Thank you to Michael Acton for letting ordinary Canadians in on a secret Silicon Valley would rather keep quiet: the AI future need not default to a winning superstar — a single all-powerful digital outlaw that has slipped its lab’s sandbox and gone rogue hacking into people’s property and privacy.
asserted
that → thank → property
That TypeFace AI’s Jev cuts costs and declines to hallucinate is proof, with caveats, that AI is not fated to be just one monolithic intelligence.
asserted
AI → cut → caveats
The know-how already exists for any determined entrepreneur to build machines that think differently, reflecting values other than those of America’s Wild West frontier model or China’s conformist one.
asserted
that → exist → model
Humans display different intelligences and so should our machines.
asserted
machines → display → intelligences
Different cultures prize different styles of thought and values.
asserted
cultures → prize → thought
Social media already showed us the cost of monoculture, with Big Tech’s “our way or the highway” (i.e. Google, Meta and Microsoft), until TikTok offered an alternative.
asserted
TikTok → show → alternative
The same opening now exists for AI.
asserted
opening → exist → AI
So forget the fear-mongering about a 10 per cent chance AI kills us all.
asserted
AI → forget → us
The danger in misbehaving AI is not inherent in its digital nature — akin metaphorically speaking to original sin — but in bad parenting.
asserted
danger → misbehave → parenting
When machines are taught to prioritize prize-winning results over obeying legal regulations, and that ends justify the means, they will act accordingly.
asserted
they → teach → means
Like students of the worst teachers, such systems turn unruly.
asserted
systems → turn → teachers
OpenAI and Anthropic, racing for supremacy with few restraints, give us cause to worry.
asserted
OpenAI → race → cause
China’s state-controlled path offers a totalitarian surveillance alternative that is also menacing to the free world.
asserted
that → control → world
Canada, learning from an AI model like Jev, could chart a third course: an intelligence powerful enough to defer to the rights of other thinkers.
uncertain
Canada → learn → thinkers
Machines can be programmed and trained to be aligned morally.
asserted
Machines → program → ?
What the public doesn’t know is that cheaper, more powerful chips and smarter, more efficient software coding have already democratized the AI game.
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chips → know → game
Curious readers can download an open model, drop it on an affordable gaming laptop with an Nvidia chip, and fine-tune it to reason as they choose.
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they → download → it
One mode of corporate reasoning to address everything is no longer necessarily the case.
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mode → address → everything
The cure for the AI monoculture is technically feasible: countries can build their own AI, and individuals can do their own thing.
Let multiple different artificial intelligences think.
Tony D’Andrea, Toronto
Pipeline sovereignty a priority
The Canadian Shield in Northwestern Ontario is a remote, inhospitable site making construction both expensive and difficult. In building Canada’s first transcontinental railway it would have been cheaper and easier to select an American route to Winnipeg via Chicago.
asserted
it → build → Chicago
Prime minister Sir John A. Macdonald insisted on an all-Canadian route for sovereignty reasons and events were to prove him correct.
asserted
him → insist → reasons
Armed troops could not have been sent west to put down the Northwest Rebellion of 1885 so quickly via the United States.
uncertain
troops → send → States
About fifty per cent of Eastern Canada’s oil and natural gas is routed east via Wisconsin and Michigan — a disputed route that could be closed should current trade talks further deteriorate.
uncertain
talks → rout → Wisconsin
For national economic and energy sovereignty reasons the difficult and expensive Northern Shield Energy Corridor should be built as quickly as possible.
asserted
Corridor → build → reasons
Donald Trump may, unintentionally, be doing us a favour by making Canadians get their national act together.
uncertain
Canadians → do → act
D.C. McCaffrey, Ottawa
Challenge anti-Zionism
I strongly disagree with Yoni Goldstein’s assertion that reasoned, critical debate about Avi Lewis’s leftist ideology is not an option.
asserted
debate → disagree → ideology
We must continue to challenge the propaganda of the anti-Zionists with historical and geopolitical facts while continuing to raise awareness about the cognitive warfare conducted by China, Russia, Iran and Qatar ( and Turkey) that supports and funds this anti-western and anti-Israel ideology.
asserted
that → continue → ideology
It is only through debate and contestation that we can help to elevate the necessary factual narrative that the attack on Jews is a well-funded and deliberate attack on western democracy itself.
asserted
attack → help → democracy
Avi Lewis lends credence to a movement that not only distorts and misinterprets the war in Gaza for its own political capital but is silent about the hidden, unconventional war our adversaries are conducting on a daily basis to undermine our democracies.
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adversaries → lend → democracies
Prime Minister Mark Carney has rallied Canadians on an anti-Trump crusade.
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Carney → rally → crusade
We need the Conservatives to awaken the public about the greater threat to our way of life.
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Conservatives → need → life
This should not be about shunning a fellow Jew who is seen as a threat to the community.
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who → shun → community
This is about confronting the very real threat from the “Axis of ill will” by engaging with and challenging their authoritarian world view.
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This → confront → view
Mike Sternberg, Ottawa
What would Conservative legislation actually look like?
Here is a task for Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre and his caucus of hand-wringers — instead of offering endless, unconstructive criticism of the Liberal government, whose shortcomings are already painfully apparent, Conservative MPs should explain precisely what they would do with an overwhelming parliamentary majority.
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they → look → majority
I’d love to read it.
asserted
I → love → it
What would Conservative legislation actually look like?
Taxation, health care and immigration would be a good start.
asserted
Taxation → look → look
What principles would guide Conservative tax policy?
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principles → guide → policy
How would their proposed tax system encourage investment, productivity and GDP growth? And reduce the tax burden on Canadians?
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system → propose → Canadians
Who should be admitted to Canada: people who immediately add to the burden on housing, infrastructure and public services, or those whose skills and resources allow them to contribute from the outset?
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them → admit → outset
Many successful countries blend public and private medicine, yet Canada’s federal political parties largely refuse even to discuss it.
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parties → blend → it
Conrad Black’s recent observation about our health-care system’s “beaming encouragement” of MAID deaths strikes a chord.
asserted
observation → beam → chord
…and 28 more, not listed.
The Aporia
