I am Firing My AI Agent!

Is there anyone not sick and tired of hearing about AI?  If we are on the edge of humanity’s destruction. please just get it over with and stop talking about it.

I imagine there are wonderful things that AI will do in this world, or at least that is what every self-pronounced expert is telling us.  And I also can believe that there are great dangers lurking in the shadows as AI evolves.  It doesn’t take a lot of imagination to envision all sorts of different outcomes of the global race to dominate in AI.  And given the current adversarial nature of politics and the world community, the direction that competition will take could be catastrophic.

 

Still, who knows, maybe AI will come up with a great plan for dealing with climate change, or map out a cure for cancer, or solve the thorny issue of how to build a fusion power plant.  Maybe AI agents will act as mediators and negotiators between warring countries or design a worldwide trade policy that benefits everyone equally, or solve the developing nation debt problem.  I kind of doubt it, but we can always hope!

 

But listen, Mr. AI Agent, keep your nose out of my business!  I don’t want a personal AI agent telling me everything I should be doing, planning my day, measuring my progress, feeding me information, advising me on what to wear or when to exercise. I don't want an AI agent chastising me for sleeping poorly or not moving often enough or not stopping to rest while driving. I don’t want an AI agent writing my blogs, giving me song ideas, completing my sentences, or jogging my memory.  I don’t want an AI agent suggesting future purchases I should consider, or advising me on career choices.  (OK, I’m retired so that isn’t really relevant).

 

I spent my whole career in technology, and I fully appreciate the amazing advances that computers and information technology have made.  But I detest technology’s intrusion into my life and the assumption that I must purchase every new gadget and keep up with every new trend in social media. And I can’t even imagine what the raging juggernaut of AI will force upon us in the coming years.  

 

At the risk of seeming curmudgeonly or even worse, old, I proclaim that I will fiercely resist any AI agent that comes my way, no matter what promises it makes of improving my life.  I will fire the damn thing and, if necessary, throw my phone and iPad into the lake.  This, I do solemnly swear! 

The Somewhat Sisyphean Nature of Human Existence

Recently I had a significant period of time where I stopped playing guitar – a couple of week’s vacation and then a few weeks focused on a very joyful event: the birth of our grandson, Oliver.  When I started to play again this week the callouses on my fingers were pretty much gone and I had to start the mildly painful process of getting them back again.

The Greek myth of Sisyphus depicts a man forced by the Gods to endlessly roll an immense boulder up a hill only for it to roll back down again.  The myth is seen by some as a symbol of the absurdity of existence or the futility of human striving.  But I see a lot of my life in the myth of Sisyphus and I don’t regard it as necessarily absurd or futile, though it is sometimes frustrating.

 

The truth is that I find myself repeating a lot of the efforts of my life.  I go to the gym for a period of time and then take a break or get injured.  When I return, I have to go through the process of building up my stamina and strength again.  The same goes for running (back when I used to run) or cycling.  My many years of soccer waxed and waned and I found my skill level had to be re-acquired through practice and play each time I took a significant break.

 

I am currently studying French and Spanish, and I am slowly building competence in listening, reading and speaking.  But any time away from these studies causes the boulder to roll back a bit and I must re-commit myself to the task and build up my comprehension again.

 

The same goes for many other areas of study or knowledge.  I find my grasp of history fades and I will periodically refresh it through reading books and doing Internet research.  I have learned and re-learned mathematics and physics many, many times as the need has arisen (going back for a masters then a PhD; teaching IB math; tutoring in math and physics).  

 

Or consider the routine tasks of life – cleaning the house, maintaining the landscaping, even conducting one’s daily hygiene.  These are all Sisyphean tasks.  The house is clean, then slowly gets dirty.  The lawn is cut, the grass grows back.  The beard is shaven, it returns.

 

The second law of thermodynamics states that the entropy of an isolated system left to spontaneous evolution cannot decrease with time.  Entropy is a measure of disorder.  It takes energy to make order out of disorder, knowledge out of ignorance and skill out of incompetence.  

 

We supply that energy to all the different facets of our lives and we proudly observe the order that results, but inevitably the boulder rolls back a bit, or even all the way and we must exert ourselves anew.  There may be a few places where we are able to hold the boulder at bay, or a few more challenging hills where our efforts continue to push the boulder ever higher, but at some point even these will lapse and we will have to pick ourselves up and make the effort to regain the ground we have lost.

 

There is an element of futility, and even absurdity, in all of this, and one is occasionally struck by the thought that life consists of simply going through the same motions again and again.  

But I try to fight this inclination to demean our efforts.  There is nobility in work and activity, even if it is partly Sisyphean.  We commune with the rest of the world and with nature in our quest to make order from disorder.  There is no shame in repetition or even drudgery if it is done in good faith and with purpose.  Perhaps there is no higher calling.  And, of course, there are always new boulders to push to keep things interesting!   

Not Even Close To a Mandate!

The shock of Trump’s election victory, which significantly exceeded what the polls and most pundits expected, has reverberated wildly through the political world.  The right has claimed a massive mandate for its agenda, and the democrats have engaged in an orgy of self-criticism and blame casting. 

 But let’s take a moment to review the election results.  The popular vote is now pretty much completely tabulated.  Trump has 77.3 million and Harris has 75.0 million.  Trump received 3 percent more than Harris.  That is far less than Biden’s 9.6% margin in 2020 and even less than Clinton’s 4.6 % margin in 2016.  It pales in comparison with Obama’s 15.8% margin over McCain in 2008.  Given the major obstacles of inflation and immigration that the democrats faced, it is absurd to describe that vote as any sort of mandate.

 

We are so used to being evenly divided as a country that we interpret even small electoral victories as dramatic events.  One can only surmise that the incessant polling indicating a dead heat between Trump and Harris somehow set us up for this post-election hysteria over the results. 

 

The fact that what are essentially incremental changes in voting ushered in republican congressional and senate majorities is more an artefact of our strange electoral process than any huge outpouring of Trump-mania.  But sadly, it allows the MAGA world to act as if it does indeed have some momentous mandate from the people.  This will no doubt lead to a reckless overreach on the part of Trump and his minions.  How well it will succeed is anyone’s guess, but if it is even close to the vengeful crusade Trump has been threatening throughout his campaign there may be hell to pay in the 2026 midterms for the MAGA world.  One can only hope!

