US Vice President J D Vance on Tuesday endorsed PM Narendra Modi‘s views on AI and agreed that the technology will make people more productive and not replace human beings.
“And I appreciate PM Modi’s point. AI, I really believe, will facilitate and make people more productive. It is not going to replace human beings. It will never replace human beings. And I think too many of the leaders in the AI industry, when they talk about this fear of replacing workers, I think they really missed the point,” Vance said in his speech at the AI summit in Paris, where he cautioned Europe to tread carefully on tech regulation and that any tough approach had the potential to smother AI.
In his speech at the summit, Modi said history has shown that jobs do not disappear due to technology, and had called for investing in skilling and reskilling.
“Loss of jobs is AI’s most feared disruption. But history has shown that work does not disappear due to technology. Its nature changes and new types of jobs are created. We need to invest in skilling and reskilling our people for an AI-driven future,” Modi said.
He added AI could help transform millions of lives by improving health, education, agriculture. It can also help create a world in which the journey to the sustainable development goals becomes easier and faster, the PM said. “We must pool together resources and talent. We must develop open-source systems that enhance trust and transparency. We must build quality data sets, free from biases. We must democratise technology and create people-centric applications,” Modi said.
In their first meeting after Vance took over as vice president, he and Modi seemed to have instantly hit it off and images from the meeting showed the two leaders at ease and eager to engage to deepen the bilateral relations between the two largest democracies.