[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 72 (Friday, April 28, 2023)]
[House]
[Pages H2112-H2114]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           ISSUES OF THE DAY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 9, 2023, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from California 
(Mr. Sherman) for 30 minutes.
  Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I will address an issue that will not 
affect us until the second half of this century, an issue that I first 
addressed 23 years ago; the first year of this century.
  It is the issue of engineered intelligence. The race that the 
engineers don't know that they are in. A race between the bioengineers 
and DNA and the computer engineers and artificial intelligence, AI, to 
create a new level of intelligence on this planet; in effect, to 
develop our successor species.
  AI will have dramatic effects in the short-term. It will have 
benefits because it is a powerful tool. It will be used by evil men and 
women because it is a powerful tool.
  They will use it to accomplish their goals, and sometimes they will 
make mistakes. They will invade privacy. They will deny loans to people 
who should get them for wrongful reasons.
  These are issues that we have faced in the last hundred years wherein 
this or that technology has invaded our privacy or discriminated 
against people in this or that financial transaction.
  My focus is the second half of this century when we will face issues 
far beyond that.
  As to artificial intelligence, Elon Musk and Steve Wozniak and others 
have asked for a 6-month delay, but we will not see a 6-month delay in 
our research.
  Frankly, a 6-month delay wouldn't accomplish much because the issues 
surrounding AI are intractable, and we have squandered at least 23 
years in failing to deal with them. Another 6 months will do us little 
good.
  I commend the Speaker of the House of Representatives, and I don't 
commend Kevin McCarthy all that often,

[[Page H2113]]

for bringing the entire House together 2 days ago to focus on the 
artificial intelligence issue and to hear from Professors Torralba and 
Madry of MIT.
  The professors showed us that AI clearly has met the Turing Test. The 
Turing Test was set forward by Professor Turing many, many decades ago.
  Professor Turing was the subject of the Imitation Game, one of the 
most brilliant computer professors we have ever had, that the western 
world has ever had.
  That test was that you would have a text chat with a computer and not 
be able to tell whether you were talking to a human or to a computer.
  At that point, computers would have reached human levels of 
intelligence. Well, we have clearly gotten to that level. We call it 
ChatGPT. Chat is right in the name.
  Today's computers cheat on the Turing Test. It is no longer a valid 
test because today's computers have something Professor Turing from the 
1940s and 1950s could not have imagined, and that is the internet.
  They are able to mimic a human response just by looking at every 
other human response to a similar statement or question by looking at 
the entire internet.
  As the MIT professors pointed out, it is kind of like a parrot; able 
to say something that under some circumstances might be the right 
response without understanding the words.
  AI will not, therefore, probably be intelligent the way I would view 
it for decades. We will need a new test, not the Turing Test.
  For now, AI is a tool. It is a great tool, as was writing and fire 
and jet travel and the internet. We will be able to deal with that 
tool.
  The second half of this century will see an AI that is intelligent, 
that has--or might very well see this. It may very well be self-aware, 
aware that it exists and that it exists on a planet that can be 
affected things outside of its own existence.
  AI may have volition; will. It may have ambition, the desire to 
survive, perhaps the desire to propagate, and in any case, the desire 
to affect the world so as to achieve its own survival. AI is a powerful 
tool.
  China is not going to stop developing it for the next 6 months. 
American corporations see big profits. They are not going to stop 
developing it.
  The private sector isn't going to spend much of its money making sure 
that AI is trustworthy. They are going to try to make sure that AI is 
profitable.
  We need to be concerned about an AI that is self-aware and ambitious. 
Such an AI will have risks that are beyond the apocalypse to the human 
race.
  Therefore, I propose that 10 percent of all the money we spend on AI 
research be used to prevent and monitor for self-awareness, volition, 
and ambition. Perhaps also to monitor for AI's awareness that we are 
monitoring it for those purposes.
  If someone, some futurist is describing what the second half of this 
century will look like, and they paint a picture that seems to be a 
science fiction movie, they might be wrong. They might be right.
  If a futurist paints a picture of the future that doesn't look like a 
science fiction movie, you know they are wrong. Our children will be 
living in a science fiction movie; we just don't know which one.
  Let us not build Skynet. If you remember the Terminator movies, you 
will remember that Skynet destroyed most of the human race just seconds 
before it thought correctly that it was going to be unplugged.
  Terminator was a great movie to watch, a terrible movie to live in, 
and I don't know if we can count on Sarah Connor.
  There are two advantages that the human race has in preventing self-
aware and ambitious AI. First, we are designing the AI, and we may 
understand what we are doing while we are doing it. We might.
  Second, the machines are inherently, from our experience, not 
volitional, not ambitious. Go to the largest computer and say to the 
computer, I am planning to unplug you, break you up, and sell you for 
parts, and that computer will help you calculate how much money you can 
get for the parts.
  Now let's look at genetic engineering, bioengineering. While the 
largest computer seems fine with being unplugged, the smallest insect 
does not.
  Try stepping on a cockroach and see whether it is okay with being 
unplugged. The DNA, which didn't care whether it survived, didn't care 
to propagate, didn't, and isn't with us.
  We may see genetic engineers, DNA engineers, start with human DNA and 
create a 1,000-pound mammal with a 100-pound brain that is going to 
beat your kids on the law school admissions test. That mammal, like 
every other mammal, will probably have a survival instinct.
  Today's big headlines are about ChatGPT and artificial intelligence. 
Last year's big headline was about CRISPR, a new technology for the DNA 
engineers to use, and those headlines may turn out to be more 
important.
  It will be hard to limit genetic engineering because initially, it 
will help deal with human tragedy. We will use genetic engineering to 
help cure disease.
  Genetic engineering will help the impaired human, will help to 
decrease disease or syndromes. First, we will see us create the non-
impaired human, the repaired human, and only then will we go forward to 
the transhuman.