 

As for the hand-wringing and finger-pointing on the left, I fear that the massive overreaction may end up being more detrimental than helpful.  Occam’s razor applies here:  inflation and immigration.  It was a mistake to focus too much on Trump’s obvious character flaws and ethical vacuum.  The public is totally saturated and inured to these faults.  They have become familiar and lost their shock value.  And yes, Harris could have distanced herself more from Biden given his low approval ratings and the key issues of the campaign.  But in the end, it is all pretty simple – the people vote their pocketbook and their refrigerator, and both appear to be hurting for reasons that most people don't truly understand.

 

There is quite simply no mandate whatsoever for the MAGA movement.  They have enough power to act as if there is one, but they will overplay their hand and the pendulum will once again reach its peak and begin to slowly move back toward the center.  Here’s hoping that the damage done in the meantime won’t be too catastrophic. There is much to be done to limit it, and that should be the focus now.

Long Live the American Populist Plutocrat Christian Party

The Republican Party is dead!  Long live the American Populist, Plutocrat Christian Party! All hail Trump and Musk!

The results are in and Donald Trump has won a decisive victory over Kamala Harris.  I wonder if he thinks this election was stolen?  He didn’t have a lot of faith in the process.  But as usual, the polls were pretty far off and here we are with another four years of Trump.

 

I regard this as the death knell of the Republican Party.  The Trump platform (to the extent there is one) has little in common with the republican values of the last 80 years.  The most notable figures in republican administrations from Reagan to Bush lined up against Trump to no avail.  The pendulum has swung violently away from the traditional two-party American system.

 

So, what does Trump represent?  What is this party that he now has so completely dominated that its political class is terrified of offending him?  How is it that a majority of Americans lined up behind a man who lies with each breath, who brags without ceasing, and who is so thin-skinned that he viciously attacks and demeans anyone who offends him?

 

Like so many things in politics, it is both simple and complex.  It is simple because a large number of people in the USA are feeling unsettled and suspicious of the government and the so-called ruling elites. 

 

It is simple because globalization and neo-liberalism have been a huge disappointment and have never delivered on their promises of increasing prosperity for all and peace through economic cooperation.

 

It is simple because the rapid pace of cultural change – non-traditional families, new norms of sexuality, homosexuality and gay marriage, transgender issues, abortion, gender equality, continuing racial struggles – has frightened a large part of the USA, especially those who subscribe to traditional religious doctrine, and created a massive backlash.

 

It is simple because a significant part of the population will never vote for a democratic candidate and is betting that a Trump presidency, for all of its chaos and drama, will make them richer than they are today.

 

It is simple because most Americans feel superior to the rest of the world and hate being entangled in organizations, treaties, or other encumbrances with countries they neither respect nor trust.

 

It is simple because a world broken by so many ills (war, climate change, economic failure) is causing more and more desperate people to cross our borders to chase the American Dream and it scares the hell out of people for so many reasons despite the fact that every one of them has ancestors that did the same thing.

 

It is simple because 100 years of Hollywood has brainwashed us into believing that only an apparently tough, no-holds-barred, extremely cocky kind of guy can protect American interests.

It is simple because we have allowed individuals to acquire so much wealth that a single person with a huge ego can significantly alter an election.

It is simple because many Americans are still unable to get their minds around a woman leading the country.

 

It is simple because the pandemic brought a couple years of high inflation, and, ultimately, Americans vote their pocketbook.

 

And finally, it is complex because none of those simple things are really simple at all, and the American public is not educated enough to understand the challenges the USA and the rest of the world currently face and that humanity always evolves in a way that requires new thinking, and their first instinct is to make a bunker of the USA and try to keep the rest of the world and its problems out.

 

So, now we have a coalition of disgruntled Americans backed by a growing bro cabal of tech plutocrats who believe they are the only possible future saviors.  How do you come up with a name for this party? Admittedly, my choice is a bit wordy and cumbersome.  But did I mention that the whole thing is a bit complex?

Free Speech and Mis- or Disinformation

Is the world destined to sink into a quagmire of mis/disinformation in the years ahead?  Will there be any way to balance free speech, social media, AI and data mining to inform the public and decision-makers on important issues in a way that clearly identifies scientific or public consensus and flags misinformation?

For clarity – misinformation is information that is false but sent without malintent, whereas disinformation is false information sent for nefarious purposes.  Both have contributed dramatically to the increasingly fractious partisanship and populism in the USA and other countries.

 

The question of whether something is information or mis/disinformation is a thorny one.  There is a spectrum of information ranging from absolute truths (for example, a mathematical proof) to generally accepted facts or events, to speculation and contrarian theories, and ultimately, to conspiracy theories or outright falsehoods that are clearly absurd and/or anti-factual.  Where should one draw the line and who should be empowered to do so?

 

In recent years we have seen the spectacular growth of social media and other means for propagating information and allowing Internet users to perform their own inquiries into topics of interest.  With this growth we have seen the emergence of a flood of misinformation, speculation, conspiracy theories, dissent, denialism and a host of other contrarian views or even deep fakes and disinformation.  

 

Social media is reluctant to play the role of judging and hence limiting, filtering or even banning this avalanche of information for reasons both of self-interest and the principle of free speech.  Moreover, the algorithms that social media uses to maximize views and thus increase ad revenue tend to bias the system in a way that multiplies the impact of mis/disinformation.

 

In recent years the mega companies that control and profit from social media have increasingly argued that the right to free speech prevents them from stopping the spread of any but the most egregious disinformation, and they reject the role of censor.

 

The principle of free speech argues that everyone should have the right to freely voice their opinion or beliefs in the public domain.  There are limits to free speech that have been described in court cases over the years – incitement to imminent unlawful action or speech that presents a ‘clear and present danger’.  But most information, even deep fakes and outright falsehoods, is difficult to characterize as ‘a clear and present danger’.

 

The example of the COVID pandemic is perfect for understanding the problem.  Both the scope of the pandemic (i.e. how many cases there were and how many deaths occurred) and the recommendations to avoid exposure and spread were available from credible domestic and international medical authorities.  For example, Johns Hopkins updated an excellent site in real time with the latest statistics, and the CDC issued its recommendations for healthy practices (masks, social-distancing, treatments, etc.). 

 

 But anyone on social media could make their own interpretations of statistics or forward any anecdotal cures or critiques of the medical community’s information.  Partisan politics amplified this effect and planted doubt in many minds about the veracity of ‘official’ or scientific information.  This created a very confusing mix of information and sadly, much of the USA is still misinformed today over what actually happened and what we should have learned.  This does not bode well for the next pandemic.

 

There have always been alternative views and theories to capture the imagination of those who mistrust the government, scientists or the traditional media.  There were conspiracy theories long before the Internet.  But the Internet and social media have essentially eliminated any curbs or sanity checks on information exchange.  There is no longer a Walter Cronkite or Huntley and Brinkley to deliver trustworthy information.  The Internet is the wild west and there is no likely way to tame it.

