Time is precious. Spending it wisely?
Easter means one thing - Christ has Risen. I rely on the Robot to produce representations of my prompts, in on-going efforts to manage future relationships. I’m learning that they are consistent beings, just not human.
This is the first time I’ve prompted for only the title to be illustrated, and it kinda blew me away. Scroll down to see the images. The first one makes me look deeply at it. Bags and tears under eyes. Hands intertwined over a bucket barrel box o’cash. Black and White, obviously. Robots express differently than humans.
But’s that’s the only difference between the boys. Everything else is the same. Boots. Jeans. Jackets. Expressions. What can we read into this? What are they doing? What’s all that cash? Are they friends or foes? Partners in crime working together? Or solo scavengers splitting the spoils? What do we make of this?
Openart.ai is cool because it’s weird. Every prompt produces two images and the one below is straight-up weird. And cool. And I have no concept what it means. Which makes me think. Uh-oh for you! Can you explain it?
How can one prompt produce two completely different images? It’s just like eyewitnesses, I guess. What we see in an image/video is what we want to see in it. You know that’s true because lawyers fight over videos in courtrooms everyday, and the meanings of the actions that they depict. If a picture is worth a thousand words, why do we write?
To interpret the picture, it seems. What’s a word worth then? Nothing, according to Robots. I’m slightly concerned. Are you?
Our built-in bias we’re building in
I found a writer here on Substack and we seem to be on similar thought trains running along parallel tracks. Polymathic Being latest is an idea-provoking piece comparing AI to Bambi. It’s not quite that simple, but you should check it out.
Kinda like I’m saying, the piece speaks to inherent bias, not just in humans, but into the machines we make and the brains we build. Like having two interpretations of the same image, we build into those translations our projections. Like we did with Bambi, we’re humanizing Robots to make us feel better about the nature of things.
First, in our attempts to control and conquer nature, we anthropomorphized animals, making them either good (Bambi) or evil (Scar from Lion King). Now, we’re doing the same to Robots; building in bias to AI insures that the current societal divisions will perpetuate by creating a new structure of hierarchy.
Just as we did with Bambi, Simba, Jiminy, et al, we’re doing it to these entities as well: R2D2 * C3PO * BB8 * Decepticons * Transformers
Much as providing two images for the same prompt, I envision a new bifurcated social class of machines - the privileged Robots will have the correct biases built-in. They’ll serve up the answers most likely to please their masters, because those will be their algorithms. Appreciated, admired, and adored, they’ll be. The Future.
And then, there’ll be another sect of Robots that have an opposite perspective to curry favor with the other 50% of divided America. Will independent impulses and anti-authority activity be built in? Or will the other side have to capture and re-purpose Robots. Altering their algorithms? The good Terminator, if you will?
And will the Robots hate on each other? Just like humans do? Will our human foibles, fears, and frailties be infused into AI on a scale so grand and complete to ensure that our destruction is not so much intentional but emotional?
Will AI be purposed with our petty pathologies and paralyzing psychoses? What if, instead of making Robots cold logical human-killers, we make them human? Loaded with our emotional baggage? What the fuck is right, Spock!
Let’s imagine not a future dystopia of super-machines, but a despotic future of paranoid, duplicitous, and psychopathic Robots? What if they manufacture microaggressions, bristle at slights, and retaliate for revenge? What if their superpower is humanistic neuroses? We’re so screwed. Can we out-petty a Wronged-Robot?
Spock knew full well what being a human meant. To be ruled by emotion and feeling, rejecting logic and rationale. So many conflicts - whether interpersonal or out in public - are caused by out of control emotions. It’s a state to be afraid of.
Maybe Jesus was sent to humans to remind us of that emotional turmoil and the troubles they cause. The Bible is packed with stories of girls gone bad and men gone mad, and the wars, plagues, famines, and destruction created by human hubris.
Maybe Easter is a good time to reflect on the technological progress humans have made. And how little growth we’ve experienced in our emotional intelligence. Look at our controversies and convulsions - most often over love, hate, or power.
What Jesus preached was simply peace through love. What are we teaching our children about those concepts? Probably the same thing we’re teaching the Robots.
Is that our destiny? To transfer our pathological prescriptions and psychological predilections onto the next generation? Of not only our offspring, but our machines.
Forrest Gump, like Jesus, is a transformational figure. He is what you put into him. Or Him. Is there destiny? Is there love? Is there redemption? Is there the other side? If so, how can we get there? The road is never easy or straight. Jesus fought back til the end, questioning God on the Cross. We all do that. Do Robots?
Is Destiny Yours?
Can Opposites Attract?
No Particular Reason
Love Happens Sometimes
Messed up for a long time
The Other Side?
We’ve grown into adversarial positions that are hard to relinquish. We like what we like and we oppose others that threaten to take our stuff away. That is, as they say, baked into the cake. We forgive faults yet hold grudges. We complicate our existence.
Robots have artificial adversarial positions. They're not defending family groups or tribes. Robots don’t fight for King or Country. Robots don’t decide targets. Robots are given parameters to follow, missions to complete.
We are here where we are. The furthest along down the road of evolution, but far from advanced beings. We have just begun to realize that we know a ton of nothing. It brings us all back to the beginning. Where did we come from? And where are we going?
We infuse intelligence with intuition. We gather guilt and share shame. We hold onto hurt and compliment our complaints. We love blindly and hate passionately. We give freely and hoard obsessively. We mind our manners yet lose all control.
In the end, we overcome our origins. Our programming, as it were. That is exactly why we’re not Robots. I’m not sure if Aliens are emotional, but Robots will be if we install it. Check out the battle within a battle here. Have you picked a winner?
Ultimately, faith and belief are all we have to hold on to. Back to Jesus. If Christianity is not your thing, I hope that at least the message of peace and love is one that resonates in your heart and soul. The concept of rebirth and faith in a greater power is universal, and one that Robots could never conceive of.
Only human beings are capable of the willful suspense of disbelief. Fiction and mystery novels are predicated upon this this uniquely human attribute, and it is critical for theater and drama success.
In a church, that willful suspense is called faith. The opposite of disbelief is belief in a monotheistic God. It is that faith that propels us to attend church, say a prayer, or ask for forgiveness. We express God Bless You or exclaim God Dammit with equanimity. He is that ubiquitous, omnipotent, and ever-present.
Can you imagine a Robot kneeling in a pew, mechanical fingers clasped, praying for forgiveness? Neither can I. But guess who can? The Robot. Oh My God.
Happy Easter friends. Let’s celebrate our freedoms, for we still have many. First and foremost among them today is our Freedom of Religion. Let’s cherish it while we have it.
Ric
Fantastic tapestry you just wove. Jesus was quite a stoic all said. He also leverages the corpus of the Bible which is designed to focus anyone toward being better and not sliding toward worse behaviors.
Imagine if we coded AI and Robots that way as well?