AI does not threaten humanity.What the owner does
We shouldn't fear that AI will take over humanity.We should fear the fact that humanity has not caught up with technology
An April lawsuit revealed that Google Chrome's private browsing mode, known as “Incognito,” isn't actually as private as we think. Google was still collecting the data, but had now agreed to destroy it, and that “private” browsing actually allowed him to access his website and his internet service providers, such as Comcast and AT&T. It does not prevent us from tracking your activities.
In fact, that information collection is the entire business model of a digital and smart device-enabled world. All of our habits and actions will be monitored and reduced to “data” for machine learning AI, whose results will be used to manipulate us for the benefit of others.
It doesn't have to be this way. AI has the potential to be used more ethically for the benefit of everyone. We shouldn't fear AI as a technology. Instead, we should be concerned about who owns AI and how those owners are using it to violate privacy and erode democracy.
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Not surprisingly, technology companies, state agencies, corporations, and other private interests are increasingly invading our privacy and spying on us. Insurers will monitor their customers' sleep apnea devices and deny coverage if there is improper use. Children's toys monitor playtime and collect data about children. Period-tracking apps share information about when a woman last had sex, her birth control practices, menstrual details, and even her mood with Facebook and other third parties, including state officials in states where abortion is prohibited. To do. Home security cameras monitor customers and are therefore vulnerable to hacker attacks. Medical apps share personal information with lawyers. Data brokers, companies that track people across platforms and technologies, amplify these intrusions by selling bundled user profiles to anyone willing to pay.
This blatant spying is obvious and feels wrong on a visceral level. But even more sinister is how the resulting data is used. Not only will it be sold to advertisers and private interests seeking to influence our behavior, but it will also be deployed in AI training to improve machine learning. Potentially this could be a good thing. Humanity will be able to learn more about itself and discover our shortcomings and ways to deal with them. It can help individuals get help and meet their needs.
Instead, machine learning is used to predict and prescribe, that is, to estimate who we are and what is most likely to influence us and change our behavior. One such action is how to make technology more “engaged” and generate more data. Because AI seeks to know us more than we know ourselves, addicts us to technology, and influences us without our knowledge, consent, or best interests in mind. It is used for. In other words, AI is not helping humanity address our shortcomings, but rather it is helping humanity address our vulnerabilities so that private interests can guide the way we think, act, and feel. They are abusing it.
A Facebook whistleblower revealed this several years ago. To meet its revenue goals, the platform used AI to keep people on the platform longer. This meant finding the optimal amount of anger-inducing and provocative content so that bullying, conspiracies, hate speech, disinformation, and other harmful communications flourish. The company experimented on users and designed addictive features into its technology without their knowledge, even though they knew this would harm teenage girls. Did. A United Nations report has identified Facebook as a “useful tool” for spreading hatred in the attempted genocide in Myanmar, with the company acknowledging the platform's role in amplifying violence. Companies and other interest groups are therefore using AI to learn our psychological weaknesses, lure us into the most unstable versions of ourselves, and manipulate us to achieve their desired ends. You can press the button.
So when we use our phones, computers, home security systems, health devices, smart watches, cars, toys, home assistants, apps, gadgets, etc., they are also using us. As we search, we are also searched. When we tell our lives on social media, our stories and scrolls are captured. Despite feeling free and in control, we are subtly guided (or “nudged” in the words of a kind engineer) toward constrained ideas and outcomes. .Based on our previous behavior, we may be flattered or super personalized The world amplifies and confirms our biases and uses our own interests and personalities to attract us further. Leveraging AI in this way may be good for business, but it will be disastrous for the empathy and informed deliberation necessary for democracy.
When technology companies ask us to accept cookies or ask for our belated consent, they aren't doing so in good faith. Even though “improving” a company's services relies on machines learning more about us than we know and finding patterns in our behavior that no one asked for. They give us the illusion of privacy. Even the developers of AI don't know how exactly the AI works, so they can't meaningfully communicate what we're agreeing to.
Current business models allow advances in AI and robotics to enrich a few while making life harder for many. Indeed, one could argue that people (and those obsessed with the tech industry) would benefit from potential advances in health, design, and all the efficiency improvements that AI could bring Economists would definitely argue that). But this doesn't mean much when people are stripped of their dignity, accused of failing to maintain the status quo, and continually monitored and manipulated for the benefit of others.
We shouldn't fear that AI will take over humanity. We should fear the fact that humanity has not caught up with technology. Instead of creating a world where people work less and live more, billionaires designed a system that rewards the few at the expense of the many. While AI has and continues to do great things, it has also been used to make people more anxious, insecure, self-centered, and less free. Until we truly learn to care for each other and consider everyone's interests, technology will continue to entrap us, never to free us.No such thing artificial ethics, And human principles must guide our technology, not the other way around. This starts by asking who owns AI and how it can be used in everyone’s best interests. The future belongs to all of us.
This is an opinion and analysis article and the views expressed by the author are not necessarily those of the author. scientific american.
