I would like to start by pointing out one thing that I found interesting and a little hypocritical about the video. On a few occasions a statement is made by area experts opposed to the current trends in AI use where they state that the creators, and parties involved in the maintenance, of AI programs are not providing enough information to make an accurate calculation of water use. This may be a recursive argument, but those detractors also do not give their own projections of the usage of water by AI that they think is more realistic. This could be due to the lack of information released, however if AI companies are pulling water from the same pool as drinking water then it would not be a particularly difficult task to see what water consumption levels were before the building of the “chip farm” and the trend after in order to get a ball park for usage amount. Also, it feels kind of silly when one of the speakers says “the water is gone.” I am aware that functionally the water can no longer be consumed for its normal uses in the usual way due to being vapor, but to ignore some parts of the water cycle feels like a bit of an overreach. It will condense, it will rain, it will end up back in the water table which is one of the reasons that they use water as a coolant instead of synthetic coolants that have a specific life span before becoming unusable sludge. Do I think that we should be more careful about water consumption, yes. However, I also think that the raw processing power of AI is going to be one of the things that helps us solve our water usage issue by making more streamlined and cost effected technology that allows for more efficient dispersal of that resource. Instead of testing water usage on crops with the risk of the crop failing leading to economic collapse and more than likely some type of food shortage, AI can crunch so many different scenarios to find the most efficient way to irrigate crops which is the biggest draw from our water reserves. I do not think that the detractors are wrong and those at the reins of power in the AI field are right, but I do think that this is another example of how public discourse has devolved into alarmism, only dichotomous choices that creates the us vs them mentality, which is all for the sake of clicks and engagement  (looking at you social media).

Now onto the article by Mattlar which I thoroughly enjoyed. The idea that Klarna is laying people off because AI is taking their jobs and not the fact that the “Buy Now Pay Later” bubble which is commonly referred to as the Subprime Burrito crisis is something that needs to be shown for the lie that it is. Klarna has started selling unpaid loans in large packages to debt collection agencies which means that in the near future people are going to be getting calls about the money they owe on a meal they purchased 6-months ago. Collections over $20 or so are crazy… Mattlar really puts to bed the idea that AI is roving the economic countryside taking all jobs insight, and shows that it is just the latest reason for businesses to push the blame onto something else. He came with receipts and data which I always appreciate. 

On the other side of the emotional spectrum would be VandeHei and Allen who are in full panic mode. While I appreciate the sentiment and the ideas they bring, there is a part of me that felt unmoved by the plight they put forward. Blue-collar jobs have been rolling with the punches since the dawn of the industrial revolution. I think what is most scary is that technological change has finally progressed to the point that it is effectively entering white collar spaces and they have no idea how to handle it. The issue is that it has not progressed enough to put individuals at the high rungs of the white collar ladder in any real danger but is certainly wreaking havoc on entry level positions. While this is of huge concern to many people, as a millennial I see another “end of the world as we know it” scenario and shrug; all the while thinking “here we go again.” Maybe as AI moves into areas where people start to feel it then they will actually make changes in the way they run a company. Will it be too late, and AI will just take over? Who knows. What I do know is that the individuals that are in the best position to succeed in that future are those that are skilled in things usually considered blue collar. The internet revolution saw the pendulum swing toward technical skills and now it is naturally swinging back to more hands-on skills being in demand. 

AI experiment

I went with Grok as I wanted to see if the changes that they made to it in the aftermath of “MechaHitler” have brought it back toward rationality and generally accepted morality. I found that identifying each article, then asking it to answer the questions provided was actually very effective and time efficient. It created a very thorough summary of the similarities and differences as well as take aways. Having piqued my interest, I then asked it to translate the response it gave me into “Pig Latin” as it was the most ridiculous thing that I could think of. To my surprise it translated the 3 or so pages into “Pig Latin” in 41 seconds. But I figured I would press it further and asked it to then translate it from a made up language to spanish and it was able to do that translation in 24 seconds. Before I went any further down this rabbit hole I was reminded of the water usage that was happening with every key stroke, so I stopped there. However, summarizing, comparing, and translating two articles full of data, nuance, some conjecture, and in drastically different formats in just over 1 minute is something that is as eerie as it is empowering. I can acknowledge that this is different then the internet when it first came out, because there were many steps to dial up with a limited pay off due to what was or was not available. The instantaneous nature of AI and what it is able to do feels like catching lightning in a bottle. Although this may feel like a bit of a stretch in some small way the emotion or feeling that it elicited was reminiscent of the first interaction with something habit forming. Being a person in long term recovery it is one that I know well and have had to attune myself too because getting into recovery does not mean that your tendencies do not try to show up in other areas. Sometimes it’s working out, video games, or an activity that you spend far too much time on. It may sound foreign or strange, however it is the honest response I had of “Yeah I could definitely get into this.” So for me it is an exceptionally dangerous thing to interact with as it will indefinitely become a type of crutch that is used for everything. What should I do this weekend, what should I make for dinner, what’s wrong with my chicken (not for dinner), so on and so forth. I think the best place to go from here is to acknowledge that this is something that can be as addictive and personally invasive as social media except it has the possibility of waking up one day with its own thoughts and feelings. Once we get to a point of dependence on it, and that singularity happens we are more or less “cooked” as the kids would say. Once we acknowledge that it can become more than a tool, then we can create boundaries that mitigate the disaster it can cause in our lives such as processing limits, electromagnetic pulse fail safes for rouge programs, effective protections for age appropriate use, and a Geneva convention-esque set of ethical and moral standards that we as a species can agree on.