Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, made a speech last week at UCL East. The ‘typescript‘ on the Government website is astonishing. The whole thing is printed in the style of a Mr Men book. Now, perhaps this is justified by the fact that Starmer was speaking rather than writing: but it still seems to be somewhat alarming that politicians do not speak in sentences but in a sort of liturgical dirge style in which there is a continual doleful optimism.
Contemplate the Mr Men style in the opening lines of the speech:
Deb Kelly is a prison officer and a PE instructor.
Two years ago, this month…
She got up on a Saturday morning…
And collapsed on the floor.
Her whole face had completely drooped.
Her left side had gone completely weak.
She was having a stroke.
She was found by her son, rushed to hospital…
Where the doctors used Artificial Intelligence…
To help pinpoint the exact location of the blood clot.
They successfully removed it.
“Well done!” said Mr First Lord of the Treasury.
This is odd. It is paginated as if it is poetry. Perhaps Starmer had it written like this so he could offer it to the London Review of Books as a poem. Or so the Roger Hargreaves Estate could add it to the canon.
That’s the form.
The content is AI.
Starmer is keen on AI. He thinks it will “transform” things. Three things. He uses the word “transform” three times. AI will transform “the lives of working people”. It will transform “our entire understanding of biology”. It will transform “our public services”.
Biopower!
Anyhow, Starmer is keen on AI, and keen to reassure us 1. that there is no serious danger, 2. that there is a Government agency tasked with reassuring us that there is no danger. How? By regulating AI. Good.
What is AI?
Answer 1. It is a grandiose assimilator of words, also replicator, digestor: a self-teaching, massively cancerous self-teaching computer programming system. For some reason, everyone seems to accept it as an inevitability. Why?
Answer 2. Why? Well, it is the solution to All Our Problems. It will replace Theresa May’s Magic Money Tree, it will plaster over Rachel Reeves’s Black Hole, it will break strikes for the stay-at-home British Work Ethic, and it will compensate for our lack of Common Sense. It will write every application letter, compose every undergraduate essay, and write every political speech from now on.
Here is Starmer. AI will (and I quote) “help in the fight against tax avoidance… halve the time social workers spend on paperwork… make public services more human… [give doctors and nurses] more time for the personal touch… turbocharge every single element of our Plan for Change”.
This is funny and scary. AI will be so busy doing what a doctor should do that the person formerly called ‘Doctor’ will now be called a ‘Bedside Mannerer First Class’ while the person formerly called ‘Nurse’ will now be called a ‘Beside Mannerer Second Class’. And notice how much of this AI is to be used to ensure that the Kraken Government maintains its grip on the Ship of State: by fighting tax avoidance and turbocharging plans for change.
If the benefits of AI are the first part of his speech, the impetus to become a leader in AI technology is the second part. “Britain is going to shape the future.” “This is the nation of Babbage, Lovelace and Turing,” he says, listing three figures as little like Starmer as it is possible to be. He then lists a lot of companies I have never heard of, which are clustering around, attracting and extracting much cash – OpenAI, Anthropic, Scale, Mistral AI, Wayve, Synthesia, Blackstone, Kyndryl, Nscale, Vantage Data Centres – and likens what is happening now to the industrial revolution. He says that Britain was once “the cradle of engineering innovation”, and presumably hopes that it will be the nursing home of engineering innovation too.
The bit that puzzled me most was this section of the speech:
And, then of course, the engine of AI progress…
…is what’s called compute.
We’ll increase our public sector compute…
Not by a factor of two or three or even 10….
But by 20.
Eh? Is he using “compute” as a noun? My dictionary knows no such thing. I asked Google, and I found a discussion thread on Reddit from 2020 where someone notes that “compute” has become a noun, and someone else explains that it is common language in “cloud-related” or “cloud-adjacent” industries. Perhaps people don’t want to use “computation” any more. I wonder if the emphasis is on the first syllable. (ComPUTE is the verb; COMpute is the noun, perhaps?) I check the video of the speech on YouTube (at around 12 minutes in) and find that Starmer is a bit unsure: first, he says, “it’s what’s called comPUTE…”, then he adds, “We’ll increase our public sector COMpute…”)
This has to be translated into English.
The English translation is:
I, Keir Starmer, propose that the Government magnifies its power by employing AI knowledge-assimilating power-grabbing linguistic tools.
(Knowledge is power, quoth Francis Bacon, four centuries ago.) He is a bit clearer in the text of the article he published in the Financial Times on January 13th to coincide with his speech.
Britain should be excited by this. For one, it offers credible hope of a long-desired boost in public sector productivity. Nurses, social workers, teachers, police officers — for millions of frontline workers, AI can give the precious gift of time. This means they can refocus on the care and connection aspects of their job that so often get buried beneath the bureaucracy. That’s the wonderful irony of AI in the public sector. It provides an opportunity to make services feel more human.
