AI, Elon and Space Travel

I have been long convinced that AI doesn’t exist. What you call the AI, is a compiler/search engine that uses algorithms created by people who are not flawless or unbiased. Although some say AI defies algorithms by diving into data masses available online, mixing and matching those, it doesn’t. Mandelbrot sets, Julia sets, complex numbers, fractals are cool, but they are not AI, they are the result of human research. AI (or whatever we call AI now) relies on math and logic patterns created by people who probably only know these patterns. These patterns create infinities that have boundaries. 

But the problem is not in the AI’s robotic and finite nature, the problem is wrong naming. Stop calling it AI and stop worshiping it. You have worshiped Google long enough. High time we stop doing it, really.

It is not the AI that becomes smarter. It’s us who become dumber and dumber. I now see people using AI-generated art. I see people saying that this art is as good as man-made art with a straight face. 

Well, it can only be the case if man-made art has deteriorated. Which it did. A lot. And the word “art” is now used with zero discretion, everything is “art”.

And the danger lies there. It’s not that AI outsmarts us and takes over control soon. It’s us “outdumbing” a laptop soon and giving it full control over our lives. 

We eat what the digital world feeds us including tons of fakes and fads. And kids repeat this lifestyle. Humans lose the skill that made them humans: find information, process information, create new stuff. Analysis and synthesis, continuously. We are close to the level of apes pressing the button at the lab to get a banana. I’m not even joking. They even call using the AI a profession while it’s at best a skill. 

Remember: there is still no such thing as an AI. 

Why did I mention Elon in the title? Well, to attract your attention of course. But not only. Elon is one of those people who keeps telling you the worst lie which is a half truth. AI is dangerous. Yes. There is danger. But not in AI. In believing that AI exists and getting too relaxed. In stopping to use our brains. In paying attention to this buzz about AI. In stopping to live your life and standing petrified in awe. In giving up being a self-sufficient human being. 

And I haven’t even mentioned the white elephant in the room: those who control and promote the AI. I’m going to.

Here is the thing: while AI doesn’t exist, cost-cutting does. People are cheap, and we still see people clean toilets everywhere. Androids are expensive and unreliable though cool when exhibited at trade shows. Even robotized vacuum cleaners mostly suck so far (pun intended). But AI is cheaper than creators, educators, programmers etc. Aren’t you scared of a future where AI will teach the masses most basic skills like reading short guides and cleaning toilets, while the rich will keep a bunch of elite educators for their kids? Of course, forget about the freedom of speech, this one is just around the corner and don’t count on AI for providing you useful information. And yes, the poor will probably go to the Moon and Mars as colonizers, if they are healthy enough to survive the journey. Or even if they are not. Remember those slave ships to the new world?

How about this, Elon Musk?

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Maria Kondorskaya

Linguist, [very] professional Content writer, Russian (and even Soviet), Muscovite, patriot, internationalist. Passive aggressive, vivacious pessimist, optimist with a morbid sense of humor. Made in the USSR in 1982.