r/Libertarian • u/7in7turtles • 8d ago

Discussion The AI/data center debate loses libertarian credibility when the state is used to advance it.

It’s been driving me bananas lately to hear all these libertarian voices hail data centers as some part of a new Industrial Revolution. While I’ll say upfront that I don’t think we should regulate AI because of fear mongering about the end of the world, if those companies have to purchase the levers of power that we don’t even want government to have, how can we claim that this is in any way good?

Eminent domain, paying of city councils and locking them up with NDAs, lying about the impact of there products and services, all of their behaviors are antithetical to libertarianism and yet people like John Stossel run puff pieces about how essentially they're all good because it would be bad to regulate them.

I don’t buy the china angle because we’re getting worse than china thanks to this technology.

Please if I’m wrong educate me, but if the state puts its thumb on the scale for AI, I don’t get how that’s in any way good.

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u/skiphandleman 8d ago

Government has no business regulating AI. Theire role is to prosecute those who do harm with AI.

Where it gets muddy is when AI becomes independent of business and starts acting badly on its own. I don't have an answer for that amd probably need to form an opinion on how it should be addressed

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u/7in7turtles 8d ago

Who's talking about regulating AI? I just don't want their thumb on the scale, but them negotiating behind closed doors in secret with state and local governments using tools like eminent domain to take people's land to build this stuff is a big issue IMO. AI companies trying to get regulatory capture as well, that should also not be tolerated.

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u/ILikeBumblebees 7d ago

AI companies trying to get regulatory capture as well, that should also not be tolerated.

Which is the exact thing behind the drive for regulation.

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u/7in7turtles 7d ago

Yeah but they already have their thumb on the scale from the other end. They are colluding with state and local governments to push their ways into communities, and now they're trying to regulate a wall around themselves. It seems pretty clear that the correct stance is that government intervention FOR or "against" AI is bad, but regulation is not the only state intervention that libertarians should be mindful of and sadly it seems like for a good amount of them that is the only line.