 

AI and deep fakes will no doubt exacerbate the situation.  Disinformation will seem ever more convincing.  The average person will have limited ability to discern the difference between valid reports and false or misleading ones.

 

There is no easy solution to this problem.  Any attempts by the government or other legal authorities to curtail or flag mis/disinformation will be condemned by many as censorship, especially in today’s highly partisan atmosphere.

 

The only real answer to this problem is education.  Parents, schools and other organizations must address this plague of mis/disinformation and give people the analytical skills to differentiate between truth and fake news.  Faith in critical institutions – scientists, government agencies, credible news agencies, medical organizations – must be restored so that the public will seek out and prioritize information from these sources.

 

There is little reason to be optimistic about the future in this regard.  Social media is a Pandora’s Box of ills and it is likely that technology advances will only serve to make things worse.  The Internet has linked the world as never before and provides incredibly wonderful tools for humans to connect, learn and create, but sadly, it has also allowed the worst of human nature to flourish.

The Emperor's New Clothes

Everyone knows this Hans Christian Andersen parable.  A vain emperor is hoodwinked by conmen who pretend to create a new suit for him.  No one is willing to question the hoax for fear of appearing stupid or ignorant.  The emperor proudly models his new outfit to his subjects, who are similarly reluctant to appear unsophisticated or uncultured, or even worse, to provoke the wrath of their emperor.  Finally, a young child calls out: “The emperor has no clothes!”

There are multiple themes and interpretations associated with this story but I love this simple parable because it illustrates how conformity, a herd-instinct and a fear of appearing ignorant have such a powerful influence on our culture.  The examples are everywhere: movies, music, technology, fashion, sports.  

I have watched numerous movies that have been heralded by critics and thought to myself ‘how can this possibly be acclaimed’?  I have gazed at some pieces of modern art (granted, I am no connoisseur . . .) and smiled at the sheer absurdity of praising these works.  I have listened to rock, pop, rap and hip-hop songs that have childish lyrics and simplistic musical themes and marveled at the serious analyses that music critics will undertake as a means to provide a veneer of sophistication for them.

Technology and financial trends are also areas that attract lemming-like sycophants who desperately want to appear savvy and in-the-know about the latest innovations and breathlessly endorse them regardless of how truly revolutionary they may be.  The giddy hyperbole greeting the appearance of chatGPT and crypto are perfect examples.  

And perhaps the silliest of all these areas of conformity and slavish adherence to the popular is the fashion industry.  We jettison mounds of apparel each year and purchase brand new items to replace them because the newest trends have been paraded before us.

The irony is that the herd instinct in all of these areas becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy in the most fundamental and powerful way of all – money!  Our conformity guarantees the financial success of these ventures. We flock to the stores, the theaters, the art shows, the concerts; we stream the videos and purchase the crypto and meme stocks; we devote hours to mind-numbing social media and video games.  

How many of them truly deserve the success they obtain?  Of course, there are many things in this world that are incredibly creative and worthy of our awe and praise.  And not everyone has the same taste or interests. But too often we allow ourselves to be herded into an echo chamber rather than make our own honest and careful evaluation of the world around us.  We should have the agency and the courage, when appropriate, to be the one who calls out ‘The Emperor Has No Clothes’!

Nations and Culture

The USA has always been a nation of immigrants, where all are accepted with no single dominant culture or ethnicity (ha!) - or at least that’s what we like to tell ourselves.  But that fact has rarely been embraced by its citizens.  The early settlers of English ancestry were appalled at the surge of Irish immigration in the mid-eighteenth century.  And subsequent waves of immigrants were often met with disdain, prejudice or outright hostility.  Our current polarized view of Hispanic immigrants is not that dissimilar to our historical habit of resenting the latest arrivals.

I would be hard-pressed to describe an average American citizen. He or she could be any skin color, adhere to any religion or none at all, and have a wide variety of cultural traits.  There may be certain characteristics that visitors to our country would point out – our love of large vehicles, our obsessive commercialism, our customer-service orientation, our ambition and workaholism, our friendliness, our patriotic fervor and perhaps a few others.  But are those really cultural traits?  

 

European nations were more homogeneous than the USA in the past and seemed to have a common ethnicity, language, cuisine and culture.  Of course, there were regional differences – a native of Bavaria would never say that people from Berlin had the same culture! -  but the similarities seemed to outnumber the differences and there was a sense, whether exaggerated or not, of each nation having its own unique identity. 

 

But in the last 50 or 60 years this has changed.  The ethnic and cultural mix of most European nations has changed pretty significantly and is likely to change even more in coming years.  Some of that change is due to the flow of formerly-colonized people into the country – primarily in France and the UK, and to a lesser degree the Netherlands.  In other countries, such as Germany, the immigration is similar to the USA, sparked by war, famine, economic hardship and the search for opportunity in a more successful economy.

 

For nations that have long had relative homogeneity and a somewhat well-defined cultural identity, these changes are often unsettling and disorienting.  Is a person of recent Turkish descent who doesn’t drink beer or eat pork really a German, even if he or she has been born there?  What defines a German?  Will a person of recent Algerian or sub-Saharan African descent ever be accepted as a true Francais or Francaise?

 

What defines a nation or the people of a nation?  As globalism, climate change, conflict, economic uncertainty and other historical forces mix up the peoples of this world, will nations retain their so-called cultural identity (which of course was never really that well-defined anyway), or will they simply become collections of people with a common language and government?

 

When the French soccer team walks out onto the field and more than half the players are Black- Beur, (the expression Black-Blanc-Beur is used to describe the mixed nature of the French squad) part of France celebrates its cultural, racial and ethnic diversity, but another, and perhaps growing, part of France doesn’t feel comfortable at all with this phenomenon.  

 

Almost every European nation is struggling with this question.  And it is a question that the USA has struggled with for its entire existence.  Asia is still much more homogeneous, but is there any doubt that as it becomes more economically successful it will eventually experience a similar mixing? 

 

Will the world one day become one big melting pot with races, ethnicities, cultures all mixed up throughout?  And will all of the nations and peoples in this big melting pot simply be molded into the prevailing forms of social media-dictated culture?  Will there even be such a thing as a cultural identity, or will the Internet, Hollywood, and giant corporations herd us all into the same cultural corral?  

 

Perhaps the only remaining pure cultural outposts will be the most impoverished countries, where there is no profit in implanting the world culture.  And we will all plan bucket-list trips to visit them so as to experience these very rare and unique places, then retreat hastily to our Starbucks and Pizzerias and scroll through our Instagram reels to hear the latest world pop sensation.

