The a watch Katie Mcfarland with her book revolution trump, washington, and we the people stop sunday night 9 00 p. M. Eastern on after words on booktv. The u. S. Chief Technology Officer talked about Artificial Intelligence and competition from china, hosted by the Hudson Institute this is about 50 minutes. [inaudible background conversations] [inaudible background conversations] welcome everyone to our meeting on ai and advanced Quantum Information Sciences, quantum computing etc. Im pleased to have an opportunity to welcome michael kratsios, who has a thoroughly intimidating title of chief Technology Officer of the United States. I think weve come to the right place to engage this important subject. The administration has ttaken a very energetic position in trying to advance the stateoftheart and above the applications of Artificial Intelligence and the Quantum Information Sciences to our nondefense applications, there is a parallel effort of substantial scale in the department of defense who the defense advanced search for projects agency and other defenses entities because these technologies are indeed of universal applications. I like to take an opportunity to begin the discussion with michael to perhaps start with a bit of current news where europe has European Union had in particular has tabled some of their ideas about how to manage some of the particularly the ethical issues relating to the use of artificial ointelligence. Weve had of course quite a number of years of tension on a transatlantic basis about the application of advanced technologies to commercial as well as governmental applications. Id be interested in getting your take on this michael. Thank you so much as you probably know the United States is kind of first out of the gate in january where we proposed the ai regulatory principles and those are out for comment. Since then the eu yesterday has released their attempt to do what we did in january with providing some sort of structure around the way they think about regulations of add Power Technologies and the European Union. Our take is twofold, i think one we are very encouraged to see a lot of focus in their document on the importance of fostering an Innovation Ecosystem thats friendly to cu artificial technology. In helping drive startups and small startups of Smaller Companies to work in the space. They also talk very much about valuesbased approach, one that the United States expressed when we put out our principles in january. The one thing i do think is important to flag and one thing where i think there could be room for improvement is their next step from taking this approach and actually implementing it. We found what they actually put out yesterday really i think it does in some ways clumsily attempt to bucket ai Power Technologies as either high risk or not high risk. The way they are proposed regulatory scheme and structure there will be some sort of group of some kind in europe that will make some sort of decision on whether or not a technology is highrisk or not and if you are high risk coming have to go through a pretty extensive regulatory approach. If you are not highrisk you dont have to do anything. We believe this all or nothing approach is not necessarily the best way to approach regulating Ai Technologies we think ai regulation is best when it serves on a spectrum of sorts. There are certain types of technologies that ai Power Technologies that will require heavy regulatory scrutiny and we in the United States are prepared to do that. There are quite a few that need just a little or not at all and i think creating the spectrum is important. I think thats kind of where our biggest concern is and ill be traveling to brussels next month and speaking to folks over there and sharing some of these concerns. I think theres a lot we have in common but i think this approach of very bluntly bifurcating the entire r d through the entire ai tech ecosystem into two buckets a little harsh for. I think its a very good point and use it as you may know, i also serve on the dod defense vScience Board and we done studies on the application of modern technology to the development of both ai and quantum and one of the opportunities that may evolve as Technology Improves to facilitate the better alignment with our allies in europe is an effort thats underway in darfur to develop explainable ai so that the user of the output of an ai based bit of analysis is able to understand the coupling between the outcome and the data that produce the outcome. We are of course not there yet but there may be some opportunities for Research Collaboration between between the u. S. And the eu to perhaps better solve this problem of explainable. Its a good segue into how the u. S. Approach in some ways differs a little bit to the european. When we put out our r principle last january they focused on three main themes and one hits directly on this explained ability. The most important thing in the u. S. Model is public engagement. Whenever we attempt to pursue regulatory action of any kind toward a private Sector Company of implementing add Power Technology we as the federal government have some experts but the community of people know this best. They have the scientists and technology and the experts to help us do that. We believe we need to as riskbased and sectorbased and specific. The types of its different for the type of regulation you have for add Power Medical diagnostic. Rather than pocketing the technology those are all high risk you have to ,be 12 things are these are not highrisk you dont have to do anything there has to be a bit of a spectrum and flexibility in the model so youre able to actually regulate appropriately for the risk of each of these technologies provide. The third, which i think you bring up very astutely is this idea of emoting trustworthy ai. Something we deeply care about and read to engender trust of the American People and the technology they are using. We need to create a regulatory model that allows the trust to be built and having better already abone of the issues thats related to this thats coming fast upon us is the interaction between ai and the internet of things. Isthe Science Board has been doing some work on the technologies of economy and counter autonomy and Ai Technology is one of the things that can make iot work for the whole society. May also be some opportunities for collaboration with our eu colleagues on trying to understand how we will manage the introduction of iot because like other applications where ai is involved the range of applications is extraordinarily diverse. I couldnt agree more and i think where we have manifested that type of thinking in our approach is actually through the first large white house summit we held on Artificial Intelligence was very intentionally titled ai for american industry. We were trying to express when we were hosting the event is Artificial Intelligence is going to touch every industry in the United States whether you are doing Oil Extraction in texas, whether you are doing farming in iowa whether biotech in boston you will be using this technology to drive your business. Uif the u. S. Wants to lead the world and win Artificial Intelligence we need to make sure all the industries are able to capture the benefits that that Artificial Intelligence can provide. Being able to have that very important dialogue with allies around the world on how to move these forward is absolutely critical. One of the news items that has been a pretty constant drumbeat for the past halfdozen years or so has been chinas alignment of its perception of its national and security interest with investments in advanced technology. They announced they are made in China China Initiative five years or so ago which identified about 10 areas of technology that would be getting particularly investment from china and often described