Many people are trying to figure out exactly what Musk is up to with Twitter. While no one can be certain except him, a strong case could be made that he is trying to create an idealized version of what Benjamin Franklin seemed to believe might be possible.Musk has often cited Franklin as one of the individuals he admires and has learned from most in history. Walter Isaacson in his book "Benjamin Franklin" states, "The opinions people have are 'almost as various as their faces.' 'There would be very little printed,' Franklin noted, if publishers produced only things that offended nobody.'" Isaacson goes on to state that Franklin summed up the Enlightenment position in his famous statement: "Printers are educated in the belief that when men differ in opinion, both sides ought equally to have the advantage of being heard by the public, and that when Truth and Error have fair play, the former is always an overmatch for the latter."Now there is certainly a massive range of opinion on what constitutes "fair play." For more fascinating details around Franklin's ideas and how Franklin attempted to resolve the inevitable dilemma of deciding whether to accept money for publishing something he believed was untrue, you should read Isaacson's book.Based on all known information about Musk, one could speculate that individual editors could be augmented with AI to achieve an ideal of non-partisanship oversight that has yet to be achieved in history. Much is at stake with what happens next. It seems like an ideal almost impossible to achieve. It would potentially require the most sophisticated AI systems ever developed, with highly advanced autonomous learning capabilities to process the shear quantity of data required to conduct a public, global forum. Some might say it's like trying to put a man on Mars.