 

Wow, that took a rather sudden dark turn, didn’t it?  The future may not be as much of a cultural desert as those last couple of paragraphs suggest, but the evolving nature of nations and associated peoples is accelerating and it is not at all clear where it all will lead.

Male/Female Friendship

I heard a French podcast recently that explored the nature of male/female friendship and why it so rarely occurs.  At first, I was skeptical, thinking that in this modern era the stereotype of men and women unable to be friends seemed outdated and could no longer be true.

 But then I thought about my life and the fact that I have no close female friends, and it didn’t seem quite so unlikely.  And as I thought more deeply about the challenges that male/female friendships must overcome I realized that it is not so strange that it is a somewhat rare occurrence.

 

Men and women seem more likely to forge strong platonic bonds before they get married or have long-term partners.  Developing a friendship with someone of the opposite sex after one is married requires a high level of trust in the partner, not to mention a measure of fidelity in the one embarking on the friendship.

 

After all, the elephant in the room with any male/female friendship, if both are heterosexual (or even bi-sexual!), is the lurking possibility of infatuation.  If one or both are physically attracted to the other, then a blossoming friendship can easily morph into a romantic attachment.  Both parties may be strong enough in their own partner relationships to resist any significant expression of that infatuation, but the tension may still be there.

 

It is easy to fall into stereotyping the predisposition of male/female relationships to become difficult in this fashion.  Perhaps it is hyperbole to presume that every male/female encounter has the potential to become an infatuation.  But aren’t we programmed to seek out romantic partners?  The fact that we may already have one may make us resolute in avoiding actual liaisons, but that does not mean that we are indifferent to the temptation or the desires that naturally occur.

 

If the early stages of a friendship are not accompanied by a physical attraction, then the friendship may be built on a purely platonic basis.  But the danger of a future attraction still lurks.  There are many examples of ‘friends’ becoming lovers over the course of time as a strong emotional or spiritual attraction slowly awakens the physical/chemical one.

 

Therefore, it is somewhat understandable that our culture looks askance at such seemingly innocent male/female activities as going out to dinner or meeting for lunch if one or both participants are married or in long-term relationships.  Jealousy, that ‘green-eyed monster’, is always ready to rear its head even in the most solid relationships.  And there is at least some justification for jealousy given the numerous instances of friendships becoming romantic and ending marriages.  

 

The other side of the male/female friendship coin is the diminished value of being ‘just a friend’ in the eyes of many men and women.  This is the infamous ‘friend zone’.  For many, being perceived as a friend, i.e. not a potential romantic partner, is tantamount to being relegated to a lower status.  It implies that you are not attractive enough to qualify for infatuation.  This derails many potential male/female friendships in their early stages. And it raises the question: In every male/female friendship is there always one person who is slightly or even hugely disappointed that the relationship is not romantic?

 

Perhaps it is not surprising that male/female friendships tend to languish after one is married and few new ones are initiated.  Most couples tend to focus on family and on a few friendships with other couples, where there seems to be less risk of temptation (though certainly not a guarantee!)

 

Once in a long-term partnership, most men and women only nurture the same sex friendships from their past, though even those friendships often stagnate due to the time demands of family and work.  Male/female friendships, if they continue at all, are typically conducted as trios rather than duos, with the spouse included and watchful for any hint of danger!

 

This is the rather strange nature of friendship relationships between men and women.  It matters not how old or how young one is, there is always the potential for fascination, leading to infatuation, leading to flirtation, leading to romance, leading to trouble.  Does this mean that we are destined to never have fulfilling male/female friendships?  Sadly, it seems so, and we are no doubt the poorer for it.

 

 

 

 

The Battle Over Education Materials

One of the most fraught areas of the culture wars is the debate about how children and teens should be taught, what materials are appropriate and how history should be presented.  Parents and politicians have accused educators of manipulating our youth and fear that they are being indoctrinated with sexually deviant ideas and other ‘woke’ ideology.

In the realm of sexuality and gender, there is great concern that introducing gay and transgender topics at an early age may influence vulnerable children to explore or embrace these behaviors when they would otherwise not have been inclined to do so.

 

The rationale for carefully exposing children to these concepts and topics is twofold: (1) to reassure children or teens who are gay or ‘gender fluid’, or who may be starting to question their sexuality or gender, that their questions, inclinations or feelings are legitimate and not something to be ashamed of.  And (2) to make all children aware of the range of sexuality and gender so that they will not be inclined to bully or ostracize the children or teens who are beginning to show signs of non-heteronormative behavior.

 

The big question is whether introducing these topics at an early age, with all good intentions, can actually change or influence one’s natural inclinations.  The argument is that children and teens are very impressionable and often insecure.  They are just beginning to establish their social and sexual identities and relationships.  Will they be motivated by these educational materials to experiment in ways that cause long term aberrations in their sexuality or concepts of gender?  Will they take steps that will be difficult or impossible to correct or change in the long term?

 

Recent Gallup polls on LGBTQ+ identification show a rising percentage of people who identify as other than purely heterosexual – from 3.5% in 2012 to 7.2% in 2022.  More striking is the difference between generations, with 19.7% of Gen Z and 11.2% of Gen X (Millennials) identifying as LGBTQ+ and only 3.2% in the older generations.  Whether the fairly dramatic increases across the generations are indications of more honest self-appraisals or of the effect of social awareness and peer, social media, or educational influence is of course very difficult to determine.  

 

If partisanship were less vicious, one could hope for a thoughtful dialog about what the best educational strategy would be for these topics.  It is naïve to think that children aren’t already confronting these issues in many other domains – social media, friends’ circles, movies and series, etc.  Wouldn’t it be wise to give a more measured and fact-based presentation in schools to provide perspective?

 

A similar battle is being fought over history.  Specifically, how to portray the history of the United States in confronting the less savory aspects of our history such as slavery, racism, treatment of Native people, imperialism, workers’ movements, immigration and other non-exceptional parts of the story.  Finding a balance that does not whitewash our nation’s history but also provides insight into the very admirable people and events that populate it is critical for creating citizens who will guide our nation into the future.

 

It is sad that we have such fierce cultural clashes on education.  I am confident that children and teens are capable of making sensible decisions and drawing appropriate conclusions from a full exposure to the complexity of human sexuality and world history.  It is far better for them to learn critical thinking through debate and discussion about wide-ranging subjects in the relative accuracy and neutrality of the classroom and the home than to have their only resource be the wild west of social media.

