Different from a nonprofit right candidate. Intovent even gotten statelevel versus federal level. We are live now for a discussion on Artificial Intelligence technology and competition from china. We will hear from the u. S. Chief technology officer, michael kratsios. Mr. Kratsios both the applications of Artificial Intelligence and quantum to ourtion sciences nondefense applications. Parallel effort of substantial scale in the department of defense through researchse advanced projects agency and other defense entities because these technologies are of universal application. I would like to take an opportunity to begin the discussion, to perhaps start with a bit of current news where europe has the European Union in particular, has tabled some of their ideas about how to manage some of the particularly the ethical issues related to Artificial Intelligence. Ofhave had quite a number years of tension on a transatlantic basis about the application of advanced commercial aso well as governmental applications. I would be interested in getting your take on this. Thank you so much. Yesterday was a big day of news for the world of ai regulation. As you probably know, the United States was first out of the gate in the january where we proposed the ai regulatory principles. Those arrive for comment. Released theiry attempt to do what we did in january with providing some sort of structure about the way they are thinking about regulations of ai powered technologies. My take is twofold. I think we are very encouraged to see a lot of focused focus in their document on an Innovation Ecosystem that is friendly. They talk about the importance of developing and working on research and development projects, helping drive startups or smaller companies. Aey also talk about valuesbased approach. In the u. S. Expressed january. One thing i think is important to flag and one thing i think it could be some room for their next step from taking this valuebased approach and implementing it. What we found in what they put out yesterday does, in some ways, clumsily attempts to bucket Ai Technologies has highrisk work not highrisk. The way their schemas isuctured, scheme structured, there will be some group that makes a decision on whether a technology is highrisk or not. If you are highrisk you have to go through an extensive regulatory approach. We believe this all or nothing approach is not really the best way to approach regulating Ai Technologies. Is askedai regulation on a spectrum of sorts. There are certain technologies which will require every regulatory scrutiny. We are prepared to do that. There were quite a few that need a little or not at all. I think creating the spectrum is important. That is where our biggest concern is. I will be traveling to brussels folksonth and speaking to over there and sharing some of these concerns. I think there is a lot we have in common but i think this approach of bluntly bifurcating the entire r d the entire ai tech ecosystem into two buckets is harsh. I think it is a very good point. Dod defensed on the Science Board and we have done studies on the application of modern technology through the development of ai and quantum. Thatf the opportunities may evolve as the Technology Improves to facilitate the better alignment with our allies in europe is an effort that is to explain airpa so that the user of the output is ablebased analysis to understand the coupling between the outcome and the data that produced the outcome. Yet, but theree may be some opportunities for Research Collaboration between better. And the eu to solve this problem of explainable ai. Mr. Kratsios i couldnt agree more. That is a good segue into how the u. S. Approach differs to the european. When we put out our principles last january they focused on three main themes. I think of them hits on this explain ability question. I think the most important thing in the u. S. Model is public engagement. Whenever we pursue regulatory action toward a private Sector Company that is implementing Ai Technology, we as the federal government have some experts, but the community are the people who know this best. They have the experts that can help us think through that. There is a lot of emphasis on our framework in the public engagement. Another is limited regulatory overreach. A believe we need to create model that is riskbased and sector specific. Rather than pocketing the tech bucketing the technology, there has to be flexibility so you are are able to regulate appropriately. The third which i think you bring up astutely is this aia of promoting trustworthy. We need to engender trust in the technologies people are using. R d and Better Technology around issues like explain ability will get us a lot closer to that place. One of the issues related to this is the interaction between ai and the internet of things. The Science Board has been doing work on the technologies of autonomy and counter autonomy. Is onely Ai Technology of those things that is going to work for the whole society. There may also be opportunities for collaboration with our how we will manage the introduction of iot because like other applications where ai is involved, the range of applications is extraordinarily diverse. Mr. Kratsios i couldnt agree more. Where we have manifested that type of thinking is through the first symposium we held on Artificial Intelligence was titled ai for american industry. Artificial intelligence is going to touch every industry in the United States. Whether you are doing oral instruction in texas, whether you would you are doing biotech in boston, you are going to be using this technology. If the u. S. Wants to leave lead the world we need to make sure we use what ai can provide. One of the news items that has been a pretty constant drumbeat for the past halfdozen alignmentbeen chinas of its perception of its national and security interests with investments in advanced technology. Their made in china 2025 initiative five or so years ago, which identified 10 areas of technology that would be getting high investment from china. It is often described in terms of billions of dollars. I would be interested in your observations about how chinas therts have been coupled to administrations initiative and your perception of the chinese effort. Mr. Kratsios i think