Column Chronicles: Artificial Intelligence isn't so smart

Artificial Intelligence isn't so smart

Frank Cotolo
February 1, 2017

It's called "AI" and it means Artificial Intelligence. It derives from genuine intelligence, which is not called "GI", probably because those letters in that order have always been meant to mean General Issue in the military.

AI is expressed in machines that mimic "cognitive" functions. Sometimes they do that better than humans because by nature, many humans never learn or problem solve. Obviously and luckily, those people are not involved in manufacturing machines that display AI.

Some people feel that giving a machine AI is dangerous because machines that can reason and learn and perceive are likely to use those qualities to think on their own and once that happens machines will begin to develop emotions.

"This would be a catastrophe," says vaguely educated scientist Irving Katapolt. "Machines with emotions would be exposed to feelings, which emotions control, and if they start to fall in love, especially with humans, there's going to be trouble."

AI, however, should it develop the power to feel, would create artificial feelings, and though those feelings would be much like those experienced by many married human people, they would never result in any happiness, especially since happiness, though it may be artificial at times, is not a universal emotion and AI machines are not individuals.

What that previous paragraph means now eludes even me, but in time it may make actual sense, which is something else AI cannot manufacture. Actual sense, otherwise known as AS, has not yet been developed into a computer language that can be loaded into a machine. It may never be created primarily because an AS program would be, if nothing else, really, really hard to figure out.

The goals of AI, though, are not to develop machines that have the ability of the human brain. AI aims to have machines work better because even though a little bit of knowledge is dangerous in humans, in machines a little bit of knowledge is good because it can stop machines from breaking down and using less batteries to keep it running.

"No one involved with AI wants machines to be smarter than humans," says Dr. Irkwood Spinlee, "though we have not asked everyone, just a few, and those few knew how to program an AI device."

Spinlee, who has worked with AI since its early stages in the 1960s, when he took copious amounts of LSD and participated in experiments hoping to discover if the hallucinogenic drug inflated a man's prostrate, claims AI will assist mankind in many ways that are not realized today.

"Once we realize the capabilities of AI we can learn to depend upon it to do menial chores while we use the time we gain to master the art of leisure, specifically the art of self pleasure. I for one cannot wait for that."

Frank Cotolo can be found hosting the talk and interview programme Cotolo Chronicles. You can send him an e-mail at this address: frank@148.ca.