AI ... AI ... AI ...

 

Sometime ago, my good friend Mevely, (Blog HERE), wrote about an Artificial Intelligence (AI) program where you write four words and the program paints a picture for you. I lost the link to that program.

I wrote England, town, 1950s and poverty and got the picture above.

There's a lot of talk about AI right now and how it will shape the future and how computers will be able to "think" and do things which will put us out of work. So let's analyse this for a moment.

I don't believe a computer will ever be able to "think". What happens in the example I gave is that the computer has a large collection (database) of photos and combines the four words to make the photo above. It is reacting to how it has been programmed; it is not "thinking" like you and I do.

In a similar way predictive text can finish a sentence for you. You type "have you cleaned" and the computer will predict the ending by suggesting: "your room", "the car", "the fridge" and so on. It is not "thinking" but using it's database and linking possible endings to the beginning of your sentence.

The same applies when computers are programmed to buy and sell shares in certain commodities and companies. They are reacting to certain market conditions as pre-programmed.

True, with mechanisation and computers you can eliminate certain repetitive jobs like the cashier at the supermarket, or the packer when you buy something on-line. The computer can "read" what you have ordered on-line, and a robotic machine in the warehouse can collect the item, wrap it, and put it in the despatch tray. It does not mean that it can "think".

I believe what makes us human beings think is our soul. The body is just a complex machine, like a computer, which reacts to commands from our soul. The body consists of a mixture of water, chemicals and minerals. None of these on their own can write the works of Shakespeare or pour me a whisky and soda. But combined together, the body and the soul within it, can perform wonders.

When the Bible says we are created in God's image it does not necessarily mean that He is human-like in body and shape - as Jesus indeed was when born on earth. The old masters and painters depicted God as a human because they took their lead from this Bible saying. 

Created in God's image means we have a soul which is capable of love, compassion, mercy, forgiveness, pity and all the other good attributes we associate with God. In His infinite goodness, He also allowed us to use these qualities or to choose to behave in our own sinful way.

Today many people do not believe in God or that we have a soul. We are considered as machines; and when we die that's it. No after-life, infinity, or Heaven and hell.

This leads to the conclusion that everything can be explained in chemical, electronic, or other scientific terms. The  body is a machine just like a sophisticated computer with advanced AI. 

And that's the danger about the way we think about AI and about the human body. 

Having accepted the notion that we are all a mixture of components, nerves, chemicals and so on, the next step is to explain human behaviour in similar scientific terms. 

Whatever our behaviour it is the result of our scientific make-up.

If someone is overweight it is not his fault it is a chemical imbalance in the brain or body. If someone is a kleptomaniac, it is not his fault it is a chemical imbalance also. Same for every other behaviour criminal or otherwise. It is not the person's fault but the way he is made-up - his neurons, or brain connectors, or deficiencies of this or that chemical, and so on. Do you see where this is going?

Move a stage further and lock people up because of such deficiencies in their make-up before they commit a crime.

MINORITY REPORT: Based on a story by famed science fiction writer Philip K. Dick, "Minority Report" is an action-detective thriller set in Washington D.C. in 2054, where police utilize a psychic technology to arrest and convict murderers before they commit their crime. Tom Cruise plays the head of this Precrime unit and is himself accused of the future murder of a man he hasn't even met.