“Once men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune
My favorite genre in literature and film has always been Science Fiction. While I also enjoy westerns and other fictional works, the biggest attraction to Science Fiction is the “What if?” factor of humanity with advanced technology. The speculative aspect of how we would use technology, especially at levels our ancestors in the not too distant past would regard as magic was intriguing and sometimes even frightening in a way that put most horror fiction to shame.
Between stacks of OMNI Magazines, Popular Science and a small treasure of VHS tapes in my childhood bedroom, I would get lost in the worlds created by authors such as Orson Scott Card, Frank Herbert, Robert Heinlein, and many others.1
The theme of cautionary science fiction has been an excellent way to explore the combination of advanced technology and the hubris of Mankind.
Take the science fiction writer Michael Crichton for example. His books have been the basis for many Sci-Fi films with the most famous being Jurassic Park, a fantastical, yet cautionary tale of scientists being able to extract dinosaur DNA from amber fossils for cloning purposes. The book and movie adaptation nicely explain the hypothetical science used to do the cloning process.
Spoiler: it doesn’t turn out to be a good idea to resurrect long extinct creatures back for a modern-day amusement park.2 A quote from one of the characters admonishing the owner of the park still resonants over three decades later.
"Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, that they didn't stop to think if they should."
- Ian Malcolm, Chaos Theorist, Jurassic Park
Where Nothing Can Possibly Go Wrong
But in his 1973 film Westworld about life-like robots with Artificial Intelligence (AI) turning murderous in a futuristic amusement park, the idea of science going further than it should resonants around the current conversations surrounding AI.3
AI has popped up in a lot of cinema and novels since around the time Westworld came out. 2001: A Space Odyssey, based on an Arthur C. Clarke novel, was also about rogue AI. Frank Herbert’s Dune book series alluded to an entire war of humanity against AI in the form of a Butlerian Jihad.
For most movie fans, the AI Skynet from The Terminator movie series has taken on greater meaning in the 21st century, especially with news stories regularly coming out describing the latest technology involving AI drones utilized in warfare. Fears of AI taking over were a centerpiece of The Matrix movies.
Positive portrayals of AI in films such as Bicentennial Man or even Chappie are often overlooked in favor of more sensational coverage and discussions of how AI will interact with humanity. Steven Spielberg’s A.I. Artificial Intelligence tried to put a humanizing touch on a future humanity alongside AI. Ex Machina took a decidedly different route on the possibilities of future AI.
The reality will most likely land somewhere in the middle.
The Jury is still out on which future we get.
AI As Savior or the Fall of Mankind
The concerns around emergent AI technology have been discussed at length, with some predicting job displacement hitting 20-30% in some industries, the constant technological intrusions into society, and a general unease with the rapidity of the proposed AI roll-outs. Estimates vary on the total number of AI data centers in the US by 2030, but a conservative number puts them at around 5,000 centers dedicated to AI functions by the end of this decade.
Some online platforms like YouTube, have raised fear-mongering to an art level on the approaching “AI Apocalypse.”
Immanentize the (AI) Eschaton
There are true believers who see AI technology as humanity’s next step in evolution, much in the way Sci-Fi author Arthur C. Clarke expressed when he said:
“It’s perfectly obvious that we are in a sense creating our own successors. I think that the most intelligent inhabitants of that future world won’t be men or monkeys, they’ll be machines.”
This article “AI May End the Myth of Human Uniqueness” makes this argument in a similar way, describing AI as if it will simply be another complimentary species of human. Maybe even better than humanity.
John MacCormick is a professor at Dickinson College and the author of “Thinking AI: How Artificial Intelligence Emulates Human Understanding.”4
“Can computer programs emulate the entire range of human thought, including creativity and intuition? There are good reasons to believe the answer is yes, especially given the recent progress in artificial intelligence. If so, the potential is enormous: AI that emulates human insight could accelerate discovery, expand access to knowledge and amplify human capability across many domains. But the rise will probably have a psychological impact too. Superhuman AI capabilities could threaten the very sense of what it means to be human.”