Project 2025 – A Simplistic Longing for a Mythical Past

I downloaded the PDF for Project 2025 recently and I read all of the Forward and much of the content.  I will try to characterize here what it is attempting to accomplish and what its strengths and weaknesses are.  In my reading, I sense an almost infantile temper tantrum over the natural evolution of human society and politico-economic systems.  It expresses a simplistic longing for an imagined prior society that never truly existed and that few today would want to recreate even if it had.

 

The first thing that struck me was its use of almost laughingly silly descriptions and condemnations of liberal trends or policies.  The first note from its director, Paul Dans, declares that ‘The Long March of cultural Marxism through our institutions has come to pass’.  Either Paul Dans has no idea what Marxism really is or he is purposely using a description that makes no sense, simply as a way to toss red meat to his audience.

 

No one in any position of power in the left is espousing Marxism.  Indeed, US liberalism is quite a bit more conservative than the current governments of most European nations, who are seen as middle-of-the-road by their constituents.  And those citizens, by the way, seem generally quite a bit happier and more fulfilled than we are in most polls.  

 

The project goes on to describe an America in free fall where the ‘very moral foundations of our society are in peril’.  This type of hyperbole is disingenuous at best, but at worst can lead to dangerous consequences when taken at face value by Christian nationalists and right-wing extremists.

 

The first of four promises the project makes is to ‘restore the family as the centerpiece of American life and protect our children’.  It sees government as an evil that subverts the family and promotes fatherlessness.  It lays at its feet a litany of ills – poverty, crime, mental illness, teen suicide, substance abuse, rejection of the church, and high school dropouts.  It characterizes the efforts of liberals to use government programs to improve society as some sort of malevolent, Godless force.  

 

Rational people can disagree over the reasons for the 50+ year intractable and complex nature of single parent households, drug addiction, homelessness, and crime, but the implication throughout this document is that this is a war between good and evil. This is not only simplistic and ignorant, but also by its religious and moral proclamations is an attempt to preclude further reasonable debate, compromise and progress on these important issues.

 

The second promise is to ‘dismantle the administrative state and return self-governance to the American people’.  This section laments the growth of government and implies some sort of corrupt agenda of the executive branch and other ‘liberal elites’.  It seeks to return to a simpler government that reflects the original intent of the founders, as if there is any more than a very tenuous relationship between that simple, isolated agricultural society and today’s incredibly complex, globally interwoven nation.  This quasi-religious fixation on the original intent of the constitution and the simple world that it encompassed, including the societal mores and prohibitions of that time period, is at the heart of this document. 

 

There is no doubt that any government can be bureaucratic and inefficient, and that continuous efforts must be made to eliminate waste and control its growth, but Project 2025’s fantasy of dismantling the so-called administrative state is a delusion that would exacerbate the already huge disparities in income and wealth and gut the protections against pollution, financial fraud, tax evasion, climate change, hunger, homelessness and other well-documented pitfalls of a complex, urban society.

 

The third promise is ‘defend our nation’s sovereignty, borders, and bounty against global threats’.  This voices the paranoia that the extreme right has regarding international cooperation, treaties, NATO, climate agreements, globalization, engagement with China and any other attempts to join with the rest of the world in addressing common interests and preventing conflict.   Again, the bogeyman of ‘global elites’ is offered up as the root of all evil.  This type of isolationism has been an undercurrent of American political thought for two centuries, but it is particularly absurd in a world that is so obviously integrated and co-dependent.  

 

The 4^th and last promise, to ‘secure our God=given individual right to enjoy the blessings of liberty’, is a vague jumble of half-baked complaints that somehow Americans are not really free to enjoy the blessings of liberty because of elites that want to limit the free market and tell everyone what they should think.  Again, the tired labels of Marxism, socialism, fascism, wokism and other liberal epithets are invoked with scant concrete or analytical evidence of what the hell these horrors are inflicting on our brave, freedom-denied citizens.

 

The Reagan years are intoned repeatedly and reverently in the project as a brief golden age where the true American values revived our economy, brought back religion and morality and forced the Soviet Union to its knees.  It neglects to mention that the economic success of that era paled in comparison to that of the 90’s under Clinton (and the deficit increased dramatically under Reagan due to tax cuts) and that the societal ills that Project 2025 blames on liberalism grew worse – more drugs, more incarceration, more births to single mothers, more crime.  Moreover, Project 2025 might want to take note that the rest of the world, including our closest European allies, credit Gorbachev and other factors for the breakup of the Soviet Union rather than Reagan’s ‘tear down this wall’ and ‘evil empire’ approach.

 

And even Project 2025, despite its fervor to promote anti-globalism, cannot help but acknowledge the complexity of economic policy and it devotes some 50 pages to two diametrically opposed views on free trade (one for and one against).

 

One of the main techniques Project 2025 envisions for taking down the administrative state and accomplishing its goals is to use an executive order to change career civil servants into political appointees and replace much of the current so-called ‘deep state’.  The chaos and inefficiency that would follow this type of drastic maneuver is almost unimaginable.

Some of the most aggressive goals of the project are not surprising - the plan to completely outlaw abortion, including pharmaceutical products, and jail any who attempt to sidestep these laws, and a crusade against the so-called woke agenda - outlawing transgender therapy, pornography (whose definition one might ask) and arresting/labeling as sexual deviants librarians or educators who allow educational materials that address these subjects.

 

The champions of Project 2025 are living in an illusory world, longing for an America that never was what they imagine it was, and certainly could never be recreated.  They are particularly frightened by the changes in society that have occurred in the past 50 years – sexuality, birth control, abortion, gay and transgender rights, racial and ethnic mixing, feminism, decreases in churchgoing and religious affiliation, birthrate decline.  Rather than engage in healthy dialogue on how these changes can be managed in a way that limits any negative ramifications, the proponents of Project 2025 want to destroy their perceived adversaries and initiate changes that every poll of public opinion says would be deeply unpopular with the overall population.

 

Project 2025 zealots may see themselves in a holy war of good versus evil, but in reality, they are fighting a doomed rearguard action against human evolution.  It is certainly possible that Donald Trump could win the election and that they would get to implement some of their mean-spirited vendettas.  But in the end they will find themselves stymied and gnashing their teeth as the world, in all its messy complexity, moves onward. 

Perfectionism and Mastery (or the lack thereof)

I recently read an article extolling the virtues of mastery – becoming so accomplished at something that one is a recognized master.  And as so often happens after I read an article like this, I became a bit depressed.

 

Mastery and perfectionism are not exact synonyms, but they have elements in common I believe.  It is hard to completely master something without having somewhat of a perfectionist nature.  Mastery also requires a high level of persistence, as one must overcome frustration, boredom, long plateaus and other obstacles to achieve true mastery of something.

