Is A.I. taking over?
Artificial intelligence website ChatGPT (Antonio Serafini, The Puma Prensa)
By Antonio Serafini, staff writer
Technology growth has been exponential for younger generations, first through social media and now via artificial intelligence. In colleges and high schools, A.I. is sweeping the campuses through different sites such as ChatGPT and now the introduction of “My A.I.” on the popular social media app called Snapchat. One of the biggest questions with AI usage is whether it is safe. Former Google head of design Tristan Harris mentions in the YouTube documentary The A.I. Dilemma, “the idea of artificial intelligence is beautiful and the benefits are exponential; however, the way artificial intelligence is being deployed is not in a safe and responsible way.” Harris goes on to mention that nearly half of A.I researchers believe that there is a staggering 10% or greater chance that humans will go extinct from our inability to control A.I. Harris fairly brings up the point that if all airplane engineers told you there was a 10% chance that everyone that gets on a plane will die, would you get on that plane?
ChatGPT has recently found itself on phones and laptops across the nation, with many people intrigued by the thought of an artificial intelligence system doing anything you ask. More specifically ChatGPT is an A.I. system that uses natural language processing to create humanlike conversational dialogue. However, ChatGPT is not the first contact we have made with A.I.; this first contact was via social media. For example, when you scroll on the popular social media app TikTok, the app calculates a way to keep you scrolling and using the app. To quickly break it down, the first experience with A.I. most of us had was social media algorithms, which has led to addiction, doom scrolling (excessively scrolling through bad news), and influencer culture, among other effects. Moreover, Aza Raskin, co-founder of the Center For Humane Technology, mentions that “the first contact with A.I. was curation and the now second contact with A.I can be described as creation.” Curation A.I. refers to the use of algorithms that process huge amounts of data and information from users, which is then deciphered into different meanings and patterns
As mentioned, the first contact with A.I. was through the usage of social media and through this usage Harris says, “We lost.” However, you have to keep in mind that A.I. was meant to be something beneficial for society. Whether it is used for people to talk to distant relatives or small business owners to build up their brand, there are certainly positive benefits from the use of A.I. and social media. Yet behind these huge benefits is a monster that is trying to maximize usage no matter what, getting teenagers and children hooked on sudden dopamine rushes. This huge “monster” behind the different apps has handcuffed our society. With the various social media apps and other A.I. run websites, there is almost nothing that we do that isn’t affected by A.I. This A.I has found a way to take control of children’s identity. For example, if you are someone that doesn't have Snapchat or Instagram, you are somewhat excluded from having a social life. The first contact with A.I. was our overall use of social media and this massive A.I. monster entangling itself with almost every aspect of our society.
The second contact with A.I is considered the creation phase of A.I. For example, these new massive A.I generators are made to help us be more efficient, write faster, and even solve climate change. Of course, these are all beneficial aspects. However the negative changes from A.I. are potentially very dangerous. For example, it is capable of listening to someone talk for only three seconds before automatically and almost identically copying the person's voice and continuing to speak. Of course this could be very dangerous, because a criminal could scam someone by copying a voice in order to get what they want. Sadly this has already begun to happen. Scammers are beginning to use artificial intelligence to sound like family members in distress and take advantage of them through their cell phones. As was reported in the Washington Post, a woman named Ruth Card almost fell victim to this scam in March of 2022. The caller, who sounded exactly like Card’s grandson, began to beg for money in order to get out of jail. Card scrambled to the bank and took out $3,000 dollars until she was stopped by the banker who reported that she was not the only person to get this exact call on the same day. In 2022 alone imposter calls were the second most popular racket in the United States. Another example of the silent growth of A.I. is ChatGPT silently teaching itself research grade chemistry. In the documentary The A.I Dilemma Raskin states that, “you can go onto Chat GPT and it will know more about research grade chemistry than actual chemistry based artificial intelligence.”
Artificial intelligence is growing and growing in our society, and not for the better. Harris uses the phrase, “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day, teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime; however, teach an A.I. to fish and it will teach itself biology, chemistry, oceanography, evolutionary theory, and fish them all to extinction.” A.I. is constantly learning, and the more we use it the more it will evolve. Don’t just listen to me, listen to the thousands of A.I. engineers pleading for people to be careful with the use of A.I. as it becomes a large part of our society today.