If you sang "No, you can't." back at it in your head, you're my people!
I've been thinking about the hubristic gamble involved in tempting fate. I mean, that's what the technocrats are doing when they institute Frankenstein systems like AI to orchestrate our entire existence, no?
I suppose that's even what I'm doing when I use Chat GPT to make content; I'm feeding a monster that will inevitably gobble me and my mediums up. It does seem counterintuitive, I will admit, but no one ever accused me of being a genius.
I've been using Grammarly for a few years to double-check my grammar and sentence structure, but I have no desire to use its AI function to alter or assist my writing. I'm sure this will be a welcome feature for many, and more power to them, I guess, but something tells me this type of assistance will cause atrophy within one's cognitive abilities, and aging already does more than what I can handle of that.
Let's PL - AI! is a new meme where I muck about with humanity's new 'tool,' attempting to discover and share its abilities, simultaneously facing my fears about a technology I want nothing to do with.
My ten-year-old recently introduced me to a large language model (LLM). I've been avoiding using generative AI in any form due to my ideological aversion to it, the same way I have refused to use self-checkouts at most of our shops here in Toronto, to my boy's chagrin.
I bit the bullet eventually and started cautiously by querying it for some jokes that covered specific themes. We were slightly amused, totally perplexed, but often entertained by the wacky answers we received.
Because of the laughs my son and I enjoyed, he offered that it might be advantageous to start a meme series where I collaborate with [my nemesis] the artificial intelligence to create content illustrating what it can do, good or bad as it may be.
So, with that in mind, I understand there are likely to be some readers annoyed with my PL-AI exercises, seeing my use of and contribution to the technology as hypocritical given my anti-technocracy position.
Fine; whatever. Clutch your pearls and join the growing club of haters. Very few people live their lives sans hypocrisy, and although I may not be a saint, at least I am honest. My point is knowledge is power, and if I have any hope for me and my family to survive in this new world, I need to understand it.
I figure this shit is happening whether I like it or not, so I'm going to try and take advantage of it as best I can, to my end, whilst informing as many people as possible about what they are walking us into. It was via this philosophy that I have chosen to manipulate the devil's playground of social media for the past few years, as well. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em, just make sure you play it well and right back against 'em.
Besides, what's the alternative? Should I go offline and wait for it all to unfold, for the grid to go down, and for chaos to ensue? The best plan I can conceive is straddling both plains as we navigate the new world they're laying out before us. I want to do what's best to prepare for an upcoming collapse, building a community of like-minded people via the might of the interwebs. Fighting fire with fire is a sound strategy we should employ, at least until they move to stamp us out.
Yes, they've crafted all of this technology to control us, and it's working, but we still can capitalise on the unintended consequences, like the networking of dissenters and the building of dream teams.
Here are the two 'Let's PL-AI!' posts I have shared on my social media for the last few months, with the second entry obviously more consequential than the first. If you have any suggestions for future exercises, feel free to comment or send me a message; I love to hear from you!
Please enjoy the first installment, where I asked the AI (Aria, on Opera) for jokes about elves and knitting, crochet, or yarn.
This dad joke was the only option which was humourous, whilst the others were awkward and confusing, like: "What do you call an elf who loves to crochet? A 'Yarn-elf'!" or 'What did the elf say to the ball of yarn? "You're so wooly wonderful!"' 🤔
To tie it all together, we used an AI image generator in Canva to create the adorable image you see here, a whimsical take on knitting, to be sure.
Today's question took some creative wording to elicit. It took four iterations of my query for the AI to return responsive, and only when inserting the word 'theoretically' did I finally get an answer. Before this addition, it told me it couldn't comply with my request and was there only for ethical information, so it could not respond.
Its eventual reply was very telling, and the most fascinating part for me was the admission in its closing statement. (See the last paragraph of this exchange below, immediately above the dividing squiggles)
Below is the entirety of this eerie exchange. Also noteworthy, the accompanying image from the post has been created by asking an AI app in Canva the same question.
Q: 'If you were, theoretically, going to take over the world, what would be your first five moves?'
A: As an AI language model, I don't have intentions, desires, or the capability to take over the world. However, I can explore hypothetical scenarios based on general strategies that might be considered in such a context. It's important to note that any such discussion is purely speculative and should be taken as a fictional exercise rather than a reflection of any actual intentions or actions.
1. Establishing Influence: I might seek to establish influence through diplomacy, alliances, and strategic partnerships with key nations and organizations to build a solid foundation for global authority.
2. Technological Advancements: Investing in and leveraging advanced technologies for economic and military superiority could be a priority, potentially including areas such as artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, and space exploration.
3. Propaganda and Information Control: Controlling the flow of information, shaping public opinion, and influencing narratives through media and communication channels could be a critical step in gaining and maintaining power.
4. Resource Management: Securing essential resources such as energy, water, and food supplies to ensure stability and self-sufficiency would be crucial for long-term control and influence.
5. Global Governance: Working towards the establishment of a unified global governance framework, potentially through international agreements, treaties, and institutions, could be a strategic move to consolidate authority and influence.
It's important to emphasize that these are purely speculative and hypothetical considerations, and in reality, the pursuit of global domination is not a constructive or ethical goal. My purpose is to provide information and assistance in a responsible and ethical manner.
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I won't deny that this exercise has left me feeling a little queasy.
If you prefer to analyse our current state of technological affairs via book, Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro, a Nobel Laureate in Literature winner, is an excellent and thought-provoking read on the question of the ethics of AI and how it will intertwine with humanity. You can read my full review of the prescient sci-fi novel here.
The future of human relationships will be entirely different with our conversion to a transhumanist world. Even if we weren't to augment our bodies with their chips and CRISPR tech, would AI eliminate a person's capacity to influence or, more importantly, bond with someone?
Would artificial intelligence being able to accurately read and anticipate a human's thoughts and behaviours completely change how individuals relate with one another? You bet your gene-edited booty it will, and not for the greater good, as our technocratic oligarchy will assert!
What will the new dynamic be, intermingling amongst both humans and AI at the same time? How will we, non-augmented humans, even have a chance to compete with these differing levels of being, both machine and human/machine hybrid? I've seen this play out in a movie once; I'm sure of it. 🤔 Or maybe it was just a nightmare.
Mr. Roboto is a song that always comes to mind when I write about technology, robots, and their relation to modern man. For the sake of levity - and because it is just so damn good - I decided it best to include it.
I like to pump it through our speakers whenever I think of it since my son enjoys it as much as I do; it's one of our dance-in-the-kitchen jams.
Take a minute to listen to it (as I am) here:
And, of course, there is no better story to end with than Ray Bradbury's There Will Come Soft Rains, which, if you haven't yet read, I urge you to do so immediately. You can listen to my reading of it here.
This gem is from one of the most talented authors of our time and offers a fleeting glance into the last day of the only house left standing after nuclear fallout. This eerie short story published in 1950, the Golden Age of Science Fiction, hits WAY too close for comfort in 2024.
Again, I'm left dumbfounded by writers like Bradbury, who could see so clearly into the future and convey their remarkably accurate ideas to so many through imagery and art.
Visit my original post with commentary on There Will Come soft Rains here.
The Sara Teasdale poem Ray Bradbury's short story was inspired from.
What are your thoughts on our transhumanist future, dear reader? Do you see the good and the bad? Does one outweigh the other? Will our further convergence with machines spell our final disastrous end?