there are two threads to pull on. The first, which needs to be , the Chinese Communist party is using Artificial Intelligence to track people, to imprison ethnic minorities, to push forward a complete surveillance state, to maintain a great chinese firewall. These are the use cases of Artificial Intelligence that are deeply in conflict with western values. This is something we have tried to communicate with our friends and allies in europe. There has never been more of an imperative before now to ensure the u. S. And our allies lead the world in Artificial Intelligence. We need to ensure the next breakthroughs are made here in the west. If we dont lead, we run the risk of these values that are opposed to everything we believe in slowly permeating these new technologies and then being exported. That is why the imperative is so great. That is why the president ainched the american initiative. That is what we made the big announcement last monday that we are committed to doubling the defense ai spending the federal government in the next two years. That is moving to two billion dollars of federally funded r d in ai. This is a massive, an incredible step forward in our commitment to American Leadership in this domain. Up, hish you brought these commitments that have been publicly asserted by the chinese government. We have a lot of skepticism in the validity of those statistics. I think i challenge we have a lot of brilliant thing take people here. I challenge all of you to spend more time thinking about if you are attempting to report on an action taken by the chinese government, is that actually happening . Are they actually spending billions of dollars . To aou compare that number number that Congress Appropriates and is actually spent and put out the door by our agencies . I think the short answer is no. I think there needs to be a good conversation about those numbers. I would point you to two studies that came out. December cap down a lot of these numbers and said, in reality they are not spending tens of billions, they are spending less. That is the type of narrative we need to make clear. When we are making comparisons we need to be comparing apples to apples. It is a good point. One of the things that i think is ironically going to render chinas investment less six less successful is their parallel with the china 2025 initiative, they also have civilized what they call military fusion, which is an effort to extract the military applications of these advanced technologies. And aie Quantum Sciences technologies will have universal applicability in trying to efforteed the scientific into producing military advantage. It will have the more likely outcome it will produce neither itary advantage to advance nor advance the science. It is something of a limitation. I think we are likely to be more successful with this approach. Reassured by your observations about the scale of the increase. Having previously served in the office of management and budget as an official, one of the questions i always ask about Public Sector investment is, what are your expectations for the outcomes of this investment . Are there pertinent metrics . Expectations that might help shape public expectations about the scale of this investment . Best way tor the answer that is to give a inscription about the type of ecosystem we have and the role that the federal government plays in driving innovation broadly. What is different than almost any other country in the world is the way that the federal government spends research and development dollars. We dont have a ministry of science. We have research and development happening across all of our federal agencies. Incredible work. You have the National Science foundation. There is a department of energy which has billions of dollars that are spent through there. An Incredible National lab infrastructure. The National Institutes of health. We are a very diverse set of places and each one of them has their own aspirational goals and pieces of the puzzle that they play. Freee incentivizing a market of ideas around innovation. The part that the federal thernment plays is that government is investing in earlystage, basic research and development. That is different from what the private sector does. That is by design. The types of research the federal government approaches is the type of research that the private sector is not incentivized to do. That is a gap we try to fill. We do it in a way where these ideas can come to life and then they are absorbed the private sector. Think a great example to show how our system is unique as this breakthrough that happened last year on quantum supremacy. There is no doubt in my mind that someone in the had called upon someone else in the china to achieve quantum supremacy before the United States. We did not make that call here in washington to our community, yet the United States and that breakthrough first. The federal government invests in this basic research. We made a commitment to invest into a quantum lab at uc santa barbara. We continue to fund the research. Some breakthroughs were made, google solved us and said, wow, this is a great team. We could equip them with more resources. They acquired the group, brought them inhouse, and that group was able to achieve what they believed was quantum supremacy. They had to prove that their device could be faster than the traditional computer, so, who has the Fastest Computers in the world . The federal government does at our National Labs. They went to the fastest computer in the world and they ran a test to prove that they had done it. Here you can see this Virtuous Cycle of all pieces working together from the federal ,overnment doing basic work finding work at academic institutions, moving into the private sector, then having to go back to the federal government for the final check. This is a type of freemarket approach that has led to a breakthrough that is world changing. A very good observation. Having done some work with the National Labs, one of the things they have been able to do successfully that interacts in a constructive way with this initiative, which is in the foundational science of Artificial Intelligence and Quantum Sciences is they have extraordinary modeling and simulation capabilities. The application