Finland is taking a novel approach to joining the AI (artificial intelligence) arms race that seems to be taking place around the world.
While other markets are doubling down on spending on technology, with Germany recently pledging €3 billion (US$3.39 billion) by 2025, the Scandinavian country is choosing to educate its citizens about AI rather than pouring money into its digital ambitions.
Finland has embarked on an ambitious mission to teach 1 percent of its population, or about 55,000 people, the basics of AI, Politico reports. The goal is for the country to become a world leader in technology, not necessarily its development, but its use.
Finland’s Economy Minister Mika Rintila said: “We will never have enough money to be the leader in artificial intelligence.” “But how you use it is another thing.”
Part of the project aims to fill the technological void left by the decline of mobile phone maker Nokia by repurposing the economy into high-end applications of AI.
Developed by the University of Helsinki in collaboration with technology consulting firm Reaktor, this online course can be taken by non-technical professionals with no programming experience. By mid-December, around 6,300 Finns had graduated from this course, bringing the total to more than 10,000 graduates.
Meanwhile, more than 250 companies have also committed to training some or all of their employees.
Interestingly, for the project’s visionary, Teemu Ruth, an associate professor of computer science at the university, it’s not just about riding on emerging technologies in hopes of improving the economy, it’s also about pursuing a “more informed democracy.”
According to Ruth, one of the objectives was to provide voters with the information they need to contribute to AI investment and regulation in Finland. AI technology has little publicly available knowledge and its governance requires careful management.
As noted by MIT Technology Review, a recent study by Oxford University’s AI Governance Center found that many U.S. consumers are unaware of the widespread use of AI technology, including services from Facebook and Netflix.
Ruth seeks to democratize knowledge and awareness about AI technology and its ethical implications. This means that top-level decisions about its governance are not necessarily made by a small group of people, but may instead be subject to national consensus.
The initiative also works with various projects, including OpenAI, a non-profit AI research company co-founded by Elon Musk, which seeks to open source the development of “safe” AI technologies that are beneficial to humanity.
So while Finland may not have the bank account to rush to AI superpower status, it certainly has the potential to lead to another, but increasingly important, aspect of technology: a clearer and more popular understanding of it.
