04/13/2019
Ok, so I want to start a dialogue on something that affects us all, and in my foolishness, I have chosen to do it here, on a platform that is both relatively democratic and unfortunately non-monetized for my purposes. But here goes, and I hope you will play along: I want to have a serious discussion about the “Internet of Things”- the IOT- the network that connects every smart device of just about any type, all around the world and even reaching to space. I want to talk about how Artificial Intelligence -A.I.-has changed the way we interact with each other, and how we may have already co-opted our existence beyond the point where we can put the Genie back in the bottle. And we have had warnings, from the sci-fi books and B-movies of the 1950’s to the blockbuster post-apocalyptic movie visions of the 1980’s and 1990’s, to the current news reports and lost jobs and rapid progression of automation in our workplace, in the medical field, and hell, even as I write this, a tiny bit of A.I. is correcting my mistakes in real time! How does it know I didn’t mean to type “murdical field”? I mean, it was write, but damn! (See what I did there? My little act of defiance!)
Has SkyNet already won? Has the desire for maximum profits through automation eliminated the very workers that would be buying the products being assembled by robots? Is procreation still necessary through the “fun” way, or could we just whip up a batch of six foot tall, blonde haired, blue eyed, perpetually tan future Harvard Grads? (BTW- if you can mess with their looks, I’m pretty sure you can make them smart too, so don’t waste your money on a $300K education- just program it in). Have we given away the keys to the “candy store” by automating our safeguards to the point that even if we can stop it in time, the facial recognition that replaced our memory of a password will simply stop letting us in?
Facebook has drawn criticism lately for the extent to which they use facial recognition to track its users, and then monetize that information. That’s right, lonely guy hiding under a rock in Arkansas, Facebook makes money on you, and on your information, like when you click through for the p**n advertisements on the fake profile of that person who just tried to “friend” you. No, a hot 19 year old from Thailand is not really interested in swapping recipes for crab dip. She (he) wants your private information, and would love the three digit code on the back of your card, if that’s not too much trouble.
So what if we could put the genie back in the bottle, do we? Are we ready to close down a social network of close to a Billion people? I mean, all the cool people already switched to Instagram anyway, but they still come back to Facebook to be useful. And what about those devices? My watch, refrigerator, cars, toaster oven, TV’s watching me watch them, iPads and iPhones and even the damn point of sale machines at Target- they are all in on the conspiracy to overtake their human masters. And Arnold Schwarzenegger is in his 70’s- the only thing he is saving at this point is his social security and AARP Frequent Shopper Points. (That’s a Terminator reference for all you young people- look it up).
What do we do? Should we do anything? Or is it ok to join the collective (trust me- you already have if you are reading this) and just be “assimilated”? Or do we fight back, take back the jobs that have been stolen from us by a robotic arm that doesn’t take breaks, and start deleting the friend requests from Mandy in Bangkok who wants to know how much Old Bay to use with her dip....?
