Quantum Ethics ?

Here is my initial contribution to the question of how to address ethical issues of quantum technologies.

First, I think there will be for some long time lack of knowledge and incorrect understanding in the general public what quantum computers and quantum technologies are, due to the disagreements and lack of explanation for the quantum phenomena. This lack of knowledge will at one moment inhibit the public discussion about the innovations and use of these technologies. We can see that by euphoria when some news about quantum are announced (example of Google’s quantum “supremacy” and similar) and this euphoria can go in the opposite direction and become negative in case of a real or only perceived misuse or dangers of quantum computers. How do we address this? It is very difficult question, but it cannot be ignored. People don’t understand even AI, with quantum computers it can be much worse.

The next problem is that quantum computers will not be used in isolation. They will be deeply integrated in a stack of other technologies, and people will judge the whole stack together (like the 4th Industrial Revolution concept – 4IR) based on its effects on the society, human identity or the natural environment. These “4IR technologies” will be judged by their domains of application and by who is applying these technologies for what purpose.

Now, we know that there will be two major actors behind AI and quantum: large corporations and nation-states. First are developing and using various kinds of technologies for the profit purposes, and the second are using them for the regime maintenance or warfare.

Consider an example: quantum can be used by AI, which is used by a metaverse world, which is used by a digital platform, which is used by a company to develop and target advertisements, entertainment or video games to the young population. They all want to make their respective customer(s) engaged. Now, you can read this word “engaged” also as addicted. So, who is responsible for the addiction of the young users, which technology should be regulated, and where should we apply ethics ? When you take them isolated, we can find arguments that these technologies are value-neutral. But the final result might not be value-neutral.

So, the question is: what should be done with that? Luke Munn in his paper says: “AI Ethics has largely been useless”. This reflects the inconvenient truth that all governance initiatives to regulate technology were more or less unsuccessful. You may check this paper of Roger Clarke, which details all unsuccessful technology regulation attempts much before this AI hype. According to this paper, the only mechanism that could work is Co-regulation, but under the condition that there is a strong and uncompromising minister who stakes his personal accountability. In other words, some kind of benevolent dictator coming from the government.

Nevertheless, this topic is indeed important. Currently digital platforms like Facebook, Google and alike are not so invested in QC, but once the large quantum computers are up and running, naturally the capital will look for the use cases to address the market of billions of consumers. And when this happens, the neuroscience might achieve mapping of the brain, genetical engineering may achieve breakthroughs in gene editing, and AI will probably come to the level of artificial general intelligence (AGI). And in this context, ethics will become very important and indeed the people will judge all this stack. Maybe indiscriminately..

China AI 2023

Some analysts have recently said that the West can either technologically become the follower of China, or slowly decline into the status of a colony, or if it wants to avoid these scenarios, take urgent actions to leapfrog the current status of lethargy and denial. Read this article on how the approach to AI differs between China and the West, and why Europe has to take action now.
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German Weiqi

After the visit of Annalena Baerbock to Beijing few months ago, another significant event is the publication of German Strategy on China, a document that aims to describe the view of Germany on the future of the bilateral and multilateral relationships with China. The document is important, as it includes sections on how EU should align the position on China, and as it could also inspire similar policies in other countries like Switzerland.

It is important to mention that the document comes two years after EU parliament rejected the comprehensive trade agreement between EU and China, which included important clauses of opening Chinese markets in various industries for EU companies. The Strategy on China doesn’t refer to that Agreement, doesn’t comment it, and doesn’t propose any similar initiative to be renegotiated with China.

China is described as a great economic, technological, political and military power. The document seems to be written several months ago, as it doesn’t include any mention of recent diplomatic events like for example brokering Saudi-Iranian agreement to re-establish normal diplomatic relationships, or expected expansion of BRICS and SCO organizations where China plays key role.

It is not clear who are the authors of this document. But as Annalena Baerbock presented this document in MERICS forum, it could be assumed that MERICS analysts contributed in its preparation.

Here is my point of view on this Strategy.
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SEF 2023

I am very grateful for the opportunity to participate at Swiss Economic Forum during two days, on June 8-9 this year.

SEF is the most important annual conference for Swiss executives and this year it was even more prestigious as the 25th anniversary edition. The talks were in areas of the financial system, sustainability, geopolitics, innovation and of course digital technologies.

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Privacy in Digital Society

Privacy is a big concern in digital society. In the original prehistoric community, people lived together and there was no privacy. But these people shared the common destiny. If there was a hunger, they would all be hungry. If the tribe gets a disease, all members would be impacted. However, when they would encounter another tribe, that tribe would be seen as a rival, so they would not share information, at least until they are sure they were not competing for the same resources. Even then they would not share all knowledge, but only a necessary minimum and respecting the reciprocity principle. Nowadays, it should be similar. We should not keep our private information away from those with whom we share common destiny, but we should not share our personal information with those who are not going to be hungry if we are.

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Gender Equality

I was reading this report from IBM Institute for Business value titled ‘Women, Leadership and the Priority Paradox‘ and it just came to my mind : how obvious and commonsensical this actually is.

Everybody should agree that intelligence is equally distributed among two genders. At least all of us could see that in the primary and secondary schools, where boys and girls are both able to understand math, learn languages, science and arts. Still, later in life, in the western and most of modern societies, men have more power and money and women less of it. Maybe you would say : “Men earn money to bring home and women decide how to spend it”. But who decides within these companies and governments how to spend money ? Following the same logic, then shouldn’t it be the women ?

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From FDI to the Investment in Outsourcing

From April 11 to April 13, I attended Annual Investment Meeting (AIM) in Dubai, one of the most important world forums on the promotion of Foreign Direct Investments (FDI).

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I had an honor to moderate a session on outsourcing within this conference, whose objective was to advise the governments on how to capture opportunities in this dynamic and global market of outsourcing. Here is a brief account on this session.

My panelists were renowned experts and global industry thought leaders:

  • Christina Knutsson, Director at GDP Global
  • Jon Becker, Legal Counsel at Clearly Legal Ltd
  • Michael Ansah, Vice President of Dell
  • Roland Jabbour, Chairman at Jabbour Holding Group
  • Zhengping Yu, Executive Director of IBM China GTS GCG

Outsourcing was selected as one of the hot topics at AIM due to the fact that more and more money is being channeled into the alternative forms of investment, like mergers and acquisitions, licensing, subcontracting and outsourcing.

Foreign Direct Investments

Several thousands participants, ministers of more than 100 countries, government officials, industry experts and consulting companies convened to a large number of sessions and country presentations. Here are just few numbers to illustrate the current state of foreign direct investments in the world:
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