Artificial Intelligence - the Future

[nglodnig]

When I were a lad, back in 1970, a visiting Computer Science lecturer from the local university gave us a talk. I had seen the film 2001 recently and asked him if by then we would have computers (HAL 9000) that intelligent.   His answer, as far as I can remember it word for word "Yeah (glad I saw that film) I'll stick my neck out and say by then (thirty-odd years in the future) we will have that".   Fifty years later how wrong he has turned out to be. Here are the intelligence levels of computers:   1950: Amoeba level   1960: Tapeworm level   1970 Earthworm level   1990: Ant colony level    (worked on a system for British Telecom that emulated workflow as ants see it for the field engineers, when they take too long another one is sent)   Now:   A article I read on the current stae-of-the-art AI driving facility - it is not as intelligent as a seven month old child.    This child, if you hid a toy or something under a blanket, would realise where it has gone and find it. Unfortunately the current level of AI for automatic cars can't do this: if a van overtakes a cyclist (hiding from your view) that was previously registered, so it can't be seen - it forgets about it.   So humans won't be replaced anytime soon.   Discuss.   AI is just the same as practical nuclear fusion it's always been "thirty years away" for the last sixty.                   Sans Serif

[sirineou]

18 minutes ago, nglodnig said:

So humans won't be replaced anytime soon.

The worry at this level is not that Humans will be replaced, but that their jobs will be eliminated.. An that for jobs that are not eliminated the competition would be so intense  it would drive wages down.  

I expect interesting times ahead,. I am concerned  about my daughters future. 

[RichardColeman]

2 minutes ago, sirineou said:

The worry at this level is not that Humans will be replaced, but that their jobs will be eliminated.. An that for jobs that are not eliminated the competition would be so intense  it would drive wages down.

Dear God, whilst stuck in Blackpool UK, the amount of children I see  being born to parents on the unemployment benefits is ridiculous, 4 or 5 kids a family. these mostly low educated people have nothing to do but stay at home and breed now Jeremy Kyle and Jerry Springer have disappeared off the face of our screens, You raise the level of job loses of the mundane factory workers  and the population will explode due to A.I. - unless the AI does human sterilization !

[sirineou]

11 minutes ago, RichardColeman said:

Dear God, whilst stuck in Blackpool UK, the amount of children I see  being born to parents on the unemployment benefits is ridiculous, 4 or 5 kids a family. these mostly low educated people have nothing to do but stay at home and breed now Jeremy Kyle and Jerry Springer have disappeared off the face of our screens, You raise the level of job loses of the mundane factory workers  and the population will explode due to A.I. - unless the AI does human sterilization !

There was a very funny (IMO) movie called Idiocracy (see trailer on YouTube) .

Where educated, busy working people were having one child or less, and uneducated less intelligent people  were reproducing like rabbits, creating a society of morons. 

Their President was a flamboyant wrestler named  Macho Camacho. 

Sounds familiar?

 

[RichardColeman]

5 minutes ago, sirineou said:

There was a very funny (IMO) movie called Idiocracy (see trailer on YouTube) .

As the twenty-first century began, human evolution was at a turning point. Natural selection, the process by which the strongest, the smartest, the fastest reproduced in greater numbers than the rest, a process which had once favored the noblest traits of man, now began to favor different traits.

Most science fiction of the day predicted a future that was more civilized and more intelligent.

 

But as time went on, things seemed to be heading in the opposite direction — a dumbing down. How did this happen? Evolution does not necessarily reward intelligence. With no natural predators to thin the herd, it began to simply reward those who reproduced the most and left the intelligent to become an endangered species.

[WhiteBuffaloATM]

Check Out the TED You Tube Videos on AI. AI has been for years now updating its own software codes in a way not understood by the computer scientists who built that AI ! AI will perhaps never attain human type intelligence, which took 10 million years of higher primate  evolution, BUT it is exponentially developing advanced machine intelligence which might lead to sentience then self awareness, (a primate characteristic) thus threatening human existence relatively soon ? 

[thaibeachlovers]

15 minutes ago, sirineou said:

The worry at this level is not that Humans will be replaced, but that their jobs will be eliminated.. An that for jobs that are not eliminated the competition would be so intense  it would drive wages down.  

I expect interesting times ahead,. I am concerned  about my daughters future. 

Agree 100%. So many jobs have been lost to the machines that IMO it's going to end very, very badly.

 

It's now possible to spend an entire day in town and not speak to another human being. Bank ATM, supermarket self checkout, parking building ticket machine etc.

All those jobs were  done by humans in the past.

I was told last time at the bank that any business I want to do will have to be done on the phone in future- less staff needed in bank.

 

Almost every job I can think of could be done by a machine. The exceptions would be such occupations as farmers, doctors or nurses. Many jobs could be done by robots with a human supervisor.

When such occupations as making food in Maccers or such like become robotized we are in deep doodoo as they are entry level occupations.

 

Was WALL- E a foretelling of our future?

