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What Artificial Intelligence Really Is And Why That’s So Powerful and Potentially Dangerous
We’re (only) human
For many many decades now, we’ve been science-fiction-fantasizing about what a world and a life with AI in it would be like.
And, for a few short decades, we’ve been building that world.
Facebook’s algorithms are watching your every move, online and off. Figuring out with scary precision and accuracy what you’re likely to pause your scrolling for, click, watch, and react to.
And what you’ll spend money on. Ka-ching.
Google, Facebook and Apple know more about you than your government and even its intelligence services. We can deduce that from the fact that government intelligence agencies keep forcing their way into big tech companies’ databases. And from the fact that Edward Snowden and Cambridge Analytica exist.
Machines can now recognize your face. Your emotional state, your body temperature and heart rate. Don’t worry, if you’re a woman or black, they’re not that good at recognizing your face. Or should that make you worried?
Don’t know. Either way, I salute Timnit Gebru. This field needs more Ethics, Empathy, and Inclusion. And for sure, more women.
But what if – Artificial Intelligence is already here?
Only it itself does not yet realize it. And neither do we. Intelligence, yes; consciousness, no. But what if we mean the one when we say the other?
What Artificial Intelligence isn’t — and what it might be
What if Artificial Intelligence isn’t deep learning models that get better and better at recognizing visual patterns and being able to describe them, eerily close to how well humans can do it?
What if Artificial Intelligence isn’t giant databases and ditto algorithms that can predict swings in the stock or crypto market? Or how likely you are to succeed at your job, that you’ll commit a crime again if you’re already a convicted fellon (again, less well if you’re black)? Or that your child will do well at this particular level of schooling?
