There is "uproar" over Sam Altman's comments comparing the energy usage of AI services to human energy use, where he argues things like in order for humans to do simple calculations, it takes twenty years of resource consumption first etc. While he seems to be about the most ineloquent individual on earth, the "outrage" is misdirected and takes what is said in the worst light. Best intentions is no longer a thing in public discourse and instead it is worst intentions to score self-satisfying metrics of relevance and importance.
This aside, I have my reservations of AI.
For those that read me often, they will know I have a pretty strong bias toward human wellbeing. This doesn't mean that I see no value in technology, despite the many times people have called me a luddite in various forms. What it means is that as I see it, there is no point to innovating our technology unless it has improving human wellbeing at its core function.
Unfortunately however, most technology developed today is to increase wealth, even when it reduces wellbeing of the majority, lowering the mean, and racing toward the bottom. Artificial intelligence has a lot of potential because it can quickly perform a multitude of tasks far faster than a human, but this gained efficiency isn't being used to more effectively improve human wellbeing, rather, it is about more effectively improving profits, by reducing reliance on human activity.
Altman also mentioned that investment should turn toward improving clean, cheap energy supply, which I strongly agree with. The goal ultimately should be to have "free and unlimited" energy, because that means that our creativity can expand with a massive limitation removed. However again, this is highly unlikely because of profit models, where instead of moving toward clean and abundant energy, we keep employing a resource scarcity model to the field, so that those who are selling what we have now, can keep on making profits at our expense. And the expense isn't just the monetary cost, it is the cost of destroying the very living conditions we need in order to survive as a species.
Over the decades there have been lots of what is essentially "Country First" initiatives, with things America first and Buy Australian, in order to try and protect the local economy. However, while this speaks to a national pride base, ultimately, these are just more mechanisms used to make a minority of people wealthier. More money in a country, doesn't necessarily mean a better life for the people within those borders.
Money doesn't equal wellbeing.
And this is especially true when the wealth is in so few hands, because there is zero economic incentive for the wealthy to care about the wellbeing of anyone other than themselves. Sure, no rich person wants to live under constant threat of kidnap in a world where violence, war and all kinds of crime run rampant on the streets, but devoid incentive, they will choose that if it means they can have more wealth.
As I see it, the shift that has to happen at all levels of our activity, is that we need to go Human First on everything we do. This doesn't stifle competition, nor does it reduce innovation in areas like AI, it just shifts the purpose of why we are innovating, and what kinds of products and services we create. And when I say all levels, I mean all levels.
The incentive for a corporation is to make profits, but significant profits should only be made through human first activities. The same with governments, where centralised initiatives like tax aren't there to attract votes or balance books, but to empower humans to be their best. Remove many of the corporate tax deduction incentives and shift the tax deductions to people. Have rebates on gym memberships and social classes like dance or music. Make people's lives better and incentivise people to make their own lives better.
Yet, as a species we keep falling into the trap we have been conditioned to fall into; money equals wellbeing and let the market decide. But the market is no longer a good mechanism for what is good for our own wellbeing. The market has been influenced, twisted and warped over the last decades by people who understand the market, behaviours, and how to manipulate both to the point that the generalised "we" are no longer able to come close to making decisions in our own best interest, let alone in the interest of our species. This warping of our behaviours has not only made a tiny fraction of the population extremely rich with a growing wealth gap, but it has made the rest of us accept it and even defend it as the way it has to be.
It is not the way it has to be.
It is only the way it is right now, because of decades of manipulation that has been reinforced by the very mechanisms we support, that are benefiting from us holding the line on the status quo. And we can see how effective and efficient the mechanisms are, because they truly have a "fly wheel" situation that keeps increasing the speed of extraction of value from the rest of society.
I was going to write "humanity" there, but I am increasingly sceptical to its existence in the culture we have built.
We as a species could be brilliant, but instead, we have organised ourselves into competing factions that are irrelevant to our wellbeing. As the saying goes, "Play stupid games, win stupid prizes" is absolutely true in how we are behaving, with the prizes being war, famine, conflict, anger, depression, loneliness. You see, human wellbeing is affected at the individual level, because the focus of most of our resource activity goes toward global conflict at the government and corporation levels. Activity that doesn't need to happen, but does because that is how the incentive is designed. Humanity gets the scraps, cursory attention and just enough to keep the stupid games going to optimise for increased wealth for the few.
Rather than being a boon for humanity that empowers us to be our best, artificial intelligence is instead going to be used to optimise wealth further under the guise that "one day" it will help us all. It is an obvious lie, because that is not how the incentives are aligned. But we keep on believing it because it is more convenient for us right now. This is more of the influence that comes from our conditioning from those who know us better than we know ourselves.
I know what the answer is, but it is unlikely to ever happen, because of the conditioning of society to keep supporting an economic model that is designed to push wealth to one extreme, while the other end shifts continually downward. We as a society will get worse and worse, even as our technological innovations, corporations, and government mechanisms get better and better at controlling us to our own detriment. And we happily keep buying into it, because we as individuals feel we can't do anything about it. Maybe that is true.
And if it is, the end is inevitable.
We will be the first species to choose to make itself extinct.
At least Humans will be first at last.
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]
Be part of the Hive discussion.
- Comment on the topics of the article, and add your perspectives and experiences.
- Read and discuss with others who comment and build your personal network
- Engage well with me and others and put in effort
And you may be rewarded.
the thing is simple, who is rich wants to be even more rich and push down whoever is not, it's not a coincidence middle class is disappearing, they all are going to be pushed to the bottom
the first thing rich people thought about AI has been "good now we can cut jobs and save money"
AI has tons on potentials, i'm thinking about researches in medic field, math, phisics... but what is it mostly being used for? military, porn, cut jobs...
There is no doubt in my mind they thought this.
I was reflecting just yesterday on how we are being played. Played like a slot machine in Vegas. Just pull our handle and we shill out the money for the wealthy and government ever so often. Enough we have made them addicts and they keep coming back. Maybe we need to stop letting them pull the handle.
This proposition you've put forward, to prioritize the wellbeing of humanity first before any other thing won't happen unless we humans learn to keep our greedy nature in check.
So far the greediness remains, profit will always be the number one goal, despite the amount of human suffering that is caused by it.
As it stands, the government is the one that is to play the biggest role in shifting the attention from profit to the well-being of the society, but that is unlikely to happen as the politicians themselves are even greedier than the others. With this you begin to see there almost no hope for our situation.
Will humanity survive in this age of digital capitalism? I don't think so, all I can think of is 'hope'. Like how much is enough for the elites or the bigs? As an individual, there is nothing I can do which can make aa significant change; however, individual in a collective sense can inndeed make a big change. But, tbh, we are not ready or thinking about doing anything. I don't remember the exact fact, but a month or two back, I read that 5-6 simple interactions with AI chatbot consumes half-a-liter of freshwater. Everything is fine for me, they can earn as much as they want to, just let the layman live a normal life. What is life without the basic necessity - water? Water is already depriving, with the mighty population of eight billion, still the world is not willing to make any change. Rather than focusing on what actually matters, everyone is just busy in capitalizing every single penny. Or there are warmongers. The US and Russia-China are in a race to build a nuclear ractor on moon, and we still haven't even eradicated extreme poverty :)
In the end, progress loses its meaning the moment it serves power before people; true innovation begins when humanity comes first. Sounds good but impossible to implement.
The idea of prioritizing humanity first is indeed a good idea; however it seems a far dream in a world driven by greed and self-interest.