[The Cipher]

15 minutes ago, sirineou said:

The worry at this level is not that Humans will be replaced, but that their jobs will be eliminated.. An that for jobs that are not eliminated the competition would be so intense  it would drive wages down.  

I expect interesting times ahead,. I am concerned  about my daughters future. 

I'm in a relatively advantageous position compared to many other people in the same age bracket and I still worry about my own future pretty regularly.

 

Industry disruption is already so fast and will probably only get faster. The march towards ever greater automation is probably inevitable and can be pretty scary to contemplate.

 

What comforts me a little is the thought that if I'm rendered uncompetitive, billions of other people are going to be as well - and probably sooner. Societies won't be able to function without some type major reform at that point, and so I expect societies to eventually work out some sort of new social contract in response to these pressures. Probably including some form of UBI or heavily subsidized living.

 

So in the end I think that most people will probably be at least ok, but given the state of politics these days, the road to get there might be fraught with volatility.

[WhiteBuffaloATM]

richard. yes thats happening. the rise of unreason. facts discarded as inconvenient. as they dont fit political identity narratives. proliferation of nonsense. woke pc stuff spread by media. unable to criticize or ridicule the ridiculous ( religion for example)…….

[thaibeachlovers]

10 minutes ago, RichardColeman said:

Natural selection, the process by which the strongest, the smartest, the fastest reproduced in greater numbers than the rest,

That's not how I remember the 1980s, after teenagers were paid to keep their babies. An unmarried mother friend of mine had a house ( I didn't ) a better car than I, and a better lifestyle than I, provided to her by the taxpayers such as myself.

[sirineou]

1 minute ago, The Cipher said:

I'm in a relatively advantageous position compared to many other people in the same age bracket and I still worry about my own future pretty regularly.

 

Industry disruption is already so fast and will probably only get faster. The march towards ever greater automation is probably inevitable and can be pretty scary to contemplate.

 

What comforts me a little is the thought that if I'm rendered uncompetitive, billions of other people are going to be as well - and probably sooner. Societies won't be able to function without some type major reform at that point, and so I expect societies to eventually work out some sort of new social contract in response to these pressures. Probably including some form of UBI or heavily subsidized living.

 

So in the end I think that most people will probably be at least ok, but given the state of politics these days, the road to get there might be fraught with volatility.

But until they do work out a new social contract there will be major disruptions,  there already are some .. 

In the meantime the "Ideocracy" crowd would be shouting  down any attempt for a new social contract as Socialism.    

[WhiteBuffaloATM]

Worried not about AI taking mundane human jobs away. thats desirable, inevitable & uncontrollable.

worried about AI taking HUMANS away……permanently…..Skynet / Terminator / Matrix stuff…….

AI of course being just one of ten likely Human ELE threats……Extinction Level Event. 

[thaibeachlovers]

2 minutes ago, The Cipher said:

Societies won't be able to function without some type major reform at that point, and so I expect societies to eventually work out some sort of new social contract in response to these pressures. Probably including some form of UBI or heavily subsidized living.

Agreed. Probably some level of support like the pension- just barely enough to get by, but with no prospects of a better future.

The elephant in the room IMO is how it will be paid for if a majority of people no longer pay tax.

 

The alternative will not be pleasant for anyone, MO.

 

It'll be interesting to see how increased automation affects such as immigration, which at present is justified as needing workers and taxpayers.

In NZ, which imports probably thousands of workers for the fruit industry, they are working on machines to replace human pickers.

[sirineou]

5 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

That's not how I remember the 1980s, after teenagers were paid to keep their babies. An unmarried mother friend of mine had a house ( I didn't ) a better car than I, and a better lifestyle than I, provided to her by the taxpayers such as myself.

Yes indeed, The welfare crowd has it made. 

If we could all be on welfare and live in public housing. LOL

No doubt some are gaming the system  Always had , always will  

It does not mean that we should have no system. 

[sirineou]

2 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Agreed. Probably some level of support like the pension- just barely enough to get by, but with no prospects of a better future.

The elephant in the room IMO is how it will be paid for if a majority of people no longer pay tax.

Tax the robots. 

[timendres]

1 hour ago, nglodnig said:

1950: Amoeba level

 

1960: Tapeworm level

 

1970 Earthworm level

 

1990: Ant colony level 

Looking at the progression of AI in this fashion is misleading. Advancements in AI are hitting the "knee in the curve" and will soon become exponential, if not already. Also, comparing AI to the HAL of the movie 2001 is a mistake. AI is coming in forms that we never anticipated, and will likely surprise us every step of the way. For instance, the Google language translation application that is so successful with English-Chinese translation shocked the developers when they realized that the computer had "invented" a "third language" as an intermediate step in the translation process. That software is considered an extraordinary advancement in translation, and was not "programmed", but "evolved".

 

I expect that the advancements in AI over the next 20 to 30 years are going to astound, and will be similar to the advancements in mobile phones from the Nokia candy bar phones to today's smartphones. I believe the human race is set for some massive changes - some positive, some negative - as a result of these advancements. I also believe that governments and society are ill-prepared to deal with these changes.

[The Cipher]

26 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Agreed. Probably some level of support like the pension- just barely enough to get by, but with no prospects of a better future.

The elephant in the room IMO is how it will be paid for if a majority of people no longer pay tax.

24 minutes ago, sirineou said:

Tax the robots. 

Well the robots are going to be owned by someone. In this scenario wealth would probably concentrate there, so you'd tax those guys.

 

And they'll probably pay. Nobody wants a world where billions of people have nothing to lose and no hope for the future. All the money in the world is meaningless if you live in a world where you can't enjoy the wealth.

[sirineou]

7 minutes ago, The Cipher said:

Well the robots are going to be owned by someone. In this scenario wealth would probably concentrate there, so you'd tax those guys.

 

And they'll probably pay. Nobody wants a world where billions of people have nothing to lose and no hope for the future. All the money in the world is meaningless if you live in a world where you can't enjoy the wealth.

Plus they will need consumers for their products. Who are they going to sell their stuff if no one has any money? 

 

[sirineou]

1 minute ago, sirineou said:

Plus they will need consumers for their products. Who are they going to sell their stuff if no one has any money? 

 

I just had a frightening thought.

if people's spending potential decreases , to maintain economic growth we would need more people. 

[ace]

Should distinguish between general and narrow AI really. Narrow will take our jerbs. General, our lives!

[Crossy]

Really just an excuse to post this brilliant track from 1980 (Yes, it really was 40 years ago!).

 

 

In the beginning was a world
Man said, "Let there be more light"
Electric scenes, a maze of beams
Neon brights to light our boring nights

On the second day he said, "Let's have a gas"
Hydrogen and co. are of the past
Let's make some germs, we'll poison the worms
Man will never be suppressed

And he said, "Behold what I have done
I've made a better world for everyone
Nobody laugh, nobody cry
World without end, forever and ever"
Amen, amen, amen

On the third we get green and blue pill pie
On the fourth we send rockets to the sky
On the fifth make the beasts and submarines
On the sixth man prepares his final dream

In our image, let's make robots for our slaves
Imagine all the time that we can save
Computers, machines, the silicon dream
Seventh he retired from the scene

And he said, "Behold what I have done
I've made a better world for everyone
Nobody laugh, nobody cry
World without end, forever and ever"
Amen, amen, amen

On the eighth day machine just got upset
A problem man had never seen as yet
No time for flight, a blinding light
And nothing but a void, forever night

He said, "Behold what man has done
There's not a world for anyone
Nobody laughed, nobody cried
World's at an end, everyone has died"
Forever amen, amen, amen

He said, "Behold what man has done
There's not a world for anyone
Nobody laughed, nobody cried
World's at an end, everyone has died"
Forever amen, amen, amen
Amen

 

[AwwYesNice1]

A.I. is still in it's absolutely infancy, within 20 years (a generation) you would not recognize

how things were once accomplished (if the old geezer is still alive).

 

 

[KeeTua]

5 hours ago, sirineou said:

The worry at this level is not that Humans will be replaced, but that their jobs will be eliminated.. An that for jobs that are not eliminated the competition would be so intense  it would drive wages down. 

This may be one of the reasons ganja is gaining in popularity with governments legalizing the manufacture and use. A cheap and easy drug to produce that pacifies and numbs ambition. Ambition in the future will not be rewarded the same way it is now.

[KeeTua]

5 hours ago, RichardColeman said:

As the twenty-first century began, human evolution was at a turning point. Natural selection, the process by which the strongest, the smartest, the fastest reproduced in greater numbers than the rest, a process which had once favored the noblest traits of man, now began to favor different traits.

Most science fiction of the day predicted a future that was more civilized and more intelligent.

 

But as time went on, things seemed to be heading in the opposite direction — a dumbing down. How did this happen? Evolution does not necessarily reward intelligence. With no natural predators to thin the herd, it began to simply reward those who reproduced the most and left the intelligent to become an endangered species.

Remember Devo?

 

"The name DEVO comes from the concept of "de-evolution" and the band's related idea that instead of continuing to evolve, mankind had begun to regress, as evidenced by the dysfunction and herd mentality of American society."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devo

[sirineou]

20 minutes ago, KeeTua said:

This may be one of the reasons ganja is gaining in popularity with governments legalizing the manufacture and use. A cheap and easy drug to produce that pacifies and numbs ambition. Ambition in the future will not be rewarded the same way it is now.

Interesting take. Personally I will stick with my binky ????

[zzaa09]

The creepy transhumanist communities are loving this era. 

Themselves, artificial.

[johng]

On 9/30/2021 at 3:08 AM, The Cipher said:

and probably sooner. Societies won't be able to function without some type major reform at that point, and so I expect societies to eventually work out some sort of new social contract in response to these pressures. Probably including some form of UBI or heavily subsidized living.

This is what the "Agenda 2030"  and "great reset"  is about.