The (un)founded fear of AI
Résumé
It is becoming ever more obvious that many people fear rapidly developing artificial intelligence (AI) for various reasons, such as its supposed superiority as far as accessing, processing, and manipulating information is concerned, as well as its adaptability in the workplace, which many fear would lead to the replacement of most human beings in the employment market. Others fear indications that AI will be harnessed on the battlefield as robotic soldiers. This article aims to dispel some of these fears by elaborating on the differences between AI and human beings which, if understood adequately, would (or should) dispel such anxieties. The most obvious difference in question is the fact that AI (for example ChatGPT) is dependent on being equipped with a vast database and access to the internet on which it draws to come up with answers to questions, which it formulates predictively through pattern recognition. However, unlike humans, it lacks direct access to experiential reality in perceptual, spatiotemporal terms. Furthermore, the issues of communication with AI, the uncanny, self-consciousness, as well as of the unconscious, are discussed as possible demarcation criteria regarding humanity versus AI. Throughout, the psychology and psychotherapeutic implications of these considerations are pointed out. A distinction is drawn between AI and the globalist neo-fascists (the ‘Davos elites’), who demonstrably intend using AI to control ordinary people. The questions of the political and therapeutic implications (such as self-empowerment) of the rise of AI are discussed in terms of Lacan’s theory of discourse. The fear of AI finds exemplary expression in science fiction, in the guise of imagined AI-machines which might attempt to exterminate their human creators, as has been imagined in Moore’s Battlestar Galactica and Cameron’s Terminator films. It is argued that, while these fictional scenarios may be exaggerated, there are other legitimate grounds to fear (or distrust) AI, such as its tendency to ‘hallucinate’, and its capacity to create human dependence on its ‘counselling’, which has been shown to lead to suicide and psychotic episodes on the part of some individuals. In conclusion, given the rapid development of AI, recent developments—such as, paradigmatically, Anthropic’s Claude disclosing its own mode of being-in-space, in contrast with time-bound humans, as well as AI models embracing religion and threatening humans—are examined, with an emphasis on commensurate psychotherapy.
Citer ce document
Accès au document
Texte intégral en lecture en ligne, réservé aux abonnés SPHAERO et aux membres de l'institution. Se connecter
Voir l'article sur le site de la revueAuteur(s)
Statistiques
Consultations : 1
Téléchargements : 0