Can political science contribute to the AI discourse?

Economists generally see AI as a production technology, or input into production. But maybe AI is actually more impactful as unlocking a new way of organizing society. Finish this story: * The printing press unlocked the Enlightenment — along with both liberal democracy and France’s Reign of Terror* Communism is primitive socialism plus electricity* The radio was an essential prerequisite for fascism * AI will unlock ????We read “AI as Governance” by Henry Farrell in order to understand whether and how political scientists are thinking about this question. * Concepts or other books discussed:* E. Glen Weyl, coauthor of Radical Markets: Uprooting Capitalism and Democracy for a Just Society, and key figure in the Plurality Institute was brought up by Seth as an example of an economist-political science crossover figure who is thinking about using technology to radically reform markets and governance. * Cybernetics: This is a “science” that studies human-technological systems from an engineering perspective. Historically, it has been implicated in some fantastic social mistakes, such as China’s one-child policy.* Arrow’s Impossibility Theorem: The economic result that society may not have rational preferences — if true, “satisfying social preferences” may not be a possible goal to maximize * GovAI - Centre for the Governance of AI* Papers on how much people/communication is already being distorted by AI:* Previous episode mentioned in the context of AI for social control:* Simulacra and Simulation (Baudrillard): Baudrillard (to the extent that any particular view can be attributed to someone so anti-reality) believed that society lives in “Simulacra”. That is, artificially, technologically or socially constructed realities that may have some pretense of connection to ultimate reality (i.e. a simulation) but are in fact completely untethered fantasy worlds at the whim of techno-capitalist power. A Keynesian economic model might be a simulation, whereas Dwarf Fortress is a simulacra (a simulation of something that never existed). Whenever Justified Posteriors hears “governance as simulation”, it thinks: simulation or simulacra?Episode Timestamps[00:00:00] Introductions and the hosts’ backgrounds in political science. [00:04:45] Introduction of the core essay: Henry Farrell’s “AI as Governance.” [00:05:30] Stating our Priors on AI as Governance[00:15:30] Defining Governance (Information processing and social coordination). [00:19:45] Governance as “Lossy Simulations” (Markets, Democracy, Bureaucracy). [00:25:30] AI as a tool for Democratic Consensus and Preference Extraction. [00:28:45] The debate on Algorithmic Bias and cultural bias in LLMs. [00:33:00] AI as a Cultural Technology and the political battles over information. [00:39:45] Low-cost signaling and the degradation of communication (AI-generated resumes).[00:43:00] Speculation on automated Cultural Battles (AI vs. AI). [00:51:30] Justifying Posteriors: Updating beliefs on the need for a new political science. Get full access to Justified Posteriors at empiricrafting.substack.com/subscribe