Some of the Democratic Party’s most prominent voices are pushing for tighter limits on artificial intelligence, including former President Barack Obama, who has joined calls for a slower pace of frontier AI development after years of Democratic leaders touting the technology’s economic and strategic potential."We need government – and specifically our leaders in Washington – to get proactive in coming up with concrete proposals, laws and regulations that deal with serious safety concerns, anticipate AI’s impact on jobs and our kids, and make sure that AI’s benefits are widely spread," Obama said in a statement Monday night.Obama’s latest comments put greater emphasis on slowing frontier AI development than his White House did in 2016, when his administration highlighted the technology’s economic potential while also warning about disruption and calling for policy responses.Democrats have long paired enthusiasm for AI’s economic and strategic potential with warnings about its risks, but some of the party’s most prominent voices are now going further — calling for a slower pace of frontier AI development and tougher limits on how the technology is built and deployed.Attorney General Todd Blanche argued Tuesday that Democrats’ renewed focus on the potential risks of artificial intelligence should not be treated as "breaking news," suggesting the timing, months before the midterm elections, is politically significant.AI EXTINCTION WARNINGS DOMINATE HEADLINES AFTER EX-ANTHROPIC EMPLOYEE'S VIRAL POSTPresident Barack Obama and Mark Zuckerberg wave to the audience at the conclusion of their panel discussion during the 2016 Global Entrepreneurship Summit at Stanford University in Stanford, California, U.S., on Friday, June 24, 2016.
(David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images)"Every Democrat senator suddenly races to a microphone to talk about AI after being eerily silent for months and months, a month.So to talk about the timing of this as being ...