curb on technology. So, we have plenty of examples of technology, of different tools being curbed or regulated or not allowed to max out their potential, for the greater good.Is it useful to compare these historical examples to AI, or are we dealing with something too different?I think if you overemphasize the novelty of it, then that leads to a throwing up of one’s hands, being like, “Oh, how could we possibly regulate this?” That’s the argument that the tech industry has been putting forth for a very long time, particularly when it comes to software. And that has been an argument that successfully deterred or slowed down regulation. It serves the interests of the companies to say, ‘This is just so fast-moving and so mysterious and so many orders of magnitude different than anything before it.’ We don’t want to use that as a convenient excuse to do nothing.[The companies] just keep on racing ahead with these things because they don’t want the other guy to be first. At the same time, they’re like, “Whoa, I don’t know if this is really ready for the world.” And now, here we are.As we see industry and government actors juggling the tradeoffs of AI innovation, do you think they will eventually compromise on regulations? I think it is really important to acknowledge the fact that the tech industry itself, and these particular tech companies, individually and collectively, [have] some of the most deep-pocketed, well-funded, and aggressive lobbyists in Washington D.C. So when they call for regulation, they’re calling for regulation that is on their own terms. And that’s not novel either. That’s what big, deep-pocketed companies have been doing forever.But also, I think one of the real challenges here is we’re at this political moment of partisan divisions, of a pretty weak Congress, quite frankly ... in terms of [operating as] a co-equal branch of government. And then you have the hurdle of the difficulty in understanding the technology itself – which is accentuated by the geriatric bent of Congress, that you have a lot of people who are just simply unfamiliar [with AI].How do you see political divisions coming into play?If we think about the Trump era as one that’s populist in character, that kind of populism and that populist energy can be harnessed. That’s the thing that actually puts the brakes on AI.You see the populist energy on the left and the right uniting against data centers, uniting it against tech billionaires, so that’s fascinating to me. And it also shows these commonalities, as different as Bernie Sanders and Steve Bannon are. Look, there are people who voted for Bernie Sanders and then voted for Donald Trump. This kind of crossover energy is not new, but now it’s being focused, directed at the AI space and AI tools and technologies in particular. Do you think this has the potential to mobilize the public in a way that could translate into real change? Absolutely. You look at focus groups: In everyone from hardcore MAGA to people who were the swing voters that went for Trump, and looking at people who voted for Zohran Mamdani, [there] is a common thread. There’s this common enemy in, or there’s a suspicion of [AI]. Deepen your worldviewwith Monitor Highlights.Politics with respectGet political stories with respectful analysis.There‘s a world of new ideas in everyBooks newsletter.There‘s more to life, enrich yours withCulture & Learning weekly.Follow humanity‘s discoveries withScience & Nature stories in your inbox.Gain a spiritual perspectivefrom the stories in your inbox.Want to understand the deeper impact of critical events? Learn the Monitor‘s insight.Already a subscriber? Log in to hide ads. I think there’s a broader public unease. I see this as a college professor with my college students, who are worried about getting jobs – young people sharing this populist antipathy towards the tech companies and the people who lead them, and this idea “the AI revolution is here and get on board.” They’re more skeptical, and they’re wondering why this is all happening.The bottom line is, regulation functions for a reason. Historically, American capitalism is healthiest when there are some kind of regulatory guardrails that still allow people to make money, be entrepreneurial, build great technology, and deploy it. But also, there’s this check and balance on corporate power. Right now we have this very, very unbalanced system. That’s part of what is making the stakes so high. ALREADY A SUBSCRIBER? LoginReal news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.The Christian Science Monitor was founded in 1908 to lift the standard of journalism and uplift humanity. 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