“Public sector productivity” is as bad as “public sector compute”. (Though I suspect it may mean that frontline workers will have more time for the shirking parts of their jobs.) But this “public sector compute” seems to be a euphemism for what is elsewhere called “sovereign AI”. CNBC Africa comments:
Sovereign AI has become a hot topic for policymakers, particularly in Europe. The term refers to the idea that technologies critical to economic growth and national security should be built and developed in the countries people are adopting them in.
The UK wants a Little England (or Chinatown) version of OpenAI’s ChatGPT so that it can carry out more coups d’état against its poor subjects. And of course the private corporations want a piece of the action. One CEO (of a company called Antler), a man with the alarming name of Magnus Grimeland, identified the £7 trillion pounds of English pension funds as a “pocket” – his word – that he would like to pick. “Imagine if you take just 5% of that and allocate it to innovation — you solve the problem.”
Starmer himself in the FT adds: “AI has arrived as the ultimate force for change and national renewal.”
Good Lord. Is anyone thinking this through?
What I worry about is this. Many significant grim commentators are saying that the United Kingdom – even if we ignore Brexit, Covid, Climate, Diversity and Immigration – has gone through colossal changes, economic on the one hand (Bank of England, OBR, excessive borrowing, bailing out banks, inflation, no joined-up policy etc.) and political and constitutional on the other (undermining Parliament by Devolution, the Supreme Court, Quangos etc.) If this is so, as it is, then isn’t Starmer hoping that AI will bail out this bloated superstate? He seems to be wagering not on putting the house in order, but in hoping for a miracle to come along, a “game changer” (and add other fashionable phrases, as Starmer does). In other words, he is what the haughty ladies of the Guardian call a ‘tech bro’.
It seems to me that there is a moral case against AI. Most of the things promised seem strictly unnecessary. And every time we turn to AI to do something we only demonstrate our unwillingness to do it ourselves. In relation to manual labour, technical advance was mostly a blessing: relieving us or our animals of hours of milling, reaping, cutting etc. But since AI is a linguistic system, what we are facing is the destruction or demoralisation of our own linguistic abilities. Why learn to write when AI can write for us?
Dr. James Alexander is a Professor in the Department of Political Science at Bilkent University in Turkey.
Editor’s note: Apart from anything else, AI keeps getting even simple things wrong. Twice this week the Google ‘AI Overview’ that now appears at the top of searches has given false information. In looking up a George Orwell quote, the AI Overview wrongly asserted that it came from 1984, when in fact it comes from a preface to Animal Farm.
The AI Overview also claimed, in a different search, that the correct phrase is “hone in on”, while “home in on” is a “common mistake”. In fact, as the top search result below the AI Overview, an article from Merriam-Webster, relays, the original phrase is “home in on”, derived from homing pigeons, and “hone in on” is a more recent corruption.
If AI can’t even get simple facts like these correct – facts confirmed in Google’s own top search results – how can it possibly be trusted with anything of any consequence?
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Braverman seems like one of the better ministers – not that the competition is fierce
If only Braverman had a position of authority
Toby, I believe you’re a good guy, but please get off the fence. It was only a few weeks ago that you were insisting a multicultural Britain was a good thing because, as far as I understood it, there were more culinary options. I believe that a multicultural Britain could work, but only if those adopting Britain as their home integrated into our culture – the one you say doesn’t exist, but also say does. We are in a multitude of wars and we need people like you – intelligent, decent, articulate, honest – to come off the fence before it really is too late.
The state has no business recording “non crime hate incidents”. Chinese social credit score anyone?
What else can it be if not a form of social credit?
They want to turn us (even more) into domesticated pets.
I think the government and other political parties urgently need to clarify what they mean by “hate” and “protest”. If I pray silently, I don’t consider that I am protesting or harassing anyone or committing a thought crime. If I politely suggest that men, regardless of how in touch with their feminine side they may be, should nonetheless stay out of women’s toilets and women’s refuges and women’s prisons, I don’t consider I am being hateful towards anyone, and I would suggest that most sensible people would agree.
It is absolutely not good enough for our lawmakers to simply say that if anyone says that they feel harassed by someone then (so long as their accuser is on the favourite’s list) that person is guilty of harassment. I’d go so far as to say that this country risks becoming a tyranny if this isn’t sorted out.
I don’t think the police should be involved at all in policing “hateful” behaviour. It’s either criminal or it’s not. If not then their role should be limited to keeping the peace so for example if there are two groups obviously about to kick off violently send them away in opposite directions.
