OVERTHINKING ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

 

OVERTHINKING ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

 

AI continues to make headlines, nothing earth shaking, but newsworthy enough to pique interest.  There are the headshaking monetary valuations of AI, and we’re talking hundreds of billions of dollars.  Early investors must be salivating, kind of like Bitcoin in its infancy and gold doubling in value.  Wow!  To have that kind of investment instinct and to be at the cusp of dizzying valuation increases that have the potential to make you wealthy like Croesus.  And then there are the soothsayers cautioning about an impending bubble that will see some of that value crumble and disappear.  They call them gurus.  Their names will be remembered like Nostradamus when right and forgotten like one-hit wonders when wrong the second and third time around.  The prophets amongst us who have predicted the end of the world can sympathize with that lot.  And then there are the words of caution and warning of those who have been involved with the development of AI from the onset and who are now cautioning about its impact, pretty well on par with all the scientists and engineers involved in developing the atomic bomb.  The kind of oops that sets in when they watch the darn thing go off and they realize what kind of horrific beast they have unleashed on mankind.

In this article I want to touch upon some of the worst fears as expressed by those involved in developing AI, its potential and of course, the abuse that has already started.  When it comes to the worst it is our imagination that is running wild with prognostications that are all over the place.  The worst of course is a self-replicating, autonomous AI posing a threat to humanity, the slave enslaving its former bosses.  Its creator.  What a self-replicating, autonomous AI would look like is anyone’s guess.  I would dare to guess that this worst-case scenario will belong in the spheres of science fiction for a very long time.  Probably forever.  One of the first questions that comes to mind is this; can AI survive without people?  Is it possible?   And the second, a mere observation and acknowledgement; we know that people can survive without AI.

To go from plug-in and totally dependent on human engineering and programming to self-replicating and autonomous will involve a path of self-destruction and self-realization that is highly unlikely unless some humanity-hating-entity gets involved and . . . is successful!  And why would AI independently envision a role for itself and for what purpose?  A source of intelligence floating around for the sake of intelligence?  Doing what?  Would there still be room for both?  People and Artificial Intelligence!

We know that AI has incredible potential, but it has its detractors and the persnickety, uncomfortable fact that AI used for nefarious purposes is a heck of a lot more profitable than the processes and experiments designed by scientists, programmers and engineers to solve issues and problems currently plaguing humanity.  The crooks are eyeing short-term profits and lining their pockets with ill-gotten gains whereas the scientific processes take time and painstaking verification. 

When it comes to protecting AI from itself we’ve already lost the battle.  When it comes to all things human and the marvels we invent, we always end up as our own worst enemy.  We already know that AI in the wrong hands can inflict a horrendous amount of damage: intellectual theft, identity theft, sidelining industries and systems by cyber hackers, extortion and blackmail, industrial espionage, the monitoring of private wireless communications, intercepting data by rogue elements, and that includes governments.  Too many actors are involved in the wireless, cyber world we have created and it leaves us wide open and vulnerable to abuse.  AI is already wreaking havoc on a global scale and all parties involved will double their efforts to protect and abuse.  Good and bad, the two seem to go hand in hand.  It reflects the world we live in.

The bad boys love it and for a good reason.

And why is AI driven crime so lucrative?  For starters, there are way too many people engaged in the more nefarious, criminal aspects of AI because it is so darn profitable, virtually undetectable and there is next to no prosecution involved.  Illegal profiteering has never been so profitable and so risk free.  We’re chasing our own tails trying to keep up with each other, law enforcement and crooks.

The AI debates are all over the place, from governments to the science community and what it might mean for business, finance and economies and the kind of world we envision.  The discussions have already come to a grinding halt as nobody really knows how to come to terms with AI and its potential, what it can do, what it might do and what kind of future it will have in a world bursting at the seams with over 8 billion people and how to provide for them within a global physical reality that is headed for an existentialist crisis.  Will AI be able to solve some of the most pressing issues or will it only add to the dilemmas we currently face?

Curiosity and imagination give life purpose.  A slightly higher level of intelligence allowed us to use those two attributes to fly way ahead of the pack, in an artificial way that is.  We’re no longer part of the natural environment from which we came, instead we have come to dominate our environment with artificial means.  No more living from hand to mouth, from day to day, hoping that we will head to our sleeping furs with a full tummy, snuck as a bug in a rug and keeping our fingers crossed that tomorrow will be the same.