“Why believe computers can achieve human-level creativity and insight? The empirical evidence from AI systems gets stronger month by month, ranging from PhD-level performance in physics and chemistry to increasingly convincing musical and visual compositions. Computer scientists have known since the 1950s that computer programs can, in principle, emulate any aspect of human thought. This is because the digital calculations inside a computer can emulate the inputs and outputs of the neurons in a human brain. Given this, “the problem is mainly one of programming,” as Alan Turing said in 1950.” [Bold added for emphasis]
The sweeping assertion that computers can “emulate any aspect of human thought” is an exercise in scientific hubris almost beyond description.
“First, life itself was once thought to have a unique quality that distinguishes it from inanimate matter. This theory, known as vitalism, died out in the early 20th century and today has no scientific credibility: Modern biochemistry has revealed that all life can be explained in terms of physics and chemistry.
Second, humans were once thought to be qualitatively distinct from nonhuman animals. But since the 19th century, Darwinism has gradually eroded that view. Today, the only credible scientific viewpoint is that humans are related to all other species via a vast series of small mutations from a common ancestor.” [Bold added for emphasis]
The “we are no different from the animals” viewpoint persists.
With the rise of intuitive and creative AI systems, humans must relinquish another supposedly special attribute: the notion that our minds are qualitatively different from other information-processing systems.
Calling the human mind simply a computer made of flesh has been an insidious mantra for almost a century. Like comparing a propeller-driven boat to swimming.
The uniqueness of the human mind is an old idea. René Descartes, for example, thought that nonhuman animals were purely mechanistic automatons, whereas humans were animated by a distinct substance that enabled reasoning. Computer scientists aren’t the only ones to be suspicious of Descartes’ claim: Many philosophers, neuroscientists and psychologists believe that the human mind emerges from physical processes, and that these processes can be emulated by computer programs. Add in the recent evidence from AI systems, and it seems the time is ripe for humans to surrender another claim to uniqueness. The human mind is no longer the only system capable of reasoning, insight or creativity.
Dissolving the idea that human and human interactions are no different than, say, wolves or sharks, is a dangerous path to go down; excusing a lot of atrocities in the name of science.
Some elements of our society continue to oppose Darwinism. Most likely, some will also oppose the reality that every human thought could be produced by a computer program… Society is best served by accepting this new reality and looking for ways to flourish within it.[Bold added for emphasis]
Case closed then, right? We should simply agree with this reality being presented and move on? The finality of demanding acceptance for a mechanical simulacrum of humanness is insulting.
We don’t know yet if it’s a good idea for AI programs to be our friends or companions, but they can certainly help solve our problems. Perhaps AI programs can also help to deepen our interactions with other humans, rendering them more meaningful. Our best approach is to accept AI for what it is — and celebrate the human mind as one amazing corner in a universe of computation. [Bold added for emphasis]
Yet this isn’t accepting AI for what it is, it’s wishcasting for humanity’s replacement.
For all the wonder talk about AI capabilities, proven and yet to be, I bristle at the idea that it will ever create or be accepted at a human level. Can it “produce” results and conjure up a simulacrum of humanness? Sure. But all of these announcements and proclamations that AI is the next evolution for the human species is a special kind of hubris.
An LLM model, no matter how advanced it becomes, will never walk by a field of apple trees and be reminded by the smell of a long ago road trip through the New England countryside. Nor can it hear a piano sonata and be transported back in time to a memory from childhood.
“Oh, but look how efficient it is!”
What is lost in the conversations around AI is that the very things that make up humanity; its imperfections, irrational ways, etc. – are exactly what makes us unique as human beings.
This trend of technological machine god worship is troubling as more and more people try to summon an egregore.
“A real tear will never be shed by Artificial Intelligence.”
- Wandering Panda
With over 13,000 bookstores open in the 1990’s, trips to a used bookstore was more like a visit to a candy factory for a bookworm like me. Aisle after aisle of shelves full of places my imagination could take me to.
While not at the scale of dinosaurs, Dolly the Sheep clone came along not too far after the movie’s release and brought up considerable ethical questions.
An excellent, if somewhat uneven series based on the movie was on HBO. Alas, Westworld is no longer available due to the high cost of residuals, according to HBO. That it (Spoiler) turns out an omnipresent AI is controlling things in season four is immaterial, I’m sure.
A lot of guest articles in Legacy Media publications are also hidden book promotions.