Just like much of the political nonsense that plagues our country, sometimes you see or hear things that leave you with a sense of “…this can’t be real!” Alas, sometimes it is…
A second tourist here in four weeks drove a vehicle into the Pacific Ocean. After a digitally-dependent, distracted driver recently dumped a rental into the Honokohau Small Boat Harbor in Kailua-Kona, yet another wayward vehicle proceeded to plunge into the same waters. According to bystanders (via Hawai`i News Now), this driver “…thought the water was a big puddle”. Hmmm, one can see how the vast Pacific might look like rainfall run amok… Perhaps relying on focused, human eyesight would have proven to be a better methodology to employ. Luckily, no one was badly hurt in either incident, other than bruised egos and some wounded pride.
From the sublime to the… whoa, what?! Artificial intelligence (AI) gurus have been warning anyone who’ll listen that rapidly-expanding AI capabilities could be catastrophic; they’ve used terms like “civilization destruction” (entrepreneur Elon Musk, 2023) and “the end of the human race” (physicist Steven Hawking, 2014). Leading tech companies are rightfully echoing this concern, some of whom actually embraced ethical stances on the sanctity of the internet before trendy likes, friends, followers, fans, and sycophants ruled their bottom lines; many have now basically eschewed ethics. A bevy of rules to theoretically dissuade rampant misuse of evolving AI science is coming, but will bad guys and evil doers care about or follow said rules? Surely, we’ll be seeing AI-created false copy, erroneous “facts”, and computer-generated pictures throughout the 2024 election cycle. As chatbot chatter runs amok, how can/should it be addressed? Wow… life on Mars is starting to sound intriguing.
The United Nations put bannisters in place post-World War II to deter nuclear-capacity nations from annihilating one another, but will 21st century egomaniacal, evil emperors play by to-be-established AI norms? Many don’t play by accepted international rules now. And how’d you like to be a professor reading student papers while wondering- is this truly a student effort, or just 10-minutes spent tweaking an AI-spewed thesis?
As Peter Gabriel sang in his wonderful tribute to late, anti-apartheid activist, Stephen Biko, “You can blow out a candle/ But you can’t blow out a fire/ Once the flames begin to catch/ The wind will blow it higher.” A I ? How ‘bout Aye Yai Yai…
Think about it…