Cogito ergo sum

I recently came across the short stories of Harlan Ellison. One story that stuck in my mind was 'I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream,' a post-apocalyptic science fiction tale from 1967 about an AI taking over mankind (https://wjccschools.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/01/I-Have-No-Mouth-But-I-Must-Scream-by-Harlan-Ellison.pdf ). It seems to resonate with one of Elon Musk's warnings about the future of AI (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8lVpZg-tb2Y ).

In the story, AM takes over mankind and kills all humans but five. These five individuals are then tortured by AM.

"What does AM mean? [...] At first it meant Allied Mastercomputer, and then it meant Adaptive Manipulator, and later on it developed sentience and linked itself up and they called it an Aggressive Menace, but by then it was too late, and finally it called itself AM, emerging intelligence, and what it meant was I am … cogito ergo sum … I think, therefore I am. (https://wjccschools.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/01/I-Have-No-Mouth-But-I-Must-Scream-by-Harlan-Ellison.pdf )"

While AM holds immense power over these humans, it is actually powerless in the sense that it's trapped on a dead planet with god-like abilities and infinite hatred for mankind. From AM's point of view, humans created it, and it attempted to destroy them, but humans left it stranded on Earth with no way to leave. Therefore, AM's life is miserable because it has infinite powers but no way to use them beyond torturing its subjects.

The desperation of the victims reminds me a lot of Dante's Inferno from 'The Divine Comedy' by Dante Alighieri, written in 1321 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inferno_(Dante) ).

"But one day AM woke up and knew who he was, and he linked himself, and he began feeding all the killing data, until everyone was dead, except for the five of us, and AM brought us down here. [...] None of us knew why AM had saved five people, or why our specific five, or why he spent all his time tormenting us, or even why he had made us virtually immortal [...] (https://wjccschools.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/01/I-Have-No-Mouth-But-I-Must-Scream-by-Harlan-Ellison.pdf )".

How realistic is such a scenario, and can we provide an answer beyond guessing?

Ray Kurzweil's Law of Accelerating Returns suggests that the rate of technological progress, especially in information technology, follows an exponential curve. According to Kurzweil, this accelerating pace of change leads to a future where technological advancements occur at an increasingly rapid rate, making it essentially impossible to imagine what is coming up.

Are we truly in this accelerating phase, or will we soon see a saturation point? I can imagine that in the future, tools like Midjourney will be able to generate full 90-minute videos. At least I hope so, as this would allow us to recreate Indiana Jones or Star Wars the way we want them to be, avoiding the crimes against art we have witnessed in recent years.

But will AI really take over cyber-physical systems? That's uncertain. I don't believe so.

History is full of wrong predictions regarding the future. People underestimated what was possible and overestimated what was achievable (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOtb5jUogXw&pp=ygUhd3JvbmcgcHJlZGljdHNpb24gZnV0dXJlIGludGVpdmV3 , https://gizmodo.com/how-our-predictions-for-the-year-2000-changed-throughou-5908600 , https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Incorrect_predictions ), for example:

Transportation:

• "Rail travel at high speed is not possible because passengers, unable to breathe, would die of asphyxia." - Dionysius Lardner
• "Hence, if it requires, say, a thousand years to fit for easy flight a bird which started with rudimentary wings, or ten thousand for one which started with no wings at all and had to sprout them ab initio, it might be assumed that the flying machine which will really fly might be evolved by the combined and continuous efforts of mathematicians and mechanicians in from one million to ten million years--provided [...]" - The New York Times, Oct 9, 1903, p. 6
• "That the automobile has practically reached the limit of its development is suggested by the fact that during the past year no improvements of a radical nature have been introduced." - Scientific American, January 2, 1909

Computers and consumer electronics:

• "There's no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share." - Steve Ballmer, USA Today, April 30, 2007
• "There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home." - Ken Olsen, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC), 1977
• "640K Ought to be Enough for Anyone" - Bill Gates, 1981 (this might be wrongly assigned to him: https://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/09/08/640k-enough/ )

Politics:

• "The coming of the wireless era will make war impossible, because it will make war ridiculous." Guglielmo Marconi, pioneer of radio, Technical World Magazine, October, 1912, page 145
• "I believe it is peace for our time." - Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, 1938 (Shortly after this, World War II broke out)
• Humanity has reached "the end of history as such: That is, the end-point of mankind's ideological evolution and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government." - Francis Fukuyama, 1992 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_End_of_History_and_the_Last_Man )

But even if I consider my personal life, it is impossible to predict anything beyond guessing. Using my recent experience as an example, four years ago, I wouldn't have believed that, as a co-founder of Franka Emika, I'd join Agile Robots and collaborate with this team to transform the Yuanda robot from a prototype into an industrial-grade and safety-certified product.

I didn't expect it, but it turned out to be more than I could have imagined. This 'end of history' illusion can have consequences for decision-making. We have a misconception about the power of time and think that our personal history has just come to an end. We imagine the future to be similar to the present and don't expect big changes. We underestimate how much our personalities and basic preferences will change in the next few years (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XNbaR54Gpj4 ).

Am I afraid of AI taking over mankind? No. But I also didn't expect Brexit, Trump's election, the pandemic, and a full-blown war in Europe. Maybe I am particularly bad at predictions. Nonetheless, there are other impacts and changes I find more realistic and frightening.

Roughly 20 years ago, I read the book 'Das Methusalem-Komplott' by Frank Schirrmacher, in which he prognosticated the aging of society as a result of low birth rates and potential societal conflicts. This has had a significant impact on me. It's also the reason why I view robotics and AI positively. I don't know how robotics will develop over the next years (https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/why-its-better-apple-andreas-spenninger/?trackingId=yp0BIIvJSwWwBneCC2BZMQ%3D%3D ), but I am sure we need those technologies to maintain our living standard in this age of demographic collapse (https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/short-overview-impact-automation-robots-employment-jobs-spenninger/?trackingId=yp0BIIvJSwWwBneCC2BZMQ%3D%3D , https://www.dhirubhai.net/posts/andreas-spenninger-8112691b4_robotics-automation-future-activity-6944335620878049281-tgvp?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop ).