🤖 Heaven Can Wait
I've just finished reading this post by @frafiomatale about existing use of Artificial Intelligence, some of which I was totally unaware of. It's worth a read if you're interested in this kind of thing.
This reminded me of a conversation I had over dinner, probably around a decade ago where we discussed a possible future where Artificial Intelligence (AI) is combined with the overwhelming use of video cameras and data storage. This thinking has probably already been turned into a movie... almost certainly not a very good one.
The Usual Aside
Before getting into these thoughts though, another thought has crossed my mind. the-child-gorilla and the-baby-gorilla will probably never need to learn to drive.
I'd like a driverless car. There seem to be more cars on the road than ever before and I get the feeling that concentrating on driving isn't the priority for most road users.
Aside complete... let's get back to a potential future (assuming we don't nuke ourselves before) and look at the component parts of it...
I mentioned 3 components in my introduction - video surveillance, data storage and Artificial Intelligence
Video Surveillance
For most of use, it's unlikely that we'll go through a day without passing a video camera of some sort. Where I'm currently sat, there's my laptop camera, the-mrs-gorilla's laptop camera, my mobile phone camera and Echo Show all with built in camera potentially (but hopefully not) recording my every movement and sound. If I go outside, I have my video doorbell and security cameras doing the same - there are so many cameras recording our movement now and it's understandable why there are so many privacy concerns. Imagine if all of this video and audio is being saved which leads me onto the next component...
Data Storage
As a society, we're increasingly creating and storing data. According to this random website that I found), there are approximately 64 zettabytes of data stored (not including physical media such as books). I have no idea how much a zettabyte is but it sounds like a big number. As technology improves, the size of storage is reducing and we're even capable of storing data in clouds now. Remarkable.
Artificial Intelligence
Finally, the component which might make the other 2 components make some sense. Now imagine that these cameras have tracked your entire life. Your movements but more importantly what you say and how you react to things. Your opinion and your world view is all stored. Your thoughts and feelings towards certain situations, certain people and different topics. It's all recorded in those zettabytes of data, waiting to be interpreted - to be understood by AI.
Then that tragic day happens. Whilst making the short 10 minute walk to pick the-child-gorilla up from school, yet another car comes bombing down my road, ignoring the sign that says "30" and is instead doing 70 whilst changing the radio off the latest Jedward song. They didn't see me - I'm a gonner.
The world is crestfallen. AI knows that I'm dead and instantly writes a loving obituary on Steemit and as a joke that only AI could make, adds the club100 hashtag and sets 25% of my beneficiary to @null. Oh AI, you're so funny.
I digress.
There are often moments in life where we think to ourselves "I wonder what .... would think of this". There are so many questions we'd like to ask a loved one - what would the-grandad-gorilla make of Brentford being in the Premier League? Oh how he'd love to have seen that (they got promoted the year after he died).
But what if... you put all of these components together. You have video and audio all stored and Artificial Intelligence can in some way recreate you. Your image, your responses, your personality. It won't just be "Alexa, how many sleeps until Christmas?", it'll be "Dad, do you think Gareth Southgate will get sacked after the World Cup?".
For almost all of us, our loved ones are remembered and held in our hearts for the remainder of our lives. We accept this and there are times when this brings us comfort, that they're there watching over us. What if one day, these aren't simply memories but virtual / augmented reality beings that we can talk to and even hold close to us again. Would that be comforting? Or just a little bit creepy?
Thats so sad but that's just life., I think he knows, he's more than happy about it because Brentford are playing good too.
About the AI thing, I've watched a lot of movies and read stuff that all come to the conclusion that these AI can turn against us, make us go extinct.
What if they get "too Intelligent", to think for themselves and all that and then get vicious??
Yeah - I like to think that he's been enjoying watching them from his birds eye view 🙂
I don't think it'd take much for AI to be more intelligent than humans and the idea that they'd lock us all up to stop us from destroying each other is an extremely logical step. Asimov's rules of robotics would stop them from destroying us though - unless the robots are smart enough to ignore those rules 🤔
Could happen 🤷🏾♂️
Thank you for the mention! These topics are fascinating, I would talk about them for hours....
If they catch my poor driving skills, I hope for my children that one day the cars will all be driven by an AI. Maybe when I'm retired I'll see it too, but the accident you mention (in theory) could never happen in a system of cars all connected to each other.
On the other hand, the person in charge of the 'central brain' could easily prevent you from using the car by pressing a simple button and under any pretext (smog, pandemic, excessive traffic, unpaid taxes...).
The use of AI in recreating loved ones who are no longer there reminds me a little of the TV series Upload, where the conscience of the dead was uploded (and probably in later seasons also downloded into a kind of neutral body) in a virtual universe. A kind of eternal life... I think that would be really creepy...
Who would still want me next to them on the sofa listening to me scream and swear during Juventus matches?
This is another interesting topic - the rules which are programmed into cars. When there's an unavoidable accident, should the car run over the human, or the dog (I believe that the majority chose the human).
I'd forgotten about Upload. I've watched the first 2 seasons - The 1st season was pretty bad but I loved the concept so kept watching. I can't decide if it's good or bad or both. I've just read that they're going to make a season 3 - my guess is that there's more downloading going on (I think the main guy downloaded into a body at the end of season 2, I can't quite remember).
There must be a few people who find your screaming entertaining 😆
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Hi,
Everything you tell us is already a reality, the situations you present remind me of the Netflix series "Mirror". The situation you tell us could not happen because the vehicles would be driven by AI 😄
That future generations one day bring their predecessors through virtual reality, to meet them, interrogate them, learn from their knowledge and learn about their thinking does not seem creepy to me, that idea is a consequence of the relationship we have with death due to our Western Christian culture. Today when we want to know the thought and works of great people of our humanity we turn to books and movies, it would be wonderful if in the future people could resort to the thought and works of others from the "first source", thanks to virtual reality.
A zettabyte is an information storage unit whose symbol is ZB, equal to10 raised to 21 (10^21) bytes.
1 Terabyte (TB) = 1000 Gigabytes (GB).
1 Petabyte (PB) = 1000 Terabytes.
1 Exabyte (EB) = 1000 Petabytes.
1 Zettabyte (ZB) = 1,000 Exabytes = 1 million petabytes = 1 billion terabytes.
I do wonder if the AI would be clever enough to anticipate the movement of humans and animals. I vaguely recall an experiment where they asked people to help define the rules of what an automated car would do in certain unavoidable situations - would it hit a parent with a pram or a dog if they were to run into the car's path. The car would probably see them coming though and already be slowing down. What a wonderfully safe world we'd live in 🙂
That's an interesting idea - would future generations be disappointed by the conversations they'd have? We've progressed so much as a society with regards to equality (still with a long way to go) and by being able to talk to them as if they were here could be very disappointing. I could imagine news headlines where some smart arse has got a controversial answer and tarnishes their reputation / legacy based upon the answer from a machine.
I can't decide if that's bigger or smaller than I would have expected.
Thats so sad but that's just life., I think he knows, he's more than happy about it because Brentford are playing good too.
About the AI thing, I've watched a lot of movies and read stuff that all come to the conclusion that these AI can turn against us, make us go extinct.
What if they get "too Intelligent", to think for themselves and all that and then get vicious??
Good!