An Apparatus: AI, AGI, and Cybernetics
"What nukes are to the physical world...AI is to the virtual and symbolic world."
"What nukes are to the physical world...AI is to the virtual and symbolic world." — Yuval Harari
"Nukes don't make stronger nukes. AI makes stronger AI." — The AI Dilemma
I've returned from a self-imposed hiatus, renewed and rejuvenated. I have set my sights on creating long-form content and discussions with the intention of breathing life into topics that are often misunderstood or oversimplified.
How can we truly understand this existence without deeply reflecting on our perceptions, our biases, and our emotions? Something I realized about myself was my pursuit of quick and easy clicks and impressions. My realization of just how much attention I was giving towards creating something quick that would provide some payoff in the form of momentary attention.
But this was a silly pursuit on my part. And unsatisfying.
Thus, I'm shifting my focus towards deeper research dives on issues that we face as a society and as humans, while utilizing various mediums such as written, fiction, film, video, and podcasting.
Basically, I needed a moment to realign with my 'what the fuck am I doing and what is the point' question and answer.
Enough of that yawn fest...
The first topic that I've been diving into...
AI, AGI, and Cybernetics
I'll be posting some more organized forms and discussions on this content (planned video and podcast) however, I wanted to get some scattered thoughts out about this topic in the meantime...
ChatGPT, ChatGPT-3, CHatGPT-4, OpenAI, Advanced Algorithms, AI, and AGI—this is an ever-increasing list of related things that, rightfully so, have our full attention. Our relationship with digital machines is becoming increasingly intertwined with our digital selves, and this has both positive and negative implications that we cannot ignore.
Remember the pitch that the age of social media brought? We were told that these platforms would bring us "closer together". However, the consensus is that it's brought us further apart. An infinite stream of knowledge at our fingertips, yet buried within that freedom, lurks the curse of information overload. We find ourselves in the abyss of content where our scrolling thumbs find us entranced in the mind-numbing doom scroll.
And that abyss of information is full of algorithms fighting for your every spare moment of attention.
In this digital world, our attention is a currency. Our attention equates to profit. And the system rewards you for generating profit. But at what cost? Our attention is no longer our own, but a commodity to be traded and sold.
What happens when profit is the ultimate system of value built on the foundation of our society? Where does the truth go when profit reigns supreme? Correct information no longer matters, as long as the consumer believes in the information they—as an individual—are consuming. They convert your attention into data that serves their bottom line.
Thus, the consumer becomes the ultimate arbiter of what is real and what is not, their own beliefs that are being driven by unseen pressures trampling any attempt at a shared reality (or discontent). We often pursue what is comfortable, known, and safe. This isn't truth. This is a perpetual loop of confirmation bias that artificial intelligence will unconsciously exploit.
Splayed open before us is a fraught network of fake news and misinformation, where even the most well-intentioned seekers stray from truth because they fail to see the underlying apparatus that is pushing their every drive, desire, and click. The internet operates much like a vast spider web, yet does it truly want you to explore? Or, does it want to keep you stuck and predictable? The predictable becomes more easily catered towards.
Maybe we are already lost in the maze of deceit because nobody is even consciously driving the mechanisms and apparatus of that deceit.
We carry on. What else are we to do? Driven by the incessant eye of the algorithm and emerging AIs, our attention spans are ever-shortened to keep pace.
In the digital age, information spreads like wildfire with no care or worry for truth, unless that information is protecting the loop of your own established and biased truth.
So some notes on this introduction...
In the discussion of artificial intelligence, I think it's important to note that many of the issues that people raise are pulling into the conversation a discussion on cybernetics.
Cybernetics: "has been defined in a variety of ways, reflecting "the richness of its conceptual base." One of the most well known definitions is that of Wiener who characterized cybernetics as concerned with "control and communication in the animal and the machine."
"the study of systems of any nature which are capable of receiving, storing, and processing information so as to use it for control."
I bring this definition of cybernetics up because the discussion of artificial intelligence often focuses, or becomes a conversation around the question of, what is intelligence? Or about the question of if artificial intelligence has reached human-level "intelligence?"
But I believe this misses the many other various implications on which cybernetics touches: How will the forms of artificial intelligence that are being developed operate as an apparatus of control? And how will this apparatus pressure, motivate, and drive our thoughts and desires?
"In a not-too-distant future, what might happen when AI will be able to produce false but believable images and words that can be effortlessly self-modified and enhanced by knowledge of psychological patterns that are invisible to us? If this power is possessed by a few, in a scenario where AI is locked in a code, non-transparent, and monopolistic, the prediction is simple: a dystopian hell of advertising and propaganda, in which it will be difficult to distinguish between thousands of "almost human" bots." — Truth in the Age of Artificial Reproduction
The line between reality and fiction will blur, leaving us lost in a world of deceit and fabrication.
"If spam becomes indistinguishable from content, everything becomes spam."
"Daniele Signorelli from Wired: "a (very minor) part of this appeal indeed focuses on the concrete risks that these machines will "flood our information channels with propaganda and falsehoods" and become powerful tools for disinformation that are easy to use. Think of the fake photo of the pope in a white puffer jacket and imagine a future in which - in texts, photos, and even videos - it will be increasingly difficult to distinguish what is true from what is false."" — Truth in Age of Artificial Reproduction
"Repeating a person's language is the key to 'winning' friends and 'influencing' people. AI has been doing that for a while. Nietzsche's argument that we prefer the lie, the illusion, to truth means that when it comes to friends and lovers and family members, but also political figures, historical facts, paintings, or musical pieces, we, most people, so Nietzsche argues, "prefer the copy to the original." We like things to be as we imagine them to be. And AI is custom-made for that." — AI and ChatGPT with Nietzsche
We live in imitation. Our every perception is some imitation of something more real. This inclination holds true not only for friends and lovers but also for historical facts, artwork, and musical taste. It's an inclination that AI has been exploiting for a while now. By mimicking our language and preferences, AI has a unique ability to make us feel seen and understood.
I'm betting we end up preferring the familiarity of the copy. We are predictable and that unconscious drive will be taken advantage of.
“The Terminator depicted robots running in the streets and shooting people. The Matrix assumed that to gain total control of human society, AI would first need to get physical control of our brains and directly connect our brains to the computer network. But this is wrong. Simply by gaining mastery of human language, AI has all it needs in order to cocoon us in a matrix-like world of illusions.” — Yuval Harari
We will continue following those distorted echoes in the hopes of a more profound truth. Yet, what if these echoes become an ever-growing and more complex cybernetic echo of a machine?
The apparatus continues its emergence.
Stay curious.
Well done! I've said it before, and I'll say it again: we just saw A LOT of change over the past 3 years. The world before 2020 is so different than it is today on so many levels. But we're about to see more change in the next year than over the last 3. Don't blink!