Within the framework of the official opening of the COP16 World Biodiversity Summit, President Gustavo Petro issued a harsh warning about the uncontrolled effects of artificial intelligence (AI) when combined with fossil fuels.
In an energetic speech before delegates from 196 countries, the president denounced that the unregulated expansion of AIarticulated with fuels such as coal, oil and gas, is leading to catastrophic consequences for humanity and the planet.
“We all know that artificial intelligence expands without human regulation, without a regulation built publicly, rationally and collectively by all the people of the world, an artificial intelligence that today uses dirty and fossil energies such as coal, oil and gas,” Petro stated from Cali.
You may be interested: Egidio Cuadrado, legendary vallenato accordion player, died
The Colombian president emphasized that the combination of AI and fossil fuels is accelerating climate collapsesomething that, according to him, not only threatens the stability of the climate, but also causes “universal mass unemployment, historically unprecedented profits, destruction of the climate and separation of human beings from reality.”
Petro linked these dangers to the excessive ambition of the economic elites, who, as he said, “dream of escaping to Mars in their dream ships, while leaving their guilt on the destroyed Earth.”
An urgent call for global regulation
The president emphasized that this lack of regulation on AI and the unbridled use of natural resources is about to break the fundamental balance for life on the planet. «Capital and profit have broken a delicate but fundamental balance of existence: the climate. In a certain way, greed, motivated by profit, is about to destroy life,” he warned.
Petro also dismissed accusations that humanity as a whole is responsible for climate collapse. According to the president, it is an “ideological falsehood” to blame all of humanity, when the truly responsible are “some powerful rich people who today are owners of networks and lifeless intelligences.”
During his speech, Petro reflected on what he described as a “ghostly reality” that unregulated artificial intelligence creates.warning about the creation of a “virtuality of happiness in the midst of barbarism” that threatens to distort the perception of reality. “There seems to be a humanity against life, a liar, because a humanity against life is also a humanity against humanity,” said the president.
For the president, AI could be used to generate a false sense of well-being while cities and cultures are destroyed by the climate crisis. He made an urgent call to combat these dangers and take up the fight for life and the survival of humanity.
«Perhaps the greatest battle is about to begin. It is no longer a battle for loot, for slaves or conquests. It is the great battle of life that Colombia wants to be part of for what is the heart of the world, the Country of Beauty,” he concluded.
You can read: Opposition calls for mobilizations against the Petro government for November 23