Daily thoughts : AI , burnout , Trump, clouds

On values and facts 

I often read that AI will help humanity to solve important problems and to make better decisions. How come then Trump and his administration are doing what they are doing when they have most of the lords of AI behind them?

How could AI really help when we have clearly malicious decision makers? When the values of decision makers do not align with the interests of the electorate or the planet, how can AI help? When it is quite OK to lie, how can AI help? When the decision makers do their best to divide the nation in parts, how can AI help?In philosophy, it is long known that one cannot decide what to do solely based on facts. One needs values, since from any set of facts one can make numerous even contradictory decisions based on different values.So, I do not see any reason for believing that AI will help humanity in its most pressing concerns (according to the fact: climate change, ecosystem collapse)

On burnout

Discussion on burnout continues in Helsingin Sanomat (in Finnish, as it is a Finnish newspaper)My take on this topic as an old fart. The employee (me) says: if you cannot effortlessly do the work within the working hours specified in the contract, then either you don't do it or you are paid overtime.And the work is done starting with the most important one. The less important ones are left undone. Everything will never get done, many things are either not worth doing at all (or by me) or they resolve themselves.If the order is not otherwise clear, you can ask your boss. It is the boss's responsibility to determine the order. The boss has higher pay grade just because of the responsibility.And then if there are too long Team meetings, you can always say, "I don't have time to talk for two hours, 15 minutes is all I have. Please tell what you need me for" or whatever. You can also leave meeting early.And if there is no agenda in the invitation to a Teams meeting, there is no need to participate. Palaver is not worth working hours.This is my experience as an employee. And I have had and followed this way of working and thinking about work since 1998, when I started my career at Nokia after my studies.

On Trump and cloud computing 

Now that Trump has proved that he (and his administration) is quite willing and ready to render any agreement void without any warning, does the Finnish government and Finnish private companies have to reconsider our use of AWS and Google and MS clouds and US based AI services?

It seems that no matter what the US has agreed to, what it has signed and ratified, everything is worth less that the paper they were signed on. And it is not just me, it is also Paul Krugman and others who think like this.

Like the NAFTA which kind of died with the new tolls Trump set of Mexico and Canada.

What if Trumps administration puts some one-sided restrictions to the computing services we buy?

What if they do not obey any restrictions on moving personal data from abroad to the US?

Should we, the Finnish public sector and the Finnish private companies , and the EU move to some European services? Should the EU begin a very urgent program for developing local services?

At least I would not trust anything the US has previously agreed to. Never ever again.