Ponderings of a Provocateur - Beware the Unintended Consequences of AI - The Enemy is Already Us

Writing the week after the 4th of July, I am pondering the brilliance of our US constitution in creating a system that was uniquely designed to ensure no dogma, religion or single point of view would dominate our society.

·????????But what happens when that system is highjacked by artificial intelligence that removes our ability to objectively, rationally consider other points of view?

·????????What happens when we are no longer able to discern the difference between reality and hyperbole?

·????????What happens when the machine we have created moves so fast and with such reach that it causes turmoil that can’t be stopped before people die?

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I started out as an optimistic futurist and technophile – believing science could help create a better future for us all – clean energy, adequate food supplies, dispersion of education, and so on.?But, having just finished reading the Chaos Machine by Max Fisher, I now think it is possible we have already reached a point where the algorithms we have created are amplifying our worst human characteristics and re-wiring the brains of large portions of our population to a point of no return.??

The spread of conspiracy theories, fake news, and sensationalistic stories via social media platforms has become our new “moral norm” and source of communal identity.?

·????????The unintended consequence of building algorithms focused on sucking us into spending hours of our precious time on social media has created a reinforcing feedback loop that rewards negative content with viewership that pushes it to the top of the “now trending” or “suggested” information feed.?

·????????Moral outrage and fear-mongering ensures more likes, retweets, or shares?- continuing the viral spread of disinformation at a speed and scale that is all but unstoppable.?

The Chaos Machine provides examples and evidence that make the case the algorithms behind Facebook, Youtube, WeChat, etc have contributed to or even activated acts of mob violence toward racial minorities, religious groups, and other targets for retribution.?The data shows it is a worldwide phenomenon – with grave consequences – even genocide.

?With the entry of generative AI tools like ChatGPT, we have perhaps come even closer to the “Singularity” predicted by Ray Kurzweil to occur by 2029 where AI becomes smarter than any individual or even collective group of humans and the content generated is essentially undetectable as being “non-human” – far surpassing the intellectual ability of most individual humans. We aren’t quite there yet – as social media has ironically exposed the downside of ChatGPT as creating incorrect information or fabricated references – known as AI hallucinations.?

·????????But if you are not an expert in a particular field and don’t take the time to triangulate and validate the information with other sources – how would you ever know an answer provided is wrong??

·????????And, why would you ever bother to learn to write poetry, compose music or create art when AI can do it for you??The risk of further “dumbing down” the population grows as people rely on AI to do their thinking. ??

In his 1993 essay on the likelihood of the Singularity coming to pass, Vernor Vinge noted if the technological Singularity can happen, it will. He wrote, “Even if all the governments of the world were to understand the "threat" and be in deadly fear of it, progress toward the goal would continue…. In fact, the competitive advantage -- economic, military, even artistic -- of every advance in automation is so compelling that passing laws, or having customs, that forbid such things merely assures that someone else will get them first.” ??In the race for profits or power, will we unleash super human intelligence where the unintended consequence is humanity becomes uncivilized??

My redeeming optimistic thought is AI and ChatGPT can’t plant a garden, they can’t cook an amazing meal, they can’t hug you when you are sad.

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