A few weeks ago, these two headlines sat side-by-side on the business page of the San Francisco Chronicle: “EPA eliminates rule that limits emissions from power plants,” and “President dismisses AI dangers as ‘hoax’.”
All I could think is that Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Human Stupidity are portrayed in these two articles. Human Stupidity drives the concept and desire for AI. AI was created to eliminate jobs performed by humans, to make us purposely stupid and devoid of our critical thinking skills. Those who have created it did so to create enormous wealth and power for themselves.
The creators, drivers and Trump followers see this as a way to enrich themselves, and make another of their human stupidity projects – Crypto Currency – balloon, and give them even more money and power.
While we worry so much that our children can read, write and master math, we do not seem to worry about the diversity of what they are reading, if their writing is really their writing, and what they are doing with these math skills. We measure intelligence by grading so-called success and performance in monetary terms. We do not measure the intelligence of those, like Al Gore, who pointed out that we are killing our planet and ourselves. We do not measure success when a volunteer or mental health professional helps an unhoused person get off the street and into a home.
If all the energy, money and hype we are expending on AI were poured into saving our planet, that would be a triumph of human intelligence. AI, with all its hype, is in reality the ultimate in human stupidity. When AI is used to write a book, a paper, a news piece, it replaces human observation and empathy, and it gives the reader a generic mishmash of what has been thought of before, stolen from others.
The data centers, used to drive the powerful AI machine, drain our planet of our resources at an accelerated pace. If instead, all the energy poured into AI were poured into creating the most efficient green energy systems of solar and wind power, recycled water technology, organic farming, green building techniques – we could save our planet and ourselves.
Let’s look at a couple of quotes from the two news pieces: “Coal, gas and oil-fired power plants are responsible for about one-quarter of the nation’s total climate pollution, second only to the transportation sector.” And Trump’s posting, “The only control or ‘guardrails’ that AI needs is a STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT, and the US has that in spades!”
So the pinnacle of human stupidity thinks he is brilliant, while the facts of real observation and documentation are ignored because those at the height of power, in our world and our country, fancy themselves geniuses while wallowing in obscene wealth and power.
One of the so-called geniuses, Elon Musk, seems to be obsessed with living on Mars. Perhaps he could perfect his hermetically sealed bubble construct on Mars, take the rest of the AI geniuses and cheerleaders with him, and leave the world to those who will work to reverse climate change.
As I grow older and older, and each year passes, I become more saddened by what lies ahead for the next generations. Can we change? Can we shift our admiration and support to those who see the real picture, that this planet is all we have?
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