in terms of billions of dollars. Id be interested in your observations about how chinas efforts have been coupled with the Administration Initiative and your perception of the chinese effort. Sort of two threads to pull on it i think the first needs to be said and i think timmy should be apparent and probably communicated more often generally is that the transcommunist party is using Artificial Intelligence to push forward a complete osurveillanc to maintain a great chinese firewall and restrict content that Chinese People have access to. Ctthese are the youth cases of Artificial Intelligence that are deeply in conflict with western values. This is something we have tried to communicate and continue to communicate with our friends and allies in europe and theres never been more imperative than now to ensure that the u. S. And allies lead the world in Artificial Intelligence. We need to ensure the next great Technological Breakthroughs are made here in the west are underpinned by western values and i think we dont lead we run the risk of these values that are diametrically opposed to everything we believe in slowly permeating these new technologies and being exported abroad. Thats why the imperative is so great thats why the president e signed into executive order launching the air american and i initiative will pursue the whole government approach over the last three years to ensure American Leadership in Artificial Intelligence thats why we made the big announcement last monday the minute you saw were committed to doubling nondefense ai spent in by the federal government in the next two years. Its moving from about billion dollars to 2 billion a federally funded our indiana night and in the course of only two years. This is a massive and incredible step forward in our commitment to American Leadership in this particular domain. I think its very important to remember is that one, i think point to what you m brought up as these commitments that have been sort of publicly asserted by the chinese government. We believe that there is a lot we have a lot of skepticism in the validity of those particular statistics. I challenge all of you to spend hmore time thinking about if youre attempting to report on are they actually spending billions of dollars . Is that really a true statement . Can you compare that number to the number that Congress Appropriates and is actually spent and put out the door by our agencies . I think the short answer is no. There needs to be a more stronger better and bigger conversation around the validity of these numbers. Pointing to two studies that came out. He put on a study last december that cast down a lot of these numbers that in reality there is definitely not spending tens of billions into spending a lot less than that. Thats the type of narrative we need to make clear because when we are trying to make comparisons about what the west is spending and how we are approaching our own ecosystem we need to be comparing apples to apples. Is a good point and one of the things i think ironically is going to render chinas investment less successful is that in parallel with their made in china 2025 initiative they also have emphasized what they call Civil Military fusion which is an effort to extract the military applications of these advanced technologies. Both Quantum Sciences and ai are technologies that will have universal applicability in trying to forcefeed the scientific effort into producing military advantage will have the more likely outcome that will produce near neither military advantage or advance the underlying science. It is something of limitation so i think we are likely to be more successful with this approach. I was very reassured by your observations about the scale of the increase and having previously served in the office of management and budget as an official number of years ago. One of the questions i always ask about Public Sector investment, which is easy to measure is what are your expectations for the outcomes of this investment . Are there pertinent metrics . Are onthere formed expectations that might help shape public expectations about the scale of the investment . Absolutely. I think the best way to answer that is to give a little bit of a description about the type of Innovation Ecosystems we have here in the United States and the roles the federal federal Government Agency plays in driving innovation in the United States. With very different than almost any other country in the world and particularly in china is the way that the federal government spends research and development dollars. We dont have a ministry of science thats sold out x number of dollars and a decision on how to spend it via research and development happening across all our federal agencies. Darfur is doing incredible work more on the late stage applied side you have in abto invest in earlystage basic Research Done by a lot of our universities. Theres a department of energy, which has billions of dollars spent to their Incredible NationalStructure National institute for health which does a lot of our bio related bio Health Related research. We are very diverse set of places and each of them have their own aspirational goals. Vein some ways we are incentivizing and creating free market ideas around innovation. The part the federal government plays a larger spectrum is generally speaking the federal government is investing in earlystage precompetitive basic research and development. Its very different then what the private sector does and thats by design. The types of research the federal government generally approaches is the type of research the private sector is not incentivized to do on their own. Thats a gap which i feel. We do it in a way where these ideas can come to life and then they are taken up and absorbed by the private sector brought to fruition and completion ultimately to commercialization. A great example to show how our system is unique is this breakthrough that happened last year on quantum supremacy. There is no doubt in my mind someone in beijing had sort of called upon someone else in china to achieve quantum supremacy before United States did. We didnt make that call here in washington to our community yet the United States made the breakthrough first. The question is why or how. I think the story is pretty interesting. The federal government invests in this earlystage basic research we made a commitment years ago to investing into a quantum lab at uc santa barbara. Its doing incredible work and we continue to fund the early basic Stage Research that didnt have commercial obligations. This was some breakthroughs were made, google sought said this is a great team we could bring them on board and put them with more resources that we have more computer time. We have acquired the Group Brought them inhouse and that group was able to achieve what they believed was quantum supremacy. Now they have to prove their divides actually be faster than traditional computer. It has the Fastest Computers in the world the federal government does our National Labs. They took their breakthrough and they went to the arun by the doe and ran the test to prove theyve done it. You can see this incredible Virtuous Cycle all pieces of the ecosystem working together lefrom work funding academic academic institution. Moving to the private sector and having to go back to the federal government ultimately for the final check. This is the type of freemarkete approach and innovation which has led to a breakthrough which is really well changing. Its a very good observation. Having done some work with the National Labs one of the things they been able to do successfully i think interacts in a particularly constructive way with this initiative which is basically in the foundational science of Artificial Intelligence. In Quantum Sciences. They have extraordinary modeling and simu