Marie Sherlock (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for attending. I think this has been one of the most important meetings we have had in a while, with profound questions confronting us as legislators and policymakers in the Oireachtas. I take from this conversation that there is a clear call for regulatory oversight. Judging by the conversation to date, there is enormous potential for good from AI but also for bad, for both workers and wider society. The basic question in my head concerns whom and what we are regulating. I am interested in the views of Professor O'Hare and Mr. Lupton regarding the market for AI. I assume we are not talking about a small number of major companies. In light of that, is there an issue in that software such as ChatGPT open source? Open source was seen as a force for good in the past, but is there now potential, not least because this technology is open to being abused, distorted or changed, for open source to be problematic? If we are trying to regulate something we do not fully understand - somebody somewhere might understand the inputs but perhaps not the extent of the outputs - do we need to start thinking about the regulation of AI in the same space as how we regulate, say, biological hazards? Mr. Lupton spoke about the concept of a land registry-type regulation system. Is that where we need to go with regard to how we regulate AI, whereby it needs to be strictly regulated in terms of its generation and use because of its potential for harm in a range of spheres, not least in the workplace?