of artificial sensing,nce or quantum for example, can be put through a synergistic suite of modeling and simulation that contributes to the advance of the foundational science. It is the foundational science that creates the technology. On that particular point i would be interested in any of your observations about how the u. S. Ai and Quantum SciencesTechnology Stacks up internationally. Mr. Schneider our take as we lead the world in both domains. There are a number of metrics you can use to come to this analysis. Generally speaking we have the best institutions, we have the most highly cited papers, we have the most vibrant venture ecosystem, have the most privatesector dollars invested, and the list goes on and on. Is, less about where we stack up today, but how do we maintain that leadership . President k at the very intentionally titled his maintaininger American Leadership in ificial intelligence go intelligence. A strategic follow approach that has four lines of effort. The first is all around research and development leadership. Spendseral government 150 billion a year on research and development. How do we coordinate those efforts in a way that will maximize the output . We do that through prioritization, weve got a lot of effort on increasing r d spending to historic levels with this announcement. The list goes on. Around ao has regulatory approach. We want to remove barriers to ai innovation. And create a Regulatory Environment that fosters and drives further innovation in these domains. Product tothat our allow that to happen was our regulatory principles that came out last january. Core values of the United States with some oversight of these technologies. The third is always around the workforce. We believe in the power of the American Worker to drive these technologies. You need to create a pipeline for better talent. So we can have the best experts here. We have done that. A great example is the president directed our agencies to prioritize Artificial Intelligence in their grants and fellowships. Whether you are at the department of industry, you will be prioritizing ai before and away you would not have before. The next is around preparing the worker for the 21st century. Where therenment will be some displacement as these technologies take hold. Four is around international engagement. We believe there must be strong ties between the u. S. And its allies on driving leadership in these particular technologies. , if itwest does not lead leaves this domain to other countries which have a set of values that are in conflict with ours. We have done so in an administration that generally is very thoughtful around approaching multilateral agreements. Ecdai. S. Signed on to the o principles. We as western democracies can come together and say these are the types of principles that underpin the way ai is developed. That is very relevant and ties to a question that often comes up with new technologies where the government is a major player in the investment and foundational science is, how do you see the ability of the government to enable a transfer of this technology to the civil sector users that would be able to evolve from the foundational science . Mr. Schneider i think this is something the guest i think this is something the government has struggled with. If a discovery is made at our National Labs, how do intrapreneurial scientists and know anden no identify that this right through has happened, find private capital to spirit into something bigger . The last administration had a Strong Initiative a around around technology transfer. I think that has been a big effort to, making their lives more open and or open to the community to share the incredible work that is being done. We are ready and willing to work with privatesector folks. Is a very useful development, because the laboratories tend to like a lot of the channels for propagating the technology into the civil sector. Now with your work in the implementation of quantum legislation, i would be interested to see how we were getting on with it . You know, the of president signed the National QuantumInitiative Act in december 2018. That created a National Quantum initiative here in the u. S. That is the whole of government effort to achieve American Leadership in quantum science. We are excited about the funding levels. Congress authorized 1. 2 billion over five years. Budget lastt in his week proposed 500 million alone in year 2021. We are proposing to spend a clip that is significantly higher than where congress authorized. What is unique about that legislation is it specifically called for the creation of quantum consortia around the United States. By design, the places where this quantum science will happen, it must happen in a an environment that has the private sector and academia. They have pledged over 600 million over five years to building out this consortia. Of the technology to be transferred really depends on a mechanism like that. One of the interesting things was, you have also proposed investing 25 million in the quantum internet. I came to see what your expectations are given the internet as we know it, with was a product arpa, theion from predecessor of darpa. Arpanet was founded in 1969. This is a big deal for the country. It showed how creating a network that connected Government Entities together could be built into something bigger. That is something the department of energy is exploring now, this idea of being able to create it back bone for the quantum internet which begins with connecting a lot of our National Labs and use that as a backbone. Then privatesector companies can plug into it and expand. The doe is running full steam ahead on this. Toare excited to do the r d, start laying the foundations for it. There was a meeting in manhattan where we brought together industry representatives, academics, and national lab representatives to Start Talking about what an architecture would look like. On ourour first thoughts website, where you can see what we put together on what this future will hold for that. I think we are excited for what could happen. There you can see an environment where we deeply believe in privatesector approach to innovation. We think there is a Critical Role the government can play. Backbone is an Important