The Least Important Thing About AI is Technology
Mark Rapier CMAS, ALC
Trusted Guide | Author | Lifelong Learner | Corporate Diplomat | Certified M&A Specialist | Certified Life Coach
Word Count: About 1,100 words, with an approximate reading time of 4 to 6 minutes. ?Please share your thoughts in the comments.
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Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI is the latest book by Yuval Noah Harari.? In some ways, Nexus can be seen as a companion to his earlier Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind .?
Nexus begins with an exploration of the role information networks have played throughout human history.? Since humans first started to tell stories, we have been sharing information.? Stories about the hunt, taught others the skills needed and the various challenges they might face.? Harari describes this transformation as the Cognitive Revolution.? As our capabilities grew, what we knew was organized into information spheres.?
We live in a world of information spheres and occupy many at the same time.? Work, family, faith, and country are spheres we all live in each day.? Some information may overlap, but much is unique to the domain.
AI is also affected by information spheres.? AI is used to identify patterns in massive amounts of data that would otherwise go unnoticed.? Generative AI can create original data based on human input and analytics.? This is where the challenges arise.?? Different platforms can look at the same data and yield different results.? The same platform can create different results when the data sets are not identical.? Differences also arise depending on how the questions are phrased.
Information spheres are designed to do two things – gather accurate information and bring order to the collection.? This is where the difficulties arise.? Reality contains many viewpoints.? Different people can look at the same information and come to different conclusions.? No collection of data provides a 100% accurate view of reality.? Truth is complicated.? We use AI to make sense and simplify truth into something easily understandable.
This thinking drives the later parts of the book.? In my opinion, Harari dives into a dystopian view of the impact AI will have on society.? Each of the concerns listed is a valid possibility.? However, the book spends little time on the potential benefits of AI.? My view is that dystopia and utopia exist on a spectrum, and life is lived in the middle.? There are good times and bad times that reflect different spots on the spectrum.
In one section, Harari cites the Industrial Revolution as the cause of imperial colonialism. This thought process tends to ignore the reality of human history. The strong have always conquered and enslaved the weak. Long before the Industrial Revolution, the Romans, Greeks, Persians, Egyptians, and Chinese had huge empires.
I believe the greatest danger poses to humans is us.? AI offers ways for us to be lazy.? Apple is running a commercial where an actress uses AI to summarize an email to convince an executive that they have read and understand the message.? Google ran and ad during the Olympics where a dad had his daughter write a fan letter rather than have her do it herself.
I wrote about this before in an article titled “I Do Not Fear the Rise of the Machines; I am Afraid of a Descent into Idiocracy.” ? The lazier we become, the stupider we will be.
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Never take anything for granted.
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“Young children learn better when they encounter the unexpected.”? I think older children like me do, too.
New search engines are on the horizon.
Ageism is real.? It affects all of us, but none more than women in Hollywood.? Kidman is fighting back.? We can all take a page from her playbook.
The Sixties Rule!
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An interesting look at language in all of its forms.
I have read The Razor’s Edge dozens of times.? Usually once every couple of years.
Quotes
“What frightens and dismays us the most is not external events themselves, but the way in which we think about them.”
- Epictetus
“Life was simple before World War II.? After that we had systems.”
- Admiral Grace Hopper
“Thinking is difficult, that’s why most people judge”
- Carl Jung
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You can order The Leader With A Thousand Faces on the Recommended Reading Page of my website.
My goal is to make this newsletter as interesting and valuable as possible. ?Please share your thoughts and suggestions for improvement. ?If there are specific topics in leadership you would like me to focus on in future issues, please send them my way.