Chamber and committees

Like my amendment 60, amendment 17 addresses the carbon impact of major capital projects. As I indicated earlier, there are two places where a reference to that could be added to the bill, and amendment 17 seeks to add it in one of them.

Given that the cabinet secretary has said that she is willing to work with me to produce an alternative, I do not have much to say about amendment 17 at this point, but I will move it so that the rest of the amendments in the group can be debated. If the cabinet secretary wants to say anything further about any alternative approaches that she has in mind or issues that she wants to explore, I will be happy to discuss them, either now or later.

I move amendment 17.

I do not have anything further to add, convener. I am happy to work with the minister on an alternative, and I therefore seek permission to withdraw amendment 17.

Amendment 17, by agreement, withdrawn.

That is a perfectly fair comment. Indeed, it is not only about the private sector, as we also require the contribution of local government, the UK Government and our entire economy. The point that I am making relates to the annual political process of setting a budget for the Scottish Government as we debate it in Parliament every year. That budget has a substantial impact on our ability to deliver the Scottish Government’s policies and proposals in the climate change plan and thereby its ability to make the greatest contribution that it can to achieving those carbon budgets. Therefore, the finance budget needs to be scrutinised in that way by Parliament, and that scrutiny by Parliament will be most effective and best informed if there has been an independent assessment of what the Government sets out.

Yes—in a moment.

I do not honestly know what the Government’s reaction to the proposal will be and whether it will be open to it, but I genuinely urge the committee, when the Government tells us what it thinks of the argument, to consider the value of applying some independent scrutiny at that stage.

As Monica Lennon suggested, the spending proposals in each year’s finance budget are not the only factor, but they are a very major factor in whether the Scottish Government’s intended policy priorities, which are designed to deliver on a carbon budget, will be met. If we set out those policies and then fail to fund them, we can have no confidence at all that we are giving ourselves even a reasonable chance of meeting what is set out in the carbon budget.

The principle is to give Parliament the greatest level of independently informed analysis of what the Government is asking us to approve every year when we pass a finance budget. Will it be able to adequately fund the climate change policies that have been set out? Will it give us a chance of meeting the carbon budget?

That form of words was suggested by parliamentary draftspeople. My understanding and intention, as I expressed it to them, was that the phrase would apply to a body such as the Scottish Fiscal Commission. I understand that that would be captured by the proposed form of words.

I congratulate and thank Emma Roddick for bringing the motion and for her speech, which properly reflected the balance between opportunity and the threat that some members have emphasised.

We have already had a couple of references to science fiction and, as a lifelong sci-fi fan, I will make the case that those are not flippant. We are dealing with this sudden reality, but fiction writers have been thinking about the issues for centuries and we can learn a lot from them, including some of my favourites, such as E M Forster’s “The Machine Stops” or “Colossus: The Forbin Project”. Even in mainstream science fiction, the “Star Wars” series depicts a society in which people are surrounded by sophisticated and amazing AI, but in which most civilians are just about scratching a wretched living out of the dirt, and it can be read as a critique of Western notions of technological progress. There is a great deal to learn from the way in which fiction writers have understood AI and have explored both the opportunities and threats.

Some threats are unambiguous. Emma Roddick and others have spoken about sexual images as a form of abuse and other members have mentioned the undermining of democracy. We have already seen how disinformation and conspiracy can become the very currency of politics, even at a time when relatively few such tools are available. That can only grow and intensify, which will, in turn, intensify the issues of distrust and disinformation that human beings have been causing perfectly well by ourselves without technology.

There are many other areas of life where there is ambiguity and where both benefits and harmful consequences are likely. It has often been suggested that AI will generate new ways of coming up with drugs or with new molecules and chemicals that we would not have been able to produce otherwise. However, one researcher who I heard being interviewed on the radio, who had been doing just that, spoke excitedly about the potential benefits and was immediately asked what there was to prevent someone using the same algorithms to generate new chemical and biological weapons. He paused and did not really answer until, in the end, all he said was, “We just won’t ask it to do that.”

Many jobs will change, but will AI simply change roles or sweep them away? If AI removes the need for humans to do boring or repetitive jobs, it could create whole new categories of work, unleashing new creativity, but that is an economic question more than a technological one. Imagine, a few years from now—and we are only a few short steps away—a six-year-old merely speaking out loud what is in their imagination and, by doing that, creating a whole new computer game and sharing that around the world within moments so that millions can contribute to it. The technology could unleash creativity for video, gaming and coding, just as printing did for mass literacy and the written word. Alternatively, whole categories of creative work could be gone and absent, with no opportunities for people to explore careers in those areas.