Role. That is good. Developing idea of the backbone in the same way arpanet first became visible, it attracted users who were able to overlay heir agencies or Offices Mission on that infrastructure, to facilitate its more rapid propagation. It sort of follows this theory of the case where federal government should be focused on parts of the ecosystem that are not incentivized to do things on their own. Whether it is building and sustaining and maintaining supercomputing infrastructure. No company is going to create their own hpc infrastructure, but it is a role the federal government can play to build that infrastructure, to allow users to pay for runtime. Unintended but most important consequence of arpanet, apart from its existence is to create kitchen the creation of Human Capital to expand and exploit the. Echnology it just occurred to me that i am remiss in reminding you have the notice on display that if you have any questions you can get them via the neri internet. Perhaps we can do better. Binary neri internet. Perhaps we can do better. I am interested in what the reaction has been to the administrations initiative in the Scientific Community over thesears of seeing government led campaigns of varied response from the ostensible beneficiaries. I would be interested to see what kind of response you are getting. Mr. Kratsios i think our response has been pretty positive. Extensiverough a policy process to shape and create and launch the american ai initiative. We believe that each part of the ecosystem, whether in the private sector, in the academia, or federal government, all have a very Important Role to play. How do we identify what roles each of those pieces play in building those into the initiative . We were very maniacally focused assets thee the federal government has that can turbocharge the other pieces of the ecosystem . How do we make more of our hpc infrastructure available for computer time . We have shown a commitment towards increasing r d dollars associated with Artificial Intelligence. The general response has been positive. We continue to look for more commitments from other parts of the ecosystem. We have shown we are willing to make the leap in an environment where we want to be fiscally responsible and we are able to find a way to prioritize those areas. Both the Quantum Sciences and ai are things that deal with data. The questions we received from some particularly energetic member of the audience who did not need instruction from the chair, submitted a very interesting mention of this this is, your take on statement from the eu yesterday about aspiring to localize the holding of data that comes from the data activity of, say, nonresident firms. Mr. Kratsios the general position is the u. S. Has been pushing back against efforts by Foreign Countries to pursue data localization rules. Is a something we believe way that you can hinder innovation and is not something that is able to help innovation. For us, we continue to believe that having a free flow of data is absolutely critical. To represst want their people use data localization rules as an excuse to pursue those policies. Another question that had come in is more of a projection of what your expectations might inif china is successful taking the lead in the application of Quantum Sciences or ai, what do you think might be the consequences . Mr. Kratsios im confident the u. S. Will maintain its leadership in ai. [laughter] the New York Times been running a series of interesting reporting on how the chinese have applied their surveillance technologies, which use ai in particular to improve the accuracy of facial recognition and so forth. They are using their involvement totelecommunications systems appis malevolent tap that is intended to their involvement in the Communication System in a way that is enabling them to propagate their Surveillance System to elsewhere, not just in china, but in africa and other parts of the world. I think we have got a compelling warning that the technology is seems itsdly and it most malevolent applications are the ones that are selected first, rather than later. Stage i woulds like to see if there are any questions from the floor that did not make it into electronic form. Do we have a mic . Grace. I go, thanks for your great work. We are great at cutting edge research. What role does it play to lift the standards of basic education in the nation . Mr. Kratsios it could not be more critical. Creating a pipeline of american talent in these domains is absolutely imperative. One of the first actions that President Trump took in 2017 is a memorandum that prioritized education at the department of education, committing millions todollars 200 million programs. Continue to look for ways to create an environment where the next great quantum scientists are american educated. We think that is something that we can continue to move the ball forward on. But we have seen also is a lot of interest from the private sector in joining in that effort. A lot of what we try to do is take initiatives that we are pushing forward and have them otherr or paired with parts of the Innovation Ecosystem to build leverage. That 200xciting about billion dollars announcement was that it was. The next day with a 300 Million Dollar commitment from some of the Largest Technology companies in the u. S. That is the kind of energy we want to see. We want to continue to build that. One thing that our office is responsible for is the drafting of a fiveyear Strategic Plan on stem education. We are in the Implementation Phase of the Second Program cents second strategy sent the law was passed. Our r dunique about structure in the federal government is that lots of agencies do it. It is not just the department of education, just nasa. It is pervasive around all of our agencies. The white house can play a role as bringing those folks together and making sure the programs are working in alignment. Ofwe have had a couple additional questions that have been submitted in electronic form. One, expand on chinas use of ai to commit human rights abuses. What can the u. S. Do to hold accountable the u. S. Companies and universities that are come side Chinese Companies that fueled the abuse . Mr. Kratsios i think the action taken by the Commerce Department and adding a