Last Monday, I wrote a short critique of Elon Musk’s DOGE attack on USAID. I posted it on my blog and social media, including my feed on X (formerly Twitter). Almost immediately, Musk’s AI chatbot, called Grok, appeared in my X feed. Grok now comments on everything I write on X.
This experience demonstrates the power of AI in surveillance and communication. I imagine that Grok was programmed to be on the look-out for posts that criticize what Musk is doing, and chatbots can quickly churn out analysis on any issue.
What Grok wrote on my X feed wasn’t inaccurate. But if I maintain my feed on X, I’ll need to review Grok’s response every time I post. Chatbots like Grok can be programmed with ideological biases. Musk says that Grok is now programmed to be “balanced,” but Grok could be reprogrammed to contradict posts that aren’t aligned with Musk’s views.
Finally, I must add an update on last Monday’s post.
USAID announced last night that it has put 4,700 employees on administrative leave and plans to fire 1,600 of them. A federal judge has ruled that the Trump administration should end the 90-day pause in foreign assistance that President Trump ordered, but the administration has so far failed to comply with the judge’s ruling.
The damage that has already been done to the rule of law in our country, U.S. leadership in the world, and progress against global poverty is immense.
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