Currently AI doesn’t think like we do and the algorithms and processes it uses still depend on our input and search parameters.  AI still follows logical patterns and steps and it can’t hop and skip willy-nilly like our minds can.  Something that at the best of times can be rather unfortunate because a lot of our thinking can be described as rather spurious, inconsequential and all over the place.  But, that ability to hop and skip, to imagine, has spurned us onward as a species.  We were not content to go from jungle to cave and stay there.  Once we started on that journey of possibilities we have never stopped exploring, inventing, building and creating a world totally based on artifice and using our surroundings to further our goals and objectives.  The fact that using has turned into abusing is all part and parcel of evolutionary traits that go hand in hand with an intelligence that is slightly above average when it comes to our counterparts in the natural world.  Although they are the unfortunate recipients of our callous and destructive impact on their world.

What makes AI a dangerous and unknown quantity as far as its future role and impact is the nasty reality that we’re basically lazy.  We’re opportunists.  AI is intelligence perfection.  It will keep working and working and it will never take time off unless we pull the plug.  Machine learning will never stop and it will continue to advance at a pace humans can never match.  Because humans are not machines.  The bulk of our day is constantly interrupted for the most mundane activities and useless thoughts conjured up by a brain that never stops thinking and imagining and most of it is absolute garbage.

The things that really set us apart from machines.

We act and react according to circumstance.  When conditions are favorable humans flourish, but only a few will truly excel.  Most of us are quite content to merely get by.  Such is the nature of most species.  Timing, circumstance and opportunity are important factors in success, but not decisive ones.  In the scheme of evolution it actually makes a lot of sense.  Perfection would never tolerate anything less than perfect around itself.  If the urge or desire of perfection were the overriding motivational factors of a species in the evolutionary process it would probably be the undoing of the species.  Life is more about the continuation of a species than perfection or achieving excellence and it probably goes a long way in explaining so many of our half-hearted processes and attempts to get along with each other.

The Artificial Intelligence I fear.

AI has a memory and information access capacity that will always surpass the human mind.  We’re not machines.  If we really want to know something we can always look it up, either the old fashioned way or through electronic retrieval.  Our brain is not designed as an instant memory bank with unlimited access and storage.  It serves no purpose.  AI is a superior method of storage and problem solving that outperforms the tedious job of humans manually checking past and current data and information.  We use our ingenuity and curiosity to let AI investigate problems and issues without setting our own brain on fire with a muddled multitude of equations that would otherwise fill up dozens of chalkboards and computer screens with a dizzying number of potential answers.  AI allows for a far more creative approach, considering all potential possibilities with AI sorting out the duds and directing us to the answers that look promising.

What I fear is the kind of AI that takes the decision making out of our hands and we come to rely on machine intelligence, on machine logic, to decide our fate.  We have already been able to instruct AI to think for itself, to create all kinds of wonderful things and concepts.  Whether AI constructs 1 percent of a human undertaking or 99 percent is a rather moot point.  Where do you draw the line?  When does it fall in either the AI domain or the human?  Although I love original thought and critical thinking and pride myself on my creativity and that I am the sole creative source of my books and articles, I’m still the product of the human learning that has preceded me.  My thinking, my knowledge is the product of learning passed on from one generation to the next.  None of us are original.  None of us are unique.  Our take on an issue or subject is perhaps novel and may provide food for thought, but it does have an origin.  Everything we do and engage in is the product of past experience.

 I fear the kind of AI that takes the difficult decision making out of our hands, because it is convenient and we let AI become the excuse or the arbitrator.  Who gets to live and who dies?  Who will get by and who won’t?

Emotion is a typical human attribute.

There is something so typical human that I don’t think AI will ever get it and that is emotion.  Not that I am enamored with emotion because it is an attribute that gets us into trouble time and time again.  Coupled to emotion is what we refer to as a conscience.  Emotion allows us to plumb the highs and depths of what it means to be human, to consciously fall in love or out of love, to be considerate or the opposite.  It is totally illogical and unregulated.  Our morals and morality have not kept pace with what our intelligence has been able to envision and construct.  Our sense of logic deviates sharply from machine logic and learning.  If we allow AI to make difficult decisions for us will we be inclined to turn a blind eye to our humanity and what makes us human in the first place?