 

No one has ever described me as a perfectionist.  When I perform tasks, I generally try to get them done quickly and adequately.  Perfection is rarely if ever my target.  In fact, I will confess to occasionally completing things in a rather slipshod manner.  I have always been eager to check things off my list and get on to the next thing.  Quantity over quality! Sometimes, that leads to a less than ideal end result.

 

When it is clearly important that something be done carefully and with attention to detail, then I do my best to comply, but again, I will only go so far.

 

The fact is that I get bored easily.  I love to do interesting things, and I am especially enchanted by the first period of acquaintance with a new hobby or interest or task, but I lose interest if a long plateau arrives and I make little or no progress for an extended period of time.

 

I have developed a lot of interests and a lot of capabilities in my life.  I am fortunate (or perhaps not?) to have a wide variety of talents and I have spread my passion across many, many things. In my youth and early adulthood, I pursued sports with an almost manic energy.  I have been writing essays and some fiction for many years, including one novel.  I have picked up four different instruments – guitar, piano, banjo and mandolin –  with varying degrees of commitment.  I have written songs and I played in a band for a few years.  I have had periodic bouts of woodworking fervor.  I have studied and obtained reasonable proficiency in German and French, and am working on Spanish.  I have read books at a fairly decent clip my entire life – both fiction and non-fiction.

 

I am reasonably accomplished at most of the above but I would never claim to be a master of any of them. Was I remiss in not pursuing one or two to a truly advanced state?  I had my moments of trying.  I have worked on chords, riffs and scales in guitar and become a reasonably good guitar player, but have never been able to achieve a really high level.  It just doesn’t seem worth the effort and the tedium.

 

In my academic and professional life, I went through various phases of commitment, sometimes just relying on my native intelligence and capabilities to achieve things and other times really applying myself quite assiduously to the work.  But again, never really a true perfectionist.

 

I think the closest I ever came to true mastery was with soccer in my senior year of college. But that was a relatively short-term period of focus.

 

The old expression ‘jack of all trades, master of none’ is one I often use to describe myself, though in moments of self-flattery I am happy to embrace the term ‘renaissance man’.  I suppose I am a renaissance man in the sense of having a very wide range of interests and knowledge in both the sciences and the arts.  But of course many of the classical renaissance men were true masters in some things, so I guess that’s where the comparison might be a bit self-delusional!

 

Would I be more fulfilled if I were a true master of something?  I don’t think I would.  One is never fully self-satisfied if one is honest.  Self-doubt is a very human trait, and one always poses ‘what ifs’ at various times in one’s life.  Generally, I am at peace with the path I took and the ‘breadth versus depth’ nature of my passions.  But of course I cannot help but wonder what it would be like to be a true master.   Perhaps in the next life!

  

Of Cat Women and Population Decline

JD Vance’s much-ridiculed comment about cat women who have no children and the hysteria on the right about the decrease in child-bearing deserve some careful analysis.

First of all, Vance’s comment is a sad reflection on both his intellect and capacity for empathy. It is true in political life that one often exaggerates or makes a statement for dramatic effect.  But his cat women critique was such a cruelly contemptuous statement that it calls into question his character and integrity.

 

People are childless for so many reasons.  Many of those reasons are deeply personal or painful – infertility, miscarriages, failed IVF, lack of a suitable partner, domestic violence, weak financial status, health issues. Vance’s callous disregard for this large segment of childlessness is simply pathetic and contemptible.

 

There seem to be three general reasons why the right is so concerned with a declining birthrate.  The first is what is generally known as ‘replacement theory’.  Since it is the white population where birthrate decline is the fastest, conservatives fear that the US population will rapidly become non-white.  This is an unsettling thought for many both for political and cultural reasons.  However, it is also a lost cause, as there is no practical way to stop the growth of diverse racial and ethnic populations in our country.  As one of my coaches used to say about almost everything - "get used to it"! 

 

The second reason is a religious one.  Conservative Christians believe that God commanded us to be ‘fruitful and multiply’, and the choice to have fewer or no children is almost sinful in their worldview.  This ties into their general fear of the breakdown of the traditional family and their horror at what they see as its attendant modern expressions – premarital sex, abortion, gay relationships and marriage, gender issues, mixed families.  This is also a lost cause short of implementing Handmaid's Tale types of laws and forcing women to give up careers.

 

The third reason is economic.  A rapid decrease in population can have serious consequences on a nation’s economy.  There can be a mismatch between the number of older citizens who are drawing down social security and Medicare and younger workers who are funding these things. 

 

Additionally, the growth of GDP will slow with slowing population growth and could even potentially decline once the overall population actually begins to get smaller.  This could make paying off the national debt more difficult among other things, if this occurs too rapidly.

 

This third reason is actually a reasonable concern.  But the basic question is whether it is desirable for the USA, and indeed the world, to continue to increase its population.  If one believes, as I do, that ultimately the earth needs to have a smaller population that can thrive in harmony with the rest of nature, then the transition to that smaller population must be very slow and steady so as not to cause major economic disruptions.  

 

Ironically, the best way for the USA to manage this transition is to throttle immigration up and down to very slowly reduce the population.  But this is such a fraught political issue and the immigration surges brought on by world events and climate change make this type of fine tuning extremely challenging. 

 

In the end, people evolve, cultures evolve.  We will never again become like the farm families of yesteryear with 6-9 children in each household (not to mention the several that would die before they reached adulthood).  Public policy should not try to fight a rear-guard action against the modern cultural forces. Instead, we must acknowledge them, adapt to them and find ways to mitigate any negative effects through positive social and economic policies.

The Corrosive Psychological Effects of Power and Wealth

Is there a better example anywhere of the old adage that ‘power corrupts’ than Elon Musk?  He may be an entrepreneurial and technical genius, but he has also clearly become a horrible human being. Or perhaps he always was and it just took a little time to fully blossom.  

And he’s not the only one.  There is an ever-growing cesspool of tech and finance billionaires who feel justified in forcing their political and personal foibles on the world through their immense wealth and connections. 

 

There are many historical examples of similarly nasty characters whose wealth and power gave them license to propagate their paranoid, deviant or delusional fantasies – Henry Ford, Howard Hughes, Donald Trump, Rupert Murdoch, Harvey Weinstein, Jeffrey Epstein, to name a few.  And if one looks closely at almost every super-rich person one can find an astonishing sense of entitlement and superiority.  

 

Not surprisingly, fantastic wealth and power are associated with a set of inter-linked psychological traits that psychologists have called the ‘dark triad’ – Machiavellianism, psychopathy and narcissism.  Studies have demonstrated that the rich and powerful exhibit these traits much more often than other groups. 

