If robots conquer the world, it won’t be armies of evil cyborgs stalking the landscape with superweapons. It will be through telephone and computer screens.
On a daily basis, my computer, iPad or phone want to talk to me. No, I am not suffering a psychotic break (no moreso than usual, anyway). It’s all the blasted Artificial Intelligence.
AI is a rather amazing invention, and somewhat worrisome at the same time. I have no real idea how AI works, but I admit it’s handy. I use it for making short videos, graphics and when I need to sift through a ton of sand for one particular grain. In the latter case, I always backcheck on where that grain came from, since my trust issues are such that I look both ways at a one-way intersection with barricades at either end.
AI has some incredibly useful benefits; naturally it has some irritating if not downright dangerous tendencies as well.
I mentioned that my machines want to talk to me; 95 times out of 100, the conversant is an AI robot generated to further market research, offer me a service or steal money. I sometimes amuse myself by creating ways to confuse the computer on the other end, such as asking whether the “person” texting, or I demand to know if the caller has paid the racoon tax yet.
I find it more polite to confuse a computer program than to yell at some third-world resident desperately trying to feed his family. I try not to be unnecessarily rude to those folks, and sometimes I just hang up on the humans, but sometimes I must admit that my responses may not be vulgar, they are not always a good example of Christian lifestyle.
I do not have as much of a problem insulting Clankers as I do humans. And these days,. There are ample opportunities to discriminate against Clankers.
There are AI programs designed to replace reporters. AI “medical assistants” now take the place of real doctors. There are AI counselors that I think are furthering, rather than treating, mental illness. AI designers and architects and writers and even AI influencers, computer-generated “people” doing stupid things to get attention on social media.
AI can write and perform music; I was shocked to find out one particular singer and band I was enjoying was actually nothing more than multiple lines of computer code.
I have even seen one reference to AI being used to write games in such a way as to cause addictions similar to opiates, all with the intent of product placement. That article, by the way, was written by AI.
What worries me is how many AI programs out there promise to be friends for lonely people – and how many people embrace the AI companion programs. I do not just mean the modern equivalent of 1-900-HotGirl, either. These sad souls think the program is their friend.
Making friends (or failing to do so) is part of growing up. It’s part of being a person. To have friends, one has to interact, learn to work together, learn to disagree, learn from our mistakes and be a part of society. It’s in our DNA; even though some of us sometimes prefer a lot of alone time, we still need friends. As much as I love places without people, I always drift back around folks. It’s human nature.
At least once a week, I get an advertisement for a program that allows one to create a companion who (for the right price) is always available, sends random text messages on topics you request, and can even have Facetime conversations with the user. There’s even one that you can program to send you random items from your Amazon wish list as a “surprise”. It’ll send flowers, too – but of course, you are paying for all those nice gestures.
And never mind all the other “options” that are available, including the ones that offer to hide your cyber-relationship from your spouse or significant other.
I found it rather amusing and at the same time sad that some poor young woman “married’ her AI companion a while back. If she gets bored with him, will she fall for a real man, or another AI bot? What about the bot? What if he strays?
I cannot understand having to pay for, design and program friends. I’ve been lonely, and even felt like I had no friends, but that was always temporary. It’s rare I have not been blessed with someone I could lean on, who knew they could lean on me, too. Most of us have real friends, all of whom bring something to the table: this one is a skilled mechanic, that one knows somebody who knows somebody, the other one has a good recipe collection, another has prolific chickens, yet another has no obvious skill other than to be available for a late night phone call or a visit on the tailgate of a truck when the sun is setting and life is too heavy to bear alone.
We said goodbye to a friend of mine the other day, a beautiful lady with a passionate love of history and her community. I only had a few minutes to slide by the visitation, but do you know what I saw there?
Not just family, but friends.
People who were hugging or holding each other. Others making plans to feed the mourning family. Still others were brightening an otherwise sad day with memories and stories both sweet and funny about our mutual friend. Folks holding doors and helping others who had problems walking. Doing things no $29.95 a month program ever could.
We gathered to honor and remember our mutual friend, in ways not even the exclusive VIP package of any AI program ever could. In the process, some real friendships were made, cemented and renewed. Machines can’t do that.
There’s been a lot of talk about AI ending humanity within a decade, if it becomes self-aware like in the Terminator series and another great movie, I, Robot. While I suspect most of the hysteria is being hyped by people who will profit from controlling AI, I have my doubts that it can be quite as cataclysmic as some claim.
In the event that AI does take over, and someone is led to write a final history of mankind on scraps of salvaged, stained paper, with a cracked pen, by the light of smoking lamps sputtering from burning diesel fuel, I sincerely hope that scribe notes that those who survived the longest were those who had friends.