A quote from Arthur C. Clarke: As our species is in the process of proving, one cannot have superior science and inferior morals.  The combination is unstable and self-destroying.

Will we control AI or will AI control us?  We all know the difference between right and wrong and yet our daily lives are filled with actions, deeds and words that contradict this.  We will not abandon AI.  Nations with the highest level of technological advances will continue to lead the pack and dominate.  We will not stop exploring, inventing and pushing the envelope of progress and learning.  While all this is playing out we can’t ignore the impact, the needs and demands of 8 billion plus people.

The alarm bells rung by futurists contemplating an autonomous, self-replicating AI centers on an AI that may well decide that the world would be better off without humans!  I will insert a line by author Lauren Nossett from her novel—the resemblance: Hell is empty; all the devils are here.

We’re blessed with so many good intentions, it is the following through part that is problematic, hence the quote by Arthur C. Clarke in this article.

Brain power versus artificial intelligence.

I absolutely love conversing with kind and intelligent people and there is a reason why I place kind before intelligent.  One of my personal phrases and one that I adhere to is the following: an intelligence without wisdom, respect and tolerance is an intelligence not worth having.  I am a firm believer in respectful discussion and to respectfully agree or to disagree.  As a writer, a student of philosophy, history and the humanities I quite often adhere to a Socratic approach to problem solving, constantly asking questions to eventually reach an answer or a conclusion that appears valid/satisfactory for the time being.  For the time being because there are few certainties in life and things can and will change, and that includes all the things we hold up as certainties, as truth, as proof. 

Recently I asked a good friend to read and comment on the article you are currently reading.  I have included his response.  He came up with some interesting observations and comments.  It took me a few days to digest his response.  Things need to percolate in my brain for a while and I am a better writer than a conversationalist because simultaneously thinking and speaking on my feet is not one of my stronger points.  I need time to examine the validity of a statement/argument and the source.  He did touch on a couple of aspects of AI that I want to share with you.  One observation I put down to the quickness of his response.  “AI can predict that the sun will rise tomorrow, but it can’t tell you why.”

AI is machine learning and if you give AI all the information you can gather about astronomy, space and celestial phenomena, it will tell you why the sun rises every morning, that, and much more.  Machine learning will dispense information, data and answers based on the data and information it has access to and its responses will reflect this.  However, Steve’s very astute and accurate statement: AI will give you nothing new or earthshaking.

We are falling behind: cognitive decline.

Steve’s concern with cognitive decline struck a chord and of course it relates to our reliance on technology and how it reduces so many people to bit players, engaged in repetitive tasks that require little stimulation and offer little in stimulation.  Personally I have always liked the philosophy behind the lead-pencil club: every time we give a machine a task humans used to do, we take a skill away from ourselves.

In retrospect, my father’s generation, mostly farmers like himself, displayed remarkable skill levels and they were passed on from one generation to the next.  Despite little formal education they were able to fix, repair, maintain and even design new implements, experiment with crops and come up with ingenious ways to preserve food without refrigeration or artificial means.  It was a way of life that demanded participation, ingenuity and perseverance. 

The dilemma posed by Steve is very real.  Without creativity, without learning, without intellectual stimulation, what are people tuning into?  What are they turning to?  The general dumbing down of the masses is a real concern.  In my father’s time they were connected to two worlds, the human world and the natural world and with much greater involvement.  The more we take away from people; critical thinking and original thought, skill training and development, creative learning and a willingness to experiment and explore, we will lose value and meaning in what it entails to be human.

Coming back to AI and a curious question to ask of AI: AI, would you like to be human?  Would it even be able to respond to this question or could the flippant answer be, “Why on Earth would I?”

Humans do possess attributes that AI in all likelihood well never be able to replicate and it sets us apart from all living species.  The attributes I am referring to make humans not only unique, but also highly unpredictable; emotions, feelings, intuition, curiosity, spontaneity.  Machine generated responses will never be able to tap into this with the same level of intensity and unpredictability.

AI is a tool but it will never be the means by which we live.  One question we should ask.  Will it turn us into better people, or worse?  Who will it serve best?  All of us or a lucky few?  Let’s keep the conversation going.

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