 

Someone who is Machiavellian uses manipulation and deceit to gain power or control.  This trait allows one to rationalize amoral or less-than-ethical means to achieve goals.  A psychopath is a person who lacks empathy, is callous and egocentric, but who may mask these traits by superficial charm and an outward appearance of normalcy.  A narcissist is a person who is extremely self-centered and has a persistent and exaggerated sense of self-importance.

 

Whether these traits are ‘nature or nurture’ is not entirely known.  It could be that these are simply the traits that enable these people to acquire riches and power and that they were at least partially present from birth.  But there is no doubt that being surrounded by massive wealth and by sycophants who provide a continuous stream of praise and adulation plays havoc with one’s version of reality.

 

There are counter-examples of course – Warren Buffett comes to mind, and Bill Gates may have mastered his inner demons in recent years and become one as well.  But these appear to be few and far between.  I would also guess that the appearance of humility or quasi-normal behavior in almost any super-rich person is a façade.    

 

I have often criticized the billionaire class.  The ultra-rich would accuse me of 'class envy', the term that they often invoke to demean those who suggest that their wealth is both unmerited and unhealthy.  But the increasingly blatant use of wealth and power by the super-rich to push their own political agendas or ideology is deeply troubling.  It is clearly in lock-step with the over-accumulation of the world’s riches by ever-fewer people.  We are returning to a primitive world where tyrants and despots pull the strings and orchestrate our political and economic life rather than allowing the collective wisdom of the people and their representatives guide us.  If this obscene imbalance of income and wealth is not corrected the future will be rather grim.

The Dilemma of Government Regulation

One of the most significant differences between conservatives and liberals is their approach to government regulation.  Regulation affects numerous aspects of industry, finance, healthcare and the environment.  Put simply, conservatives deplore regulation in almost any form and liberals champion regulation as a curb against a host of societal ills.  

What does the government attempt to regulate?  The goals of government regulation are generally to ensure that the public welfare is safeguarded, that business is conducted fairly, that everyone has equal opportunity in the marketplace, that environmental and climate conditions are protected and that the economy does not experience dramatic ups and downs.

 

Conservatives despise regulation because they believe it is costly to implement, interferes with the normal flow of business and commerce, and places excessive restrictions on enterprises. They believe it contradicts and damages the basic tenet of capitalism, the free market.  Conservatives trust in the long-term good intentions of businesses and society to self-govern and moderate their behavior to achieve the same goals that government regulation targets.

 

Liberals point to numerous historical events – stock market bubbles, monopolies, pollution, banking and investment fraud, recessions, extreme income and wealth inequality, and other societal ills – as proof that government regulation is necessary to curb the excesses and injustices that naturally occur as a result of human behavior.

 

No one loves regulation.  We all chafe at having someone else tell us what we can or can’t do.  But it is clear to any serious student of political reality that some level of government regulation is necessary in a society.  The question is how much.  It is the duty and challenge of our elected officials to determine how much government regulation to enact.

 

A reasonable approach to this issue would be for government officials to make use of independent expertise and the massive amount of available data and history to determine how to proceed.  But instead, most of our representatives seem locked into rigid, pre-conceived notions and are heavily influenced by powerful, well-funded interest groups.  

 

In the current political environment, if a politician wants to keep his or her position, then he or she must find significant financial support, and that support generally comes from wealthy donors or political action committees that have a very specific agenda.  This makes it difficult for elected officials to make decisions based on reason and data.

 

In an ideal world, we would task working groups of independent experts to propose the best possible set of regulations that would strike a balance between the protection of society and the freedom of the marketplace.  But sadly, in today’s partisan politics, even the mere selection of any group of experts would become a savage battle that would no doubt end in paralysis and a waste of time.

 

And there is the fact that most of these issues are multi-variable and complex.  The concepts have elements of science and mathematics, but they are not physics or chemistry.  They are subject to interpretation and when human beings interpret, they bring all of their prejudices to bear.

 

So, what we end up with is a seesaw battle of regulation and cancellation of regulation in successive administrations and congresses, as each group attempts to correct what it portrays as excessive meddling by the other side.  It is no doubt a colossal waste of money and effort, but probably inevitable.  Such is the contradictory nature of human society.

Veneration of our Elders – No Longer in Vogue?

There was a time when it made sense for the young to venerate their elders.  In centuries past, the elders were typically not all that old anyway – maybe between 40 and 60 for the most part.  But they possessed knowledge and life experiences that they could pass on to the young.  The world changed very slowly in those days, if at all.  The skills and experience that one developed over a lifetime were relevant to the next generation.  The young could sit at the feet of the masters and learn.

The modern world is quite different.  The pace of change has become so rapid that even ten years can be enough to make skills or experience obsolete.  Just take a look at an AARP magazine today and the painful efforts it makes to explain technology to aging souls or explain how they can avoid the hackers and phishing expeditions that victimize the hapless oldsters.

 

Physical aging has always diminished the elderly, but the raging juggernaut of today’s technological change is rendering the experience of older adults more or less useless and giving the appearance of mental or intellectual fragility as well. Gen X, Y and Z’ers roll their eyes as boomers or greatest gens attempt to keep up with the latest social media apps or tech devices. It takes about 5 seconds of us tapping clumsily on our virtual keyboards until they grab our smart phones and do the job for us.

 

And even if older adults have non-technology experience that might be valuable - business acumen, negotiating skills, emotional intelligence, etc. – their embarrassingly pathetic skills in technology diminish their stature in the eyes of the young and they may find any other possible expertise they have discounted as well.  Moreover, the style of business and the skills necessary to conduct it are changing in concert with the technology.

 

In 1987 I was running the development, computer and media departments at a rapidly growing Habitat for Humanity.  We had volunteers of all ages coming in to do various tasks either in the office or out on the construction site.

 

One of the volunteers was a late-fifties man who had been a Navy pilot in the Vietnam War and was now retired.  I thought he might enjoy doing some of the computer work. I explained the process to him but he had no experience with computers and was completely perplexed.  I tried working with him but very quickly his self-confidence was shot and he found it impossible to master the techniques.  He was embarrassed and very uncomfortable.

 

Here was a man who had flown bombing missions over Vietnam in a very sophisticated aircraft, one of the most demanding and challenging things one can imagine.  Naval aviators are a very confident and capable group. But the computer world was alien to him and had left him behind.

 

I realized then how easily the changing circumstances of our lives can strip away the veneer of worldliness, competence or sophistication that we pretend to have.  And the last 35 years have confirmed that realization.  

