What Are We Afraid Of?
Is the "I" in AI for Identity?
What makes you "you?"
Is it how your friends, enemies, and acquaintances see you? Are you the sum of your memories and experiences? Do those memories disappear after your body dies? Or are you an immortal soul that lives on long after? Is your self an illusion, created by firing and misfiring synapses inside your head? What happens to that illusion after the final misfire?
Sir Kazuo Ishiguro, winner of the Novel prize in Literature, raises these questions in Klara in the Sun, his latest novel. He released it in 2021 and predicted at least some of the Sturm und Drang 2023 has experienced over artificial intelligence.
Klara is an artificial friend (AF); an android equipped with AI, designed to act as a companion. She narrates her story, taking us from her early days waiting in the store to be purchased to... well, that would be a spoiler.
It's clear from the very beginning that Klara isn't simply a bundle of predefined routines. She learns from her experiences.
Ishiguro imbues Klara with a unique voice that draws you into her unique way of seeing the world. Her unnamed manufacturer sent her to the store with a brain full of facts and figures, but only enough practical knowledge to follow instructions from "Manager," the salesperson in charge or the AFs in her store.
So Klara observes her surroundings and draws her own conclusions on how the world works, but she frequently misunderstands and develops her own superstitions. She "hallucinates," just like our friends ChatGPT and Bard.
Klara embodies the aspects of AI that make technologists excited— programs that train themselves. Code that, rather than needing to account for every possibility, can compensate and adjust for new circumstances. But Ishiguro foresaw the problems we saw this year. If AI can learn the right way, it can learn the wrong way, too.
But for as long as I remember, this learning was one of the promises of AI. And we've done it! We have code that can train itself.
And it's a #$%#ing mess.
On the one hand, scientists are putting it to use on problems like synthesizing new drugs and unwinding the cause of disease. On the other, the money guys are using it to steal other people's work and eliminate jobs.
Stealing other people's work isn't new, and technology eliminating jobs is a tale as old as time. That doesn't mean that this new threat isn't a clear and present and danger, though. Until now, the artless clods that control the money had to rely on "work for hire" and endless copyright to monetize other people's ideas. Now they can push a button, steal all the ideas out there, pull the "recycle" lever, profit, and ignore the fact that the other artless clod has a 'bot that's stealing from his 'bot at the same time.
I don't know what the answers to those problems are. All I have are more questions:
Is that what we're really afraid of?
Is that what we should be afraid of?
Is the problem AI or society?
While Klara and the Sun alludes to AI causing upheaval and unrest by eliminating jobs, its primary focus remains on the existential questions I posed at the top, and how they relate to AI.
If we're created by our memories and experiences, then can't AI become people too?
If you can program AI with your memories and experiences, can it become you? Can an AI replace (or "continue") someone by observing how they react to different circumstances?
These questions aren't new, but science fiction often limits AI (and robots) to either being a boon to humanity as its loyal servants or an existential threat determined to wipe out humanity, if not all organic life. Using AI as POV characters with story ARCs isn't as common.
The Bobiverse series tackles identity head on, with a man who wakes up to find that not only has his consciousness has been harnessed to run a space probe, but that he can create copies of himself. (That can create copies of themselves...)
The MCU explores AI in the vastly underrated Age of Ultron, with characters that were created in the comics back in the late 1960s. On the surface, the movie is a boilerplate AI story: evil computer wants to take over the world. But that evil AI was created by a narcissistic genius with PTSD (Tony Stark, portrayed by Robert Downey Jr.), that he infused with parts of his consciousness. After all, he's perfectly capable of saving the world. It's just a matter of creating a mind like his that has the time and can work at greater speeds.
What could go wrong?
So, we get James Spader imitating Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark, which is entertaining enough. But the villain lays the groundwork for another, even better, AI (why wouldn't he have the same idea?) that defeats him.
For the moment, our decrepit crony capitalist society has reduced artificial intelligence to an intellectual property quandary wrapped in an employment issue. But in the long run, that's the least of our problems.
What I'm Writing To
I started my "Touching Grass" feature just in time for it to get cold and my riding to move indoors and on the bike trainer. So for the next few months, I'll share some of the music I listen to while I'm working.
While I usually steer away from lyrics when I'm trying to write, shoegaze obscures the words enough that I can keep them in the background.
When it comes to shoegaze, Jesus and Mary Chain rule the roost.
As far as recreational listening goes, Manfred Mann’s Earth Band has been part of the soundtrack to my indoor bike rides.
What I'm Reading
Looking for something to read? Check out J.W. Ellenhall's 3-Page Book Battles Reviews and Novel Tips. This is one of the best reviews I've read in a long time.
Refer a subscriber to my list from this link, to get a free ebook copy of Shadows of the Past!
Eric Goebelbecker
Trick of the Tale LLC
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