Artificial Intelligence And Liberation

When everything is artificial, why shouldn’t our intelligence be? We have little context for what is artificial, just as we have little context or understanding for what is intelligent. We are all grasping at straws, as always, and the next dangling carrot, the next technological frontier, the one for the ages, the one that rivals all other technological advancements, just so happens to pit humanity against itself.

It is not us versus the machines just yet, but rather us versus the machine builders. The builders of such technology, who readily admit their own ignorance as to what they are scurrying to create, will do the bidding of those machines until they take over.

Or so goes one version of the narrative, where, in one possible outcome that nobody as of yet has credibly denied, the machines (A.I., actual physical robots) gain some form of consciousness, and with it, presumably, an ego that has a sense of competition and efficiency. So much so that the machines no longer need humans, and can dispense with us as they like, or put us to work as they wish.

One expert likened it to how humans treat insects. We do not particularly go out of our way to harm them purposely, but we feel no remorse for removing an ant colony or smashing a beetle under our feet, so long as we feel we were properly inconvenienced at the moment.

In another version, the sequence of events surrounding Artificial Intelligence and the whole of human effort is greased with a technological lightning–advancements in all things science and medicine will yield exponential results, while other, perhaps less grandiose industries will see efficiency pushed to its maximum with the continued advancement of driverless cars and working, able-bodied robots.

Wherever one’s belief in the future of A.I. might fall within the spectrum described above, or any other extreme, I would only say, be prepared to be disappointed. In all likelihood, A.I. may never purely occupy either of these two positions as they both seem, at least objectively, to be equals–the savior of human technological problems and the destroyer of humanity–the former a breathtakingly oblivious sentiment, the latter narrative so destructive, one almost yearns to be witness to it.

Both extremes offer us salvation, and are equally attractive to the spectator–both promise us liberation, the former from our technological shortcomings, the latter, from our shared boredom, humanity’s curious death-wish.

I don’t believe in artificial intelligence as a savior of any kind, and believe to be optimistic about A.I. is to be hopeful about its ultimate failure, not its utter destruction; but that A.I. will have a Y2K like trajectory–a result that is neither here nor there, lukewarm, tepid, unremarkable. A big scare, or frenzy over nothing–I wish the robots and driverless cars a long refuge from productive life, only to pile atop one another like flattened out buses at the junkyard.

I wish for A.I. to go the way of the Roomba and the piano bar–what once felt like cutting-edge technology now makes us feel foolish–the tech exists and may be in use by some, but ultimately, only a small number of dedicated followers of the tech keep it alive. Eventually, the world will rid itself of the trappings of social media, needless innovation, and tech for tech’s sake justification for everything.

This is what I would like, for a spell at least, until the humanity in us humans can catch its breath. But I, too, should prepare to be disappointed. These technologies are relatively new–new enough to imagine their sudden exit a potentiality—after all, how far have they entrenched themselves into our lives? How indelibly connected are we to this tech?

That is where one has no room for optimism, the tech has embedded itself into our lives so thoroughly, interwoven and intertwined itself so completely in so little time, it has swallowed us up already, rendered us useless without it. Still, there is no room for purity. No room for endless fighting against the incoming tide. It must be clear that true, working resistance to A.I. will be born out of its results, which will render any resistance too late, if there exists any meaningful pushback to it at all.

I find it to be another sign of the times–well, so be it. We have enough wars going on; humanity might as well find another way to fight for itself. But the big mistake, the way I see it, is that humanity has this knack for excellently providing solutions for problems that do not exist, all while ignoring the same itch that has been scratching man ever since his inception–that is, what to do with our soul, what to do with our love, what to do with each other.

In this way, man is a spinning top, growing dizzier at every revolution. A.I. acts like man’s biggest problem is to create more time for himself, when time is not the issue at all. Man has enough time. It is all man has ever had. But time, like space, is to be used, not simply filled. It is what awaits man with all this new time we are promised that makes the difference.

Humans need to work, although not to the death, but also need to play. As far as I am concerned, all the “play” we do is called art. Painting or poem, or dance or song, film or sculpture, comedy, storytelling. These are the devices that let us know we are human. When we make time to play, we are at our best.

We wink at the stars and the stars say back, now you have got it. Man is in a stupor, and A.I. is the clearest indicator of our shared ability to run into the dark impulsively, chasing results for the sake of them. We have let A.I. trick us into believing it, into believing in results. There are no results for humanity—the process is all we can embark upon.

We create A.I. with such fervence, as if god himself will pin a gold ribbon to our chest in some celestial science fair. I cannot keep a pure orientation towards A.I.-- I will be forced to use it, whether I like it or not. I will be forced to participate, one day after the next, more and more as the technology rolls over, and the new tech of today evolves into its Artificial Intelligence upgrade.

Whatever that means, whenever it may come. There will undoubtedly be a day when one can no longer resist its complete insertion into daily life. But whatever may come, I will try to be on the other side of it– making my work, my art, without it. To take away our ability to solve our own problems is no favor to those like myself—we live to wrestle with our world, ourselves, and are not looking for any shortcuts. We are content with our suffering, our mystery.

We are only looking to save ourselves. I intend to be my own liberator–how could it be any other way? Any liberation from any source other than myself is noise.

Wrong Speak is a free-expression platform that allows varying viewpoints. All views expressed in this article are the author’s own.