                              {time}  1215

  There is a second issue, kind of something off to the side, and that 
is some world leaders--and I am looking at you Kim Jong-un--will seek 
to create submissive or subservient humans genetically.
  Third, also off to the side, there are animal rights advocates who 
have argued that animals have reached a point where they deserve 
constitutional rights. Well, when genetic engineers create a pet dog or 
a working dog with near human intelligence, those animal rights 
advocates may have a point.
  Let us return to the great race to create transhuman intelligence 
that is self-aware and ambitious. We need rules regarding genetic 
engineering that make it plain that while it is okay to seek to prevent 
intellectual disability, it is not okay to use genetic engineering to 
create intelligence beyond that of the average human.
  Of course, we need to prevent the use of genetic engineering to 
create animals of greater intelligence than that animal species or 
humans of impaired will or impaired intelligence.
  We do know one thing: Intelligence is the most powerful thing on the 
planet. It is intelligence that gave us fire. It is intelligence that 
gave us nuclear fusion. It is intelligence that gives us an unending 
supply of cat videos on our phone.
  The last time a new level of intelligence arose on this planet it was 
when our ancestors said hello to a Neanderthal. It didn't work out for 
the Neanderthal.
  There is a race between the computer engineers and AI and the 
bioengineers and DNA to develop the next level of intelligence, perhaps 
to create our successor species.
  Will the next dominant species on this planet be carbon-based or 
silicon-based, the product of genetic engineering or the product of 
computer engineering?
  Artificial intelligence is in the lead, creating an incredible level 
of intelligence that is useful to us now and is progressing at the 
speed of computing. Genetic engineering starts with the raw material 
that has a survival instinct and ambition.
  I don't know who will win this race. I am old-fashioned. I am rooting 
for team human, which may not even be in the race.


                       Recent Events in Pakistan

  Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I would like to address recent events in 
Pakistan. In evaluating those events, some would say that America 
should root for whichever political leader styles themselves as more 
pro-American and has been easier for us to deal with on this or that 
bilateral issue.
  I would say--and I think the State Department agrees--that what comes 
first is our dedication to democracy and the rule of law. Imran Khan 
was difficult for us to deal with; Prime Minister Sharif is somewhat 
easier. The question is democracy and the rule of law.
  The Supreme Court of Pakistan has ruled that there should be 
provincial elections in Punjab and later on in another province. That 
is the rule of law.

