Imagine: two hundred aliens land on Earth, with thousands and thousands more of them expected in looming, unstoppable waves.And imagine, too, that we know some of the aliens are here to help us, to make our planet better, smarter, and more efficient.But we also know that some of the aliens are here to do us harm, perhaps injure us irreparably.
What we don’t know is this: which aliens will be good to us, and which will be malevolent?That is the situation with AI.But it is more complicated than that.PARENTS PUSH CONGRESS TO ACT ON KIDS' ONLINE SAFETY AFTER JURIES FIND META AND YOUTUBE LIABLE FOR HARMBecause the good aliens and the bad aliens aren’t necessarily different aliens.The same technology that can help discover a cure for cancer, give a low-income kid access to a world-class tutor, make government more efficient, and produce extraordinary new wealth also can deceive, manipulate, displace, addict, and destroy.
The alien who comes bearing gifts in the morning might be the one who burns down the village at night.And yet for the multitudes of op-eds and think pieces, the anxious parent text chains and furtive bot-synthesized office memos, the accelerating quotidian reliance on AI for driving directions, recipes, fun facts, and how-tos, we aren’t discussing AI with the frequency and intensity it warrants.Parents should know when and how their children are using AI.Children should always know when they are dealing with a machine rather than a human being. (Kurt "CyberGuy" Knutsson)We are merely watching, transfixed and paralyzed; or turning away and scurrying back to landlines and paperback books; or playing along, sinking into the lazy comfort of an easy answer.
An algorithmic echo of Ray Bradbury’s 1948 short story, "Mars is Heaven."REP.TED LIEU: AI IS ALREADY TOO POWERFUL.
WE NEED A KILL SWITCH BEFORE DISASTER STRIKESThere is little doubt that AI will be the next leap forward in human advancement, akin to the printing press, the Industrial Revolutio...