Human skills, experience and competence could be built with this technology, or they could be massively undermined. In education, if students, teachers and curriculum creators collectively learn new things, we could enrich our education or we could be left with algorithms marking each other’s homework.

In short, there is no way to know yet whether, after thousands of years of human learning, we will become dependent and incapable as a result of this technology and will be left standing in the shadow of algorithms, rather than on the shoulders of giants. We simply do not yet know how to regulate these technologies.

As a species, so far, we have been poor at regulating our inventions, whether in the arms industry or in relation to the disinformation and conspiracies in print media or social media. We do not have a great track record on that.

I congratulate and thank Emma Roddick for bringing the motion and for her speech, which properly reflected the balance between opportunity and the threat that some members have emphasised.

We have already had a couple of references to science fiction and, as a lifelong sci-fi fan, I will make the case that those are not flippant. We are dealing with this sudden reality, but fiction writers have been thinking about the issues for centuries and we can learn a lot from them, including some of my favourites, such as E M Forster’s “The Machine Stops” or “Colossus: The Forbin Project”. Even in mainstream science fiction, the “Star Wars” series depicts a society in which people are surrounded by sophisticated and amazing AI, but in which most civilians are just about scratching a wretched living out of the dirt, and it can be read as a critique of Western notions of technological progress. There is a great deal to learn from the way in which fiction writers have understood AI and have explored both the opportunities and threats.

Some threats are unambiguous. Emma Roddick and others have spoken about sexual images as a form of abuse and other members have mentioned the undermining of democracy. We have already seen how disinformation and conspiracy can become the very currency of politics, even at a time when relatively few such tools are available. That can only grow and intensify, which will, in turn, intensify the issues of distrust and disinformation that human beings have been causing perfectly well by ourselves without technology.

There are many other areas of life where there is ambiguity and where both benefits and harmful consequences are likely. It has often been suggested that AI will generate new ways of coming up with drugs or with new molecules and chemicals that we would not have been able to produce otherwise. However, one researcher who I heard being interviewed on the radio, who had been doing just that, spoke excitedly about the potential benefits and was immediately asked what there was to prevent someone using the same algorithms to generate new chemical and biological weapons. He paused and did not really answer until, in the end, all he said was, “We just won’t ask it to do that.”

Many jobs will change, but will AI simply change roles or sweep them away? If AI removes the need for humans to do boring or repetitive jobs, it could create whole new categories of work, unleashing new creativity, but that is an economic question more than a technological one. Imagine, a few years from now—and we are only a few short steps away—a six-year-old merely speaking out loud what is in their imagination and, by doing that, creating a whole new computer game and sharing that around the world within moments so that millions can contribute to it. The technology could unleash creativity for video, gaming and coding, just as printing did for mass literacy and the written word. Alternatively, whole categories of creative work could be gone and absent, with no opportunities for people to explore careers in those areas.

Human skills, experience and competence could be built with this technology, or they could be massively undermined. In education, if students, teachers and curriculum creators collectively learn new things, we could enrich our education or we could be left with algorithms marking each other’s homework.

In short, there is no way to know yet whether, after thousands of years of human learning, we will become dependent and incapable as a result of this technology and will be left standing in the shadow of algorithms, rather than on the shoulders of giants. We simply do not yet know how to regulate these technologies.

As a species, so far, we have been poor at regulating our inventions, whether in the arms industry or in relation to the disinformation and conspiracies in print media or social media. We do not have a great track record on that.

Given that Ben Wilson has raised the issue, perhaps I could ask him to confirm one point before I ask Bridget Burns to speak.

Professor Jafry said that we need a clear plan. The energy strategy and just transition plan is currently with the Government and waiting to be published. If the Scottish Government was able to publish the plan before it went to COP29, with it supporting a presumption against new fossil fuel capacity, that would be a symbolic position and an example of soft power, because decisions on such licences are not taken here. That would be within the scope of the Scottish Government’s role at COP29, and it would be an important step in rebuilding and restoring Scotland’s credibility in that area.

That is helpful.

Does Bridget Burns want to add anything?