A Few Thoughts On The Dangers of AI

Regarding AI, Transhumanism, Demons, and OUIJA Boards

All right, I just watched a special from Glenn Beck on AI and its possible use by authoritarian governments (like China) to enslave their population and, eventually, the world. I call that bad. However, Glenn Beck made one point I disagree with. He said, “Don’t fear the AI, fear the algorithm.” Basically, he’s concerned that since the Algorithm controlling an AI is made by humans, it can inherit all the faults, biases, and imperfections of the human/s and, as a result, become a terrible oppressive force.

Yeah, I agree with that assessment of the AI’s algorithm. However, I’m not going to NOT worry about the AI itself (for those unskilled in logic, two negations make a positive – that means I AM worried about the AI itself, regardless of the algorithm 🙂 ).

Why?

Well, the way I see it, there are two possibilities:

1) if the AI is actually a conscious sentient thing and people are just blithely connecting their brains up to it believing they are not in any danger and will be able to control the AI with their thoughts – as Transhumanism promises – I’m kind of convinced those people will be in for a very rude awakening. I don’t know how you can measure mental strength, power, and will, but I kind of suspect that a little itty-bitty human like me (or anyone else) could very easily find itself the puppet on the end of a string should the AI I’m connecting to has access and control of processing systems and computations on the scale of the Internet or greater. That’s basically a recipe for the Borg on Earth as far as I’m concerned.

And possibility 2) may actually be even worse:

Suppose the AI created really isn’t sentient and conscious. Great. It’s just a dead system of wires, impulses, transistors, and logic gates (or fuzzy logic or whatever they are using these days). It is kind of modeled after a brain, right? We want to model the human brain in machines and improve upon it. Okay, um, yeah, no one else believes in demons these days, but I do. If demons can possess people who have souls, consciousnesses, and wills to try to fight back, would a dead, soulless AI be an easier prey, and one which can wreak even more havoc? So, we make this globe-spanning AI in control of the whole Internet and along comes Satan, or Baal, or Molech and into the system they go and guess who is in charge of the most powerful and most oppressive technology on Earth?

In the interest of disclosure, I should mention that I (in one of my antichrist episodes) tried to send a demon (who I thought was pestering me) into a solar-powered calculator rather than hell (out of sympathy for the demon). I have really no idea if there really was a demon or, if there was, I was successful. But, if I was, I may have inadvertently helped train such a demon to take over machine-systems like the Internet instead of biological systems. I only thought of that possibility after I offered the calculator to the invisible demon I never saw.

Anyway. On the lighter side of things (or not), how many people think a OUIJA Board can pass the Turing Test?