Demise of the Machine
Let’s talk about A.I., artificial intelligence. We’re all thinking about it; it’s at our fingertips, tips our tongues and worming its way into our minds through auditory waves. I try to stay away from it, but at work it’s inevitable not to get some daft summary of my emails. Also, listening to my staff talk about how they use Chat GPT, and whatever else, to help them get dressed, means I’m constantly passively encountering it.
Artificial intelligence means nothing to me. I was born early enough to know a world without mobile phones and when having a computer in one’s home was a luxury. Therefore, I’m able to see artificial intelligence for what it is: an expected advancement of technology, that through rampant deregulation has become a pursuit of money at all costs. Capitalism has always been about the acquisition of money at all costs, but with its recent merging with science, I’ve got a big bone to pick. I take great issue when the music I listen to is made by A.I. Music, like painting and drama, is one of the OG artistic disciplines; How we humans entertained (and continue to entertain) ourselves when there was no wheel. For a piece of technology to deny us our natural ability and inclination denotes not an aid, but a weapon. A weapon is set for total annihilation, its purpose to leave nothing in its wake. Is that what we’re after in our pursuit of convenience? Self-destruction? I don’t think so, but we’re going about this jolly business of easy street with our eyes and ears covered in bottle coke glasses: we’re aware, but don’t want to focus.
Remember when we all ran to the movie theatre to see Steven Spielberg’s oeuvre? How we couldn’t believe how terrible it was and that it made no sense? A mechanical boy wants to become real so he can feel maternal love. At the time it was non-sensical, with much of the ‘lessons’ coming across as contrived. A cutesy Bladerunner it was trying to be, the critics said and we all scoffed at the idea of nostalgia being replaced by machines. Well, here we are, in an age where technology is doing its damndest to hijack our emotions and therefore our existence. Somewhere in the film A.I., it becomes apparent to the viewer that machines cannot thrive without humans, and sometimes we humans need machines. As much as the genie is out of the bottle, it needs us for its survival just as much as we may need it. Humans have to remember that our brain is the ultimate supercomputer, the mysterious organic matter that over hundreds of years learned, failed, tried again, then perfected and finally created this spurious reasoning. The spark came from God and like Prometheus we learned to tame it. That is divine right, yet it behooves us to control ourselves. A member of my staff told me: ‘what’s the point of learning how to read with A.I. everywhere?’ and I had to grunt my disapproval. No, no, we are the masters, and as the masters we must practise caution in what we create, because at some point we’ll need to destroy our fabrication to remain top banana.
Image: UCF Website
