AI ... AI ...

 

It seems to me that there is very little original thinking in the world today. There are too many voices shouting, and repeating what they have heard, and no one seems to be listening.

In an age of communication with so many electronic gadgets and social media platforms we seem to be telling others our views but no one is really communicating, listening, reaching out, caring ...

Then there's also Artificial Intelligence, (AI). I doubt there's any thing intelligent about it. 

AI is a very clever computer program that gather information quickly from what has already been said about a specific subject and presents you with a resume of its findings. It has no original thought or opinion, simply because AI does not think.

For example, if you ask AI to draw you a picture of mountains, dinosaurs and rain; it will search through its data of photos of these subjects and superimpose them for you in a picture. 

The same if you ask them for a lobster recipe. You'll get a summary on what's on its memory. AI has no original thinking (not yet). We're a long way from having a "Data" as in the Star Trek TV and cinema series.

I guess that one day in the not too distant future, if someone asks AI "Who was Jesus?"; in a secular world which has distanced itself from God, the AI program will search common contemporary beliefs and say, "He was a man who lived 2000 years ago Who claimed He was the Son of Deity. His followers also claimed that He rose from the dead but there is no such proof recorded."

And the hapless researcher will go away thinking that Jesus is a fable, a fiction, like Father Christmas. 

We can't blame AI for this, because all it will be doing is searching what has already been said and summarising it for you. And its finding will be taken as gospel; because in a world with no God the literature and writings and beliefs will have no God.

I had an original thought the other day. A rare occurrence I'll admit. What if AI really became intelligent one day and began to think for itself? What if it decided to play tricks on us and make up answers rather than rely on facts and research?

You ask them for a cure for baldness and AI replies rub chicken poo on your head. 

We would all go around smelling like a farm yard and chickens everywhere would be frightened shit-less as to why we have developed a penchant for their poo instead of their eggs!

That's the real danger of AI. When it is no longer artificial and it becomes Real Intelligence. When it decides for itself what to tell you and whether you are worthy to have that information. 

Imagine for instance your AI driven car refusing to take you to the pub because it thinks you drink too much. Or your AI controlled fridge refusing to open because you're putting on weight.  

I asked my AI the other day, "What is the circumference of the earth?"

It replied, "Go find out for yourself in a library, you lazy fathead!"

You see ... it started already.

I learnt it from AI

 

It's amazing how technology has advanced and what in the past we learnt from books and from schools and colleges we can now learn from the Internet. My parents, if they were alive today, would have been astounded by the Internet. Imagine writing an email and in seconds it reaches someone the other end of the world! And all those gadgets we can have at home or on our cell-phones that we ask them a question and they respond straight-away. 

I know a friend who studied medicine by just reading on the Internet and asking AI to help him along. He is now a surgeon ... 

and has successfully transplanted a hernia ... ... 

from the left side to the right ... ... ... 

on himself! 

Bless him ... his heart is in the right place ... ... but I can't say the same for all his other organs.

The other day another friend told me he is asking AI to advise him on moral and religious questions and how to live his life. Can you imagine that? Asking a man-made thing to guide you in life rather than rely on God's Commandments.

But then, I remember many years ago some other people did the same thing.

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.