Last week brought a rare good-news story: artificial intelligence enabled researchers to develop an antibiotic capable of killing an exotic superbug that had defied all existing antimicrobial drugs. An AI-driven algorithm mapped out thousands of chemical compounds in key proteins of Acinetobacter baumannii, a bacterium that causes pneumonia and infects wounds so severely that the World Health Organization had classified it as one of humanity’s three “critical threats.”
Once the mapping was done, the AI proceeded to invent an effective drug with novel features compared to existing antibiotics. Without AI’s help, the life-saving antibiotic would remain a pipe dream. It was a scientific triumph for the ages.
But there is a nasty flipside. Remember Chris Smalls, the Amazon warehouse worker who organized an employee walkout from the company’s Staten Island, New York, facility to protest working conditions during the pandemic?
Smalls shot to brief fame when it was revealed that, having fired him, Amazon’s rich and powerful directors spent a long teleconference planning to use character assassination to undermine his cause. Still, a couple of years later, Smalls successfully organized the first (and still only) formally recognized Amazon employees
— source yanisvaroufakis.eu | Yanis Varoufakis | 18/07/2023