 

Perhaps that is why older adults today are starting to more often cling to their professional lives and put off retirement.  The lure of world travel and weekday golfing may be tempting, but the recognition that one loses one’s relevancy and dignity in the bargain gives one pause.  With retirement likely to last twenty, thirty or even forty years, the thought of sliding further and further into insignificance in the eyes of much of the world is sobering.  Becoming a walking boomer meme and object of eye-rolling amusement is not what we envisioned when we contemplated our golden years.  

 

I know this lament is a bit exaggerated.  Families still generally adore their senior members and children eagerly anticipate visits by or to their grandparents.  Longevity itself has a certain intrinsic value that most people respect or at least appreciate.  The old can fill in the details of the ever-increasing treasure trove of family photos and videos (though the stories may get repeated a bit too often . . .).   The oldest generation provides a sense of continuity and a linkage to the past.  We have a place of some honor in society by virtue of having gone before and made our contributions to family, friends, community and workplace.  We can enjoy our final phase of life even if the technical world laps us several times.

 

 

Artificial Intelligence – The Good and (Mostly) the Bad

It is accepted wisdom that all technological advances have their pros and cons.  It is my goal in this thought piece to analyze the potential impact of AI over the coming years and to predict both the benefits and the possible negative consequences that will one might expect.

The last few years have heralded the arrival of AI with incredible fanfare, and there has been a fierce competition to see who can most dramatically proclaim its future impact – “bigger than the computer”, “bigger than the transistor”, “bigger than the steam engine”, “bigger than fire”!  

 

The progress made in recent years in AI has indeed been remarkable, particularly in electric vehicles and in generative AI applications like chatGPT.   The technology is still in its infancy, but has already proven itself a rather precocious toddler.  We are only just starting to investigate the possible applications of this technology and if, like other technologies, it has the exponential growth in power and scope that one might expect, then it will indeed change the world in ways that we cannot even imagine now.

 

AI will probably be employed on a professional, industrial and personal level to save time and labor, much like earlier technologies.  There are many jobs that can be completely eliminated by AI devices or applications and there are others where AI will augment or assist.  Giving people more free time is seen as a worthy goal for technology, and certainly the march of human progress in technology has freed people from much of the drudgery of the past.

 

But is there a point at which displacing human labor, effort and creativity becomes detrimental? In the early industrial revolution, the replacement of skilled trades by machines sparked the Luddite movement, whose members protested and destroyed machines as they saw their wages decrease and their skills become obsolete.

 

We may view the replacement of assembly line workers by robots as a salutary advance because assembly line work is mind-numbing, but will more engaging, so-called ‘knowledge jobs’ actually be created?  Won’t AI actually be able to do much of that knowledge work with little guidance or input from humans?

 

And if one argues that AI will simply reduce the overall amount of human work necessary to produce the things we need, there are two interesting questions that arise.  One, will society prove capable of dividing up the remaining work in a way that allows everyone to participate and receive their share of the benefits?

 

And two, once we are relieved of the burden of working for 30 or 40 hours a week and perhaps need only show up for 5 or 10, what shall we do with our free time?  If the last 30 years are any indication, the great mass of humanity is unlikely to burst into creative enterprise and find ever more enlightening ways to express itself.  Binge-watching Netflix series, playing Minecraft and interminably scrolling Instagram reels are the more likely activities, and one wonders what kind of society will evolve from this pseudo-Eden of no more work.

 

In past technology revolutions one can argue that the jobs eliminated were more than compensated for by the creation of new jobs that supported or were corollary to the new technology.  But AI may be different, in that it is not merely a device or a piece of software, but rather combines both a task and the human intelligence necessary to create, maintain and modify itself.

To the extent that AI can assist human beings in performing tasks or creating things and NOT replace them entirely, then one can hope that the benefits will outweigh the dangers.  But I don’t think it is hyperbole to contemplate the more extreme outcome of partially or even totally sidelining much of human endeavor.  

It may be that humans need to have meaningful work, and not just activity, and that by reducing or eliminating that need we are attempting to short-circuit evolution.  It is common for retired people to fight depression when they face endless days of free time.  The societal instability that arose out of the Great Depression or other periods of large scale unemployment may have been partly or even mainly due to desperate need and poverty, but as the old saying goes - idle hands are the devil's playground.  

 

The use of AI in the military sphere is nightmarish to imagine.  And there is absolutely no doubt that it will swiftly inhabit every aspect of that world.  Terminator type scenarios are probably a decade or two off, but AI use in drones, combat vehicles, weaponry and decision-making is already upon us and will no doubt increase exponentially in the next few years.  The overwhelming amount of information, sensor data and tactical options in warfare have increasingly become almost impossible for humans to process.  AI may already be taking over command.

 

In the world of social media and the arts, AI is being hyped and sold as a boon for creators, but will it soon re-define what creativity is and make it a cheap commodity?  If I can ask chatGPT to write a poem for me, tweak it a bit, and then parade it as my own creation, will AI soon lead to the Walmartization of culture?  And why learn how to write if my AI app can do it for me?  Are we gleefully welcoming our own obsolescence?

 

And we all know what bots, deep fakes and other early forms of AI have done to civil discourse and politics, not to mention the incredible harm that tiktok, Instagram, YouTube, discord, facebook and other social media have done to the vulnerable teenage psyche.  Are more advanced forms of AI likely to wreak even more havoc?

Another concern is what impact AI will have on education.  We have already seen that newer generations have lost the ability of map orientation, cursive writing and mental math.  Why learn algebra or calculus if AI can do it faster?  No need to master grammar, AI will make sure anything you write is correct.  When every fact and concept can be accessed immediately through vocal interactions with Siri or her brethren, why study history or political science or literature?

 

I have been using chatGPT’s mia for practicing my French and German.  I say something and mia responds appropriately, posing questions to push the conversation along and correcting me if I ask her to do so.  It is not yet quite the same as speaking to a language teacher, but it is close.  And it takes away all the nervousness and shyness that one normally needs to overcome to conduct a conversation.  How seductive is that?  But is it a slippery slope to isolation and social disintegration?  Will we all choose to inhabit a world of AI-produced acquaintances, friends and lovers.  None of the messiness of real human relationships – what could be better? 

 

Yes, AI is upon us and there may be some wondrous things that make our lives better.  But beware, all that glitters is not gold.  The tech billionaires who argue for unfettered development of AI see the world through a lens focused on corporate profits and unimaginably high valuations of AI startups.  Their short-sighted arrogance needs to be tempered by more sober analysis before Pandora’s box is entirely open.