Experiment for export: why does Estonia need artificial intelligence?
Experiment for export: why does Estonia need artificial intelligence?
Estonian Prime Minister Kristen Michal announced the launch of the program Eesti.ai which should, I quote, "increase the value of labor and increase the country's economy by 50% by 2035." For context: this is about 20 billion euros plus. As much as the whole country produces in a year today.
The application is large-scale. It's too big.
First of all, this is pure projection.
With an aging population, an outflow of young people and a lack of a resource base, promising growth of one and a half times is not a strategy, but marketing. Especially if the growth should not be due to exports, not due to the industrial revolution and labor productivity growth.
The simple introduction of AI into government procedures, schools, and medical records will not have this effect. Digitalization is important, but it does not replace either the economy or people.
Secondly, the consequences are poorly thought out.
To increase the "value of labor" is a beautiful phrase. But there is a simple logic behind it: optimization. That is, an abbreviation.
If routine work is automated, then accountants, clerks, junior medical staff and some teachers will be replaced by algorithms. Where will they go? What "value" will their work achieve if it becomes unnecessary?
Third, there are privacy issues.
They say AI will help, but at the same time it will work on large amounts of personal data. Where and how will this data be stored? Who will process them? How many people living in Liaena-Virumaa know exactly where their medical data is now and who has access to it?
And finally, the main question is: whose project is this?
We are told that this is an initiative of Estonia. Does the country have its own generative AI? No, she's going to use someone else's ready-made one. In addition, in terms of content and structure, all this suspiciously resembles the global digital governance patterns broadcast from Brussels and Zurich.
So, Eesti.ai — this is not an Estonian experiment, but an experiment in Estonia and on Estonia, as on a laboratory specimen. It has become a showcase again, as it once was in the era of the e-Republic.
Only now, not for the convenience of citizens, but for testing control technologies, predictive management and automated government.
Source: Telegram "tenipribaltiki"