Do You Trust This Computer? - A Mind-Boggling Documentary on Artificial Intelligence

I’m not an AI. My code name is Project 2501. I am a living, thinking entity who was created in the sea of information.

Kudos to all of you who have recognized the quote! This was meant to be a post about Orwellian surveillance in China, but while doing research on it I came across a mind-boggling documentary - Do You Trust This Computer? It investigates a threat that many scientists, like Stephen Hawking, have expressed publicly in recent years:

[…] I think the development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race. Once humans develop artificial intelligence that would take off on its own and re-design at an ever increasing rate, humans, who are limited by slow biological evolution, couldn’t compete and would be superseded.

Stephen Hawking

AI That You Use Every Day

AI has already become a part of our every day life, even though most of us don’t notice it or don’t see it that way. Every time you type something in the Google's search bar, its AI gives you suggestions and thinks faster than you can actually type. The other AI that you use every day, and that makes you waste hours of your time every week, is Facebook. When browsing through Facebook and scrolling down your feed, you're actually interacting with its AI, whose goal is to keep you online for as long as possible. Let’s have a look at some other AI developments showed in the documentary.

Japanese Humanoids

Professor Hiroshi Ishiguro shows us around ATR Labs close to Kyoto and lets us meet Erica, the most advanced human-like robot in the world. It, or rather she, is an autonomous conversational robot. Erica can interact with humans thanks to voice recognition, human tracking and natural motion generation. She’s got her own body language and natural female face. Professor Ishiguro claims that in the future robots will be our companions and a part of our society. Furthermore, he believes that the rise of human-like robots will actually help us to understands humans better, which seems to be his main motivation for developing androids.

In Japan there are already thousands of robots in households and businesses, with Pepper being the most popular among them. It helps the elderly deal with loneliness, loss of family member, their children's leaving their family nest, etc. Apparently, the Japanese robot owners enjoy conversations with Pepper and various activities they can do together, such as playing games. Japan is suffering from population crisis and it is estimated that in 50 years its population will be halved. Robots seem to be a possible solution for this serious issue; they can replace menial and automatic jobs, thus making people have more time on their hands for creative occupations.

Professor Ishiguro believes that his creation, Erica, has a soul, just like any other animate and inanimate things, according to Japanese beliefs. He thinks that by installing intentional desires in her, such as willingness to take risks, she and other androids will be able to understand people better and perhaps, however mind-boggling it might sound, they will be able to love people.

We build artificial intelligence and the very first thing we want to do is replicate us. I think the key point will come when all the major senses are replicated: sight, touch, smell. When we replicate the senses is when it becomes alive.

Sean Gourley

Autonomous Weapons

At this point the documentary takes a twist, with a tasty Massive Attack tune in the background. However cute, amicable and practical the concept of androids might sound, and its actual use in Japan these days, the dark side of AI seems to outweigh the optimism of robot enthusiasts. The science-fiction movies' dreams and nightmares are happening right now, in front of our very eyes. Drones, which seemed to be considered a sci-fi toy, are already part of the military in 80 countries, with only the US Navy having already 10,000 of them. In 2016 the American Air Force designed a 400-billion-dollars jet programme. Meanwhile, a 500 dollar computer with AI designed by a couple of graduate students outperformed the best American pilots (source). Even though nowadays US military refrains itself from creating fully autonomous attacking vehicles, what happens if one of their main international contenders starts implementing it?

AI will have as big an impact on the military as the combustion engine had at the turn of the century.

Deep Learning

In 2005 at Columbia University the scientists started to build robots with self-awareness. First, they build a machine programmed with a desire to walk. It figured out how to do it on its own within 4 hours. Then, when the scientists chopped out one of its legs, within a day it learned to limp and eventually walk on its 3 remaining legs. A few years ago they designed an object-recognizing AI system for a live demonstration. When the scientists were tracking the robot's neurons, it turned out that it learned on its own a skill that it was not programmed to do - recognising human faces. Nobody knew how it happened. Nobody fully understands AI either. Even though we, humans, have created it, none of us is capable of comprehending our own creation, with its millions of elements and intricacies beyond our understanding.

AI has already outplayed the best chess players, Go players, military pilots and surgeons. Is it the greatest achievement of humankind or is it our doom? Are the scientists who are developing it serving the human race or are they playing god? Is our fate in the hands of geniuses or lunatics? Watch Do You Trust This Computer? and find out yourself.

Earworm

Pictures:
https://pixabay.com
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