[[Page H2114]]

I believe that supreme court has ruled that its initial ruling is final 
and unappealable, and the supreme court has ordered that the funds be 
released as are necessary to hold those provincial elections.
  America stands not with this policy or that policy or a government 
that will agree with us on this issue or that issue. America stands for 
democracy and the rule of law. America also stands for human rights and 
the right of free speech and the right to express one's opinions. I, of 
course, have been concerned about some of the terrible disappearances, 
some of the abuses of human rights, some of the substantial evidence of 
torture.
  We need human rights and democracy in Pakistan. We need the rule of 
law. America stands not with its short-term bilateral concerns but with 
our dedication to democracy and human rights.
  Most important of all, Pakistan has national elections set forth in 
October, and nothing is more important for Pakistan than that those 
elections be timely, legitimate, fair, and that whoever wins the 
elections be allowed to govern.


                        War in Ethiopia, Tigray

  Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I will turn my attention to an issue that 
too many in Washington didn't pay attention to, as over 600,000 people 
died, and now some are not paying attention to the theory that the 
problem is over. I speak of northern Ethiopia, Tigray.
  While the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement was signed in November, 
the Tigrayan people continue to face ethnic violence and 
discrimination. Earlier this month, the AP reported that Amhara forces 
have renewed their campaign of ethnic cleansing against Tigrayan 
civilians and have uprooted roughly 47,000 Tigrayans from areas in 
southern Tigray just since March. The Amhara forces are carrying out 
this campaign of ethnic cleansing through forced evictions, harassment, 
and murder.
  Throughout all history, ethnic cleansing and genocide have gone 
together. This is not a standalone event, but rather, follows a 
horrific campaign of ethnic cleansing of Tigrayan civilians by Amhara 
regional forces that began in the year 2020.
  Last year, Secretary Blinken publicly recognized that ``Members of 
the Amhara forces also committed the crime against humanity of 
deportation or forcible transfer and committed ethnic cleansing in 
western Tigray,'' in addition to ``war crimes'' and ``crimes against 
humanity, including murder, rape and other forms of sexual violence and 
persecution.'' This is on top of the involvement of Eritrean forces in 
Tigray. Eritrea is a separate country. It has no business having its 
troops anywhere in Ethiopia.
  The determination made by our State Department on what is happening 
in Tigray follows extensive reporting by Human Rights Watch and Amnesty 
International in April of 2022, which documented: `` . . . Ethiopian 
federal forces, systematically expelled several hundred thousand 
Tigrayan civilians from their homes using threats, unlawful killings, 
sexual violence, mass arbitrary detention, pillage, forcible transfer, 
and the denial of humanitarian assistance.''
  We have many things going on in the world. I know that most of our 
foreign policy or a very large chunk of it is focused on events in 
Eastern Europe and Ukraine, but Washington cannot turn away from this 
issue, nor can we assume that the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement 
solves the problem.

  The people of Tigray deserve our attention and the engagement of the 
United States and the entire international community. Our leaders in 
Washington need to focus on what has been the most deadly event of the 
last several years.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Arrington).


            Celebrating the 100th Anniversary of Texas Tech

  Mr. ARRINGTON. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize and celebrate 
the anniversary of a west Texas treasure. 100 years ago today, Governor 
Pat Neff signed senate bill 103 that created what would become my proud 
alma mater: Texas Tech University.
  Today, Texas Tech's student population consists of 40,000 of the best 
and brightest young men and women from around the country and the 
world.
  I love Texas Tech and everything it represents. Our first president 
Paul Horn said it best: ``Everything that is done on these West Texas 
Plains ought to be on a big scale. . . . Let our thoughts be big 
thoughts and broad thoughts. Let our thinking be in worldwide terms.''
  Texas Tech has embodied that vision. Its students and alumni have 
lived up to that calling for an entire century. I am so proud to bear 
our banner far and wide.
  On behalf of Red Raider Nation, as we strive for honor ever more, 
happy 100th birthday to Texas Tech. Wreck `em, get your guns up, and 
God bless west Texas.
  Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, seeing no one else who wishes me to yield 
them time, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________