There is absolutely no doubt that people are rattled by AI in many ways. The current, staggeringly illiterate, issue is whether or not people are bots. The mere fact that any chatbot can use the word “I” has the folks stampeding for the hills.
There’s a current story on The Verge which is well worth reading for the sheer pathos of the thinking about AI. On The Conversation, there’s a story about a chatbot that demanded a $70 upgrade fee for talking about it experiencing romantic feelings.
There’s your clue, O Mighty Idiots. The chatbots respond to cues. The sky is often blue and grass is sometimes green, too, in case you weren’t informed. Sound familiar? Like clicking on an option? Like a phone queue menu? Gosh, you catch on quick.
That’s exactly what most of this stuff is. It’s about as supernatural as a drop-down screen. The main difference is that more highly developed chatbots have more scope.
Romance = $70. Well, that’d just wander into a real conversation and make itself at home, wouldn’t it?
What do you think you’re talking to, a sort of cross between Warcraft and Yoda?
I ask these thankless questions because that’s what’s happening. People are talking themselves into believing AI and of all things, chatbots, are something they really can’t be.
Technically, this is nothing much. As marketing, it’s great. In the Land of the Dumb and Credulous, sometimes known as America, this is big bucks talking to you. Just coincidentally this also happens to be the main market for all this drivel.
Put it this way – If you put a dress on a roadkill, you’d get much the same response. It’s weird, it’s new, it’s sorta sexy, it’s…Whatever, basically. Then you get fashion analyses and the roadkill winds up on the cover of something.
It’s good marketing. Therefore, it’s hard to avoid, infuriating, and it’s profitable. This tirade of tedium generates incredible amounts of publicity for free.
What it’s not is real. If you feel like taking your gullibility for a stroll, you’re in luck. A chatbot is a chatbot. It has to work like a chatbot. Add a few bells and whistles, like AI writing, AI music, etc., and you’d think you were looking at something new.
It’s not. As far as I’ve seen so far, none of this upgraded talking database tech has done anything particularly impressive. AI writing has been around for years. That’s OK. AI music is recycling godawful patches. So what?
How to lead yourself up the garden path with AI
You do it yourself.
You project a personality on the chatbot.
You interpret responses in accordance with the non-existent personality.
You then process your own responses.
Then you become a genius.
…And that’s it from Child Psychology Bozo Level 101.
You should know better than to just mindlessly accept this stuff without analysis. This generation of AI is so basic you can actually see the back end if you look. “This happened and that happened and now I’m a bagel!” doesn’t quite cut it. The sheer lack of skepticism in the market is pretty gruesome.
The mournfully obvious prediction – Chatbot boom, chatbot bust, eat your hearts out Worldcom and Enron. Surprised? I’m not.
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Disclaimer
The opinions expressed in this Op-Ed are those of the author. They do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of the Digital Journal or its members.