number of Chinese Companies that were complicit in enabling the suppression of ethnic minorities was a huge step for the country and something we need to continue to point to and bring more attention to. There are a number of Technology Companies that are being utilized to pursue these human rights atrocities and these need to be called out for what they entities list. O the question of u. S. Engagement thatlittle tricky and one i care about deeply. I think there is an obligation among Technology Companies to be a lot more open eyed and less naive and more cognizant of the types of activities that are happening and they are engaging in china. This idea you talked about it a lot this Civil Military fusion. Even if you are conducting what you believe is innocuous research in china, that type of research is being used for all sorts of ways that you cannot even imagine. We need to constantly remind folks, whether you are investors , whether you are american was a verythere prominent American Company selling medical devices used to itfire metric analysis was used to track and created database of ethnic minorities. This is very tragic and we should not have American Companies implicit in this behavior. Since the problem is so pervasive, i think we will probably need some more detailed federal attention to it. And of the issues that always comes up when discussion of , in thes are engaged is and quantumi sciences did the allocation of those resources result from a investment and some other parts of science that might be considered lower or came out second to ai and quantum . Mr. Kratsios our Budget Proposal for 2021 was a fix percent increase for research and development. The pie increased, and we spent a lot of that excess in the areas that the president has prioritized. We will take some more questions from the floor. Gent with the beard. I feel there is a flaw name. Your spectrum there are times in which things are dual use. You can use the exact same algorithm to detect heart arrhythmias as to detect flaws submarines. Can you need to spectra. In which it isum single use and you can measure the potential of that single use. The other spectrum is this complex mix of good uses and bad uses. Dual uses. Are you going to stop the proliferation of the arrhythmia attacked her detector . Cant you establish to spectra to better get a handle on this problem . Mr. Kratsios i think it is a tricky issue. In the world of ai you can think of facial recognition software, at the same type of technology that can be used to unlock our could be the same that used to identify certain folks who they are trying to target. Generally speaking, yes, it is a complicated topic. I think the best manifestation is the work commerce is doing. There were on the hook by congress to look at export controls for emerging tech. They had an arduous and long process in trying to get Stakeholder Feedback on things like export controls on ai. How do you get your hands around the types of issues you bring up. It continues to be tricky. Yes, sir. Taiwanese in the front of the penetration by china. Afford to cooperate with taiwan . Tsmcther question is, the is the world leader in semiconductor manufacturing. Is there something being theemplated to not benefit wrong use of those chips . Mr. Kratsios i think the best way for me to answer that is to go back to the main thesis of today, which is that we need to ensure western leadership in nextgeneration technological discoveries. That requires us to have a strong relationship with our allies, to work on aching sure they are the homes for the next great discoveries. Have hit our sellby date. I know you have to get back to your day job. We have really appreciated your opportunities that you have offered here to explain what has been going on with this important investment and we wish you well. Mr. Kratsios thank you so much for your time. [applause] President Trump holds a Campaign Rally in colorado springs, colorado this evening. Ch live color bridge coverage at 7 00 eastern. One of our neighbors was a priest. We used to come by once a week to ask my father for a donation to the church and also some Dairy Products for some of his constituents who could not otherwise afford it. In the 18 years my father never once refused such a request. 1942 then november same priest showed up, however this time he showed up with an armed Police Officer and two armed soldiers. We did not know why that happened this time. So we all went down to find out what was going on. We came close to the priest, he is looking at the Police Officer , pointing at us and saying, these are jews. So we were turned into the authorities by a priest. You can watch this entire hearing on combating a crimes tonight at 9 00 p. M. Eastern here on cspan. This House OversightCommittee Hearing was held to mark 75 years since the liberation of the auschwitz concentration camp. This weekend on book tv, africanamerican history. The likelihood of succession and challenges for the working class. At 6 20 eastern. The fierce 44. We dont say this is the greatest black achievers ever. We dont try to put that these are just 44 that we looked sensibility of the first africanamerican president , in the sense that, they did something pioneering, something disrupting, they were, you know, in some cases noisy geniuses or quiet innovators. Buckley 00 p. M. Fh examines the possibility of a state exiting the union. Every morning the Washington Post arrives and it seems to me like a fresh argument for secession. It just trips with contempt on the others. There is a lot of that. Athink what is missing is tolerance of people with different points of view. Sunday at nine p. M. Eastern on afterwards. Pulitzer prize winning journalist Nicholas Nicholas book typetheir rope. People born in the small towns around america, people are walking on a tight rope. One miss and they fall. There is no safety net. Over the last 50 years we with thise obsessed personal responsibility narrative, blaming the people who fall off the tight rope for the catastrophes that follow. Quach watch watch the authors this weekend on book tv. On cspan two. Lived in these lands and Sacred Places for thousands of years. Part of theriginal Cultural Heritage of every person hearing these words today. Hether you are native or not