“The cross-cutting nature of AI means that no field will remain untouched by this technology.”
Dr. Teresa Scassa
“The cross-cutting nature of AI means that no field will remain untouched by this technology,” says Dr. Scassa. “To maximize its benefits, it will be critical that the social and ethical implications of AI are addressed at the earliest stages of development, through to application, and with greater collaboration among researchers across disciplines and sectors.”
Dr. Scassa was appointed as Chair of the Expert Panel on Artificial Intelligence for Science and Engineering in April of 2021. The panel came about at the request of the National Research Council of Canada (NRC), which asked the CCA to examine the legal, ethical, policy and social challenges associated with deploying AI technologies to enable scientific/engineering research design and discovery in Canada. Dr. Scassa was joined by a multidisciplinary group with extensive expertise in law, policy, ethics, philosophy, sociology, and AI technology, including Dr. B. Courtney Doagoo, a Fellow at the AI + Society Initiative and the Centre for Law, Technology and Society at the University of Ottawa.
The Expert Panel’s report, entitled Leaps and Boundaries, concludes that while AI unquestionably has the potential to spur innovation and further scientific understanding beyond the limits of human abilities, it also has the potential to deepen existing inequities, perpetuate human biases, and even create new ones. AI is already used for a broad range of purposes in science and engineering, but the rapid pace at which AI technologies are developing and expanding creates legal and regulatory hurdles, including issues related to data governance, intellectual property, and the management of acceptable levels of societal risk. The report identifies the actors whose decisions will determine how mounting AI challenges can be addressed and how various fields and sectors can potentially integrate AI into their practices. It will support crucial policy-making and inform national and international dialogue on this important topic. In addition to support from the NRC, the report was co-sponsored by the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.
Dr. Scassa is a world-leading scholar, and holder of the Canada Research Chair in Information Law and Policy. Her research explores issues at the intersection of evolving technologies, established laws and global preoccupations over data and its governance, making her ideally suited to her leadership role on the development of this report.
The Common Law Section congratulates Dr. Scassa on her valuable contributions to this important area of public policy.