I don’t want to read only about Braverman’s thoughts on this outrage, nor that she is writing a couple of letters, I want to know what she will actually do.
She could start by hauling in some senior plods and having them put out statements confirming any more of this sharia nonsense and the perps will be arrested.
If we do not put a stop to this Sharia crap we are on a very dangerous path, not that the current trajectory is not already exceedingly dangerous.
Furthermore, the Christian churches need to see if they can find a pair and start to speak out in favour of the nominally majority religion, and that does not include the Satanic, treasonous Jelly Welby.
Good on Toby for getting the FSU on the case. The response from West Yorkshire’s finest should be interesting.
I would argue that it is the very establishment of the Church of England that sends out the wrong message in a country that is a long way towards secularism, it’s a long time past the point at which we should disestablish the church and then there would be a level playing field with no apparent bias towards any religion.
You mean the church of Darwin, shit happens, nominalism and relativism I assume.
I am not interested in a level playing field. I am not interested in Islam. We are supposedly a Christian country and it’s about time it was reasserted.
Provide a level playing field for Muslims and before we know it there will be sharia sheriffs on every street corner. No thanks.
Our Constitution is rooted in Christianity, hence we are a Christian country even if many of the folk who live here aren’t practising Christians. The rhythms of our culture are based on Christianity.
Exactly.
I must admit I’m a supporter of antidisestablishmentarianism. It’s not like the Church is dictating our law, and I think it is important that voices outside of the political parties are heard. To just disestablish and not replace with anything of substance so that the stranglehold of the established political parties further increased wouldn’t help anyone. Very easy to knock something down, much harder to build something up, and I tend to be cautious about radical constitutional change which can often have unintended consequences. Just look at the “supreme court”, and the state of the House of Lords, which is more a tool of the establishment than it has ever been since they reduced the hereditary peers.
Stop Press 2: According to the Mail on Sunday, the 14 year-old autistic boy had to move out of his home last week following arson threats.
I wonder, is it too much to ask to start deporting foreign nationals who make such threats in these circumstances?
I wonder, is plod investigating the arson threats.
I maintain that Welby is ‘treasonous’ by virtue of him being a gnostic, not a Xian.
“The lodestar of our democracy is freedom of speech.”
Depends on the topic, apparently…
All topics can be spoken about freely, but some can be spoken about more freely than others.
Yes, good point Marcus.
That was the most impressive, morally unambiguous and and courageous statement by a major politician that I have come across in decades
Those who have viewed the Daily Sceptic as fertile ground for attacking and undermining liberal democracy (whether from a pro-Russian Federation / CCP or generally fascistic / marxist basis) take note.
No matter what the temporary setbacks cooperative and tolerant coexistence will always win out over bullying tyranny.
To be more explicit, this is magnificent (although I would replace the nationalistic localised terminology with universal alternatives):
“We do not have blasphemy laws in Great Britain, and must not be complicit in the attempts to impose them on this country. There is no right not to be offended. There is no legal obligation to be reverent towards any religion.
The lodestar of our democracy is freedom of speech. Nobody can demand respect for their belief system, even if it is a religion. People are legally entitled to reject – and to leave – any religion. There is no apostasy law in this country. The act of accusing someone of apostasy or blasphemy is effectively inciting violence upon that person.
Everyone who lives here has to accept this country’s pluralism and freedom of speech and belief. One person’s freedom to, for example, convert from Islam to Christianity is the same freedom that allows a Muslim to say that Jesus was a prophet but not God Incarnate.
This freedom is absolute. It doesn’t vary case by case. It can’t be disapplied at a local level. And no one living in this country can legitimately claim that this doesn’t apply to them because they belong to a different tradition.”
Power speaks truth.
Yes. My comment is awaiting approval from the censor committee, in which I point out that Braverman is at last speaking the silent part out loud – that we live under Cultural Pluralism, not Multiculturalism.
Everyone who lives here has to accept this country’s pluralism and freedom of speech and belief.
Pluralism. I hope this is a nod to cultural pluralism. As in “Cultural pluralism is a term used when smaller groups within a larger society maintain their unique cultural identities, whereby their values and practices are accepted by the dominant culture, provided such are consistent with the laws and values of the wider society. [wikipedia]
There is cultural pluralism is this country, not multiculturalism. It seems various minority groups may be operating under this confusion?
Quite right, Toby, there is no blasphemy law, not should there be, nor is there a right not to be offended, not should there be. But it’s not a bad thing to have respect for other people and their beliefs, and it’s entirely appropriate for an institution such as a school to censure what they consider to be bad taste. Would you defend the free speech of critics of Judaism in the same way as critics of Islam, or would you be more delicate?