Two of New York\u2019s sweethearts, Mayor Zohran Mamdani and activist and \u201cBroad City\u201d star Ilana Glazer, spoke about AI at Webster Hall in Manhattan on Monday night, with Glazer posing questions to the mayor about the future of AI in society.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Mamdani encouraged New Yorkers to resist the overwhelming feeling that AI is inevitably coming for their jobs, their kids\u2019 minds, and their dignity, and to take back control instead.\u00a0<\/p>\n
His message came at a moment when the federal government is doing little to regulate AI, leaving cities to act on their own. At The People\u2019s AI Assembly, an event hosted by the AI Now Institute<\/a>, a think tank that explores the social implications of AI, Mamdani argued that the technology\u2019s rapid rollout is not inevitable and that public officials should hold AI companies accountable.<\/p>\n Last month, Mamdani ordered a ban on AI use <\/a>in elementary and middle schools. Glazer, a parent, said the technology\u2019s arrival in classrooms unsettles her.<\/p>\n \u201cIt just makes me nervous. It feels so non-consensual, as though\u2026this has to be in schools. It wasn\u2019t two years ago. Why does it have to be in schools?\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Over the summer, the mayor also introduced a policy that would require landlords, brokers, and real estate platforms to clearly disclose when a property\u2019s listing photos or videos are made with AI. The policy is aimed at protecting New Yorkers from getting \u201chouse-phished,\u201d<\/a> or tricked by misleading listings.<\/p>\n Both moves challenge the assumption that schools and the public must simply accept AI as it arrives.<\/p>\n \u201cNothing has to be,\u201d Mamdani said at the event Monday. \u201cThere\u2019s a creep that comes with this, and there\u2019s an intent to overwhelm that leaves people feeling as if there is simply no option.\u201d<\/p>\n He said there has been a \u201creckless adoption of technology without any kind of a reckoning with the limitations of that technology,\u201d citing the U.S. military\u2019s February strike on a school in Iran that killed more than 150 people, including at least 123 children<\/a>. Officials involved in the Pentagon\u2019s internal investigation have told Bloomberg that overreliance on AI in targeting was one factor in the attack.<\/p>\n \u201cThere is this desire to speak about [AI] as if it is infallible, as if it cannot be questioned, as if the only people who can regulate it are the ones who are currently developing it,\u201d Mamdani said, noting that Facebook made similar arguments back in 2008. \u201cWhat it really is,\u2019 he continued, \u201cis an attempt to escape any kind of accountability at any level, without also jeopardizing the potential valuation from an IPO.\u201d<\/p>\n Anthropic is expected to debut on the public markets this year, and OpenAI has said it will go public in 2027.\u00a0<\/p>\n Mamdani criticized the \u201ccomplete abdication of federal law\u201d when it comes to AI.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cAt a national level, when the conversation is about artificial intelligence, it\u2019s so often framed in this language of an arms race with China, and any of the humanistic concern, we just push to the side in a language of national competition,\u201d the mayor said.\u00a0<\/p>\n