IF YOU THINK AI REALLY IS INTELLIGENT…
It is my firm belief that neither the hype-artists nor the doomsayers in the exploding “artificial intelligence” market are to be taken at face value. The two parts of the concept are contradictions in terms, for starters. Nonetheless, I am assured by the daily arrival of unsolicited advertisements in my computer that AI could write this blog.
How that jives with French philosopher Rene Descartes’ famous summation of humanity Cogito, ergo sum, “I think, therefor I am”, issued in 1637 and still extant, isn’t addressed in the sales pitches.
In search of an answer, I asked Google: “Can AI write blog posts?”
This was the reply: “AI tools exist today that can write full sentences and paragraphs. Depending on the blog topic, these tools can actually write most of a simple blog post. This is extremely useful. Using AI, you can cut down the time you spend on basic content creation.”
Since I quite enjoy the time I spend on content creation, the next obvious question is: “Can AI get me beyond ‘basic’ and interest readers?”
I have found no reasons to think so.
The Cambridge Advance Learner’s Dictionary, 2006 defines intelligence as: “The ability to learn, understand and make judgments or have opinions that are based on reason.”
One website has more than 70 variations of that. None of them succinctly sum up the supposedly intelligent half of AI.
As for artificial — AI cannot feel empathy, sympathy, anger, joy, admiration, disdain, inspiration, exasperation, curiosity, or any of the other human emotions that go into creative writing, or thought.
Nonetheless, one of the many websites dedicated to AI claimed: “In the future, a good percentage of the articles posted online will be assisted by artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning in some way.”
That’s all fine, except: “AI relies on existing web content and data to develop wording”, which exposes the user to spurious content, and worst of all, the crime of plagiarism.
‘CAN’T BUY ME LOVE’
And all that aside, where’s any sense of accomplishment in conceiving and finishing a blog if AI ‘writes’ it?
Where’s the learning process and development of style that re-writing and editing your work spurs?
Quite often my weekly perch ruminations start out as one thing and end up another. I make no claim to literary greatness, I’m just enjoying myself, and hoping the same goes for the reader.
But I don’t sit at my keyboard and wonder, as AI by its process alone does: “How can I please everybody?”
Sometimes it’s more “I wonder who’ll be outraged by this one?”
On occasion I can make a good guess at who I might upset, and proceed with glee. Bet AI can’t give u that feeling.
A WASTE BY ANY OTHER NAME
The esteemed American psychologist Robert Sternberg summed up AI in one neat sentence: “The world supports a multi-million dollar industry of intelligence and ability research, but it devotes virtually nothing to determine why this intelligence is squandered in amazing, breathtaking acts of stupidity.”
One of those is the growing use of AI by students to cheat.
Educators are increasingly concerned that AI tools will mean “students will not have to write their own essays, making them functionally useless as an assessment tool.”
Another fret is that “With a little bit of practice, a student can use AI to write his or her paper in a fraction of the time that it would normally take to write an essay.”
WHY NOT USE WHAT’S AVAILABLE?
It won’t be long before a mini-industry of products and programmes to detect and counter cheating will be flooding Inboxes with advertisements. But that will still be another form of AI.
A solution more in keeping with Descartes would be to teach students a simple lesson: if you pass an exam by cheating, you have learned nothing. You’ve wasted your time and that of teachers who’ve dedicated their time, knowledge and energy to enlighten and inform you, to spark your curiosity, not just for your benefit, but for everyone with whom you come into contact for the rest of your life.
Cheating by using AI may seem like a little thing, a fib, a version of “everyone does it”.
But if you’re willing to cheat on something so fundamental to your own future, why should anyone ever believe anything you say or do is completely honest and honourable?
Like it or loathe it, AI is now an integral, and metastasising, part of our lives.
I suggest we approach and embrace it by combing Sternberg: “The essence of intelligence would seem to be in knowing when to think and act quickly, and knowing when to think and act slowly” with Descartes: “Cogito, ergo sum”.
To which I feel constrained to add, and a robot didn’t write this.
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5 thoughts on “IF YOU THINK AI REALLY IS INTELLIGENT…”
Fully agree, Pizz! A few years back we were contracted to provide the content (q&a mostly) for a ‘bot’ intended to respond to victims of domestic abuse — and to family members and friends who wanted to help and support victims. The lack of empathy was a massive obstacle, as was the finite nature of potential responses. I think AI is an example of how people who are good at one thing — in this instance tech, often erroneously think that this makes them good at everything.
I think, sadly, that you’re right Barb
Maybe it’s all contained in the name ARTIFICIAL. Happy new year pizz
I have little personal knowledge of the scope & impact of AI on my life or that of the world I live in. However, my son, a university prof. submitted one of his final exams to chatgpt, a conversational AI site & received responses to his essay questions that were impressively acceptable & undetectable. However, he says a Harvard professor has already developed a program to detect AI written responses. The battle is on. Regardless, your communication skills are thoughtfully evident, informative, & much appreciated. Keep up the good work.
Nothing “A” about your “I”, Pizz. Another good one. I am still waiting for a blog from you that causes me outrage. That would be fun. Alas, I think our upbringing and subsequent world view are too parallel for that to happen. Perhaps“confirmation bias” at work there.
Anyway, my final years as an English teacher and a teacher of writing found me combating the tendency of a few students to plagiarize. Google was a new thing and putting a few sentences up in that search line often revealed the source. Maybe the first time I ever felt slightly ahead of my students in technology. Lasted about five seconds. What I went to eventually was something that really started the students. In their final summative essay of the semester I had them read their paper to me in private. It gave me a chance to quiz them a little and expand on some things. This and the mere cadence of their reading their “own ” material usually revealed the authentic from borrowed. If it rang like a bell we proceeded if it thunked like a lead pipe I asked them to “revise”. No accusation. The first time was painful but the next was better and so on until we agreed on the ownership of the effort.
I did not have to deal with this latest AI thing and sympathize with Prof Maquire.
Having said that there is one place I hope for advances in AI. I envision a day when they will take away my licence. I will be okay with that if I can call up an electric autonomous vehicle, have it come to my door and take me into town to the pub or whatever and drive me home. No cab driver with covid just me and my book.
I should live so long