AI Fears Give Bernie Sanders a Rare Moment of Unity With Bannon

(Bloomberg) -- Politics makes strange bedfellows, and so too does artificial intelligence.

Fears that AI poses an increasing threat to safety and prosperity have made progressive firebrand Senator Bernie Sanders and conservative provocateur Steve Bannon unlikely allies with their demands for more safeguards. Both men appeared Tuesday at an event in Washington where each warned that the technology carries potentially catastrophic risks and that AI companies have amassed vast power, jeopardizing human interests.

Sanders and Bannon each took aim at AI billionaires for moving too quickly on the technology. But Sanders favors congressional action — a time-consuming endeavor that would require bipartisan support — while Bannon would prefer President Donald Trump take executive action.

"The legislation's going to be enormously complicated and take a while, just because the technology's complicated and the opportunities are complicated and the bottomless pit abyss of the downside is complicated," Bannon said.

The daylong gathering, whose attendees also included investor Frank McCourt and Massachusetts Institute of Technology economist Daron Acemoglu, took place against a backdrop of intensifying AI anxiety, touched off by warnings from Silicon Valley researchers that cutting-edge systems carry an increasing risk of slipping beyond human control. Those concerns have fueled calls for lawmakers and the Trump administration to address AI risks, though there's little sign of any imminent action — which Sanders lamented in his remarks.

"If AI surpasses human intelligence, as many scientists believe could happen, this technology will escape human control with potentially catastrophic consequences," said Sanders, a Vermont independent who aligns with Democrats. "Congress, under both Democratic and Republican control, have been asleep at the wheel and we now have a president whose ignorance regarding this issue is truly embarrassing."

Bannon, the architect of Trump's 2016 election victory, took the stage right after Sanders and praised the senator for doing "a great job of summarizing the risk."

"Obviously he and I have a quite different opinion of the president of the United States but we're trying to raise up above partisanship and we have to," he added.