What is Artificial Intelligence in the Social Imagination...

     

    Artificial Intelligence (A.I) is probably one of the most misused terms in technology and data science. AI as a thing in itself (something created as a thing to be admired and used) is featured in articles, books, politician speeches, and even in consultancy companies PowerPoint slides; let alone that the Pope talks about it [https://towardsdatascience.com/no-artificial-intelligence-doesnt-exist-yet-3318d83fdfe8].

    But if there is artificial intelligence, what is it? In order to answer that question, we should first ask what is intelligence and if there could be artificial intelligence? From a sociologists point of view, intelligence is “learning by association” within the framework of social interaction (one to another in a given place) starting with mother, then parents, siblings (if any) grandparents and the wider community. In years past, anyone who was not considered intelligent by their peers and or local community was the village idiot. Which meant then that some people just don't 'learn'. And, that still may be the case.

    What is learning by association if it truly is the 'mark' of intelligence? One has to be able to learn what one is and is not. In saying that, we can assume there is a kind of internal coding of who is who, what is what (and is not etc.) and how everyone works together agreeing on or not what the causality is and thus assessing what is and what is not in a place over time that more often than not produces positive outcomes for the one and the group...which 'intelligent' people call progress.

    Though that seems to be relatively enough to understand intelligence, its not enough as some things translate automatically through place and culture. Intelligence is found in humor, in jokes, in idiomatic expressions, in pranks, in strategies, in entertainment, in performance, in relaxation and enjoyment of even simple pleasures like that of seeing a rainbow after a storm. Its writing a poem, even if no one else reads it. 

    THE INSTITUTE Artificial-intelligence systems are nowhere near advanced enough to replace humans in many tasks involving reasoning, real-world knowledge, and social interaction. They are showing human-level competence in low-level pattern recognition skills, but at the cognitive level they are merely imitating human intelligence, not engaging deeply and creatively, says Michael I. Jordan, a leading researcher in AI and machine learning. Jordan is a professor in the department of electrical engineering and computer science, and the department of statistics, at the University of California, Berkeley.

    Jordan says, "People are getting confused about the meaning of AI in discussions of technology trends—that there is some kind of intelligent thought in computers that is responsible for the progress and which is competing with humans," he says. “We don't have that, but people are talking as if we do" [https://spectrum.ieee.org/stop-calling-everything-ai-machinelearning-pioneer-says].

 

Commentary: AI in discussions of technology trends—that there is some kind of intelligent thought in computers that is responsible for the progress and which is competing with humans," he says. “We don't have that, but people are talking as if we do".

Exactly, why are people talking as if we do? The word here to examine is not necessarily intelligence but progress. People everywhere have fallen for the word progress as if that represents man's existence. Does one have to progress in order to be intelligent? No, however, western man has a tendency to think so. Max Weber, one of my favorite sociologist, wrote that western (Judeo-Christian) man thinks that man has a duty to overcome the world. That kind of thought is in many ways, artificial intelligence in progress. The man who has a tendency to think he moves forward has yet to really learn.

Interesting as that is about western thought, we still observe many people worldwide fascinated with Ai and they are of different beliefs/world views/culture. Perhaps, they are fascinated or even afraid for their humanity in terms of who controls Ai. One should consider that is the real problem, isn't it? Who has the con in terms of progress. 

Should we (the west) like them (everyone else) be fascinated or afraid of who has the con? In context of humanity as we know it, we should. Indeed, there really is a potential threat to humanity. Not just in light of the fact that Ai technology (who controls it) applied not only in weaponry but in all other aspects of our human existence that was and is created through social interaction/learning.

It is a threat to our social reality, our social interaction (face to face relationships) as we observe that happening already via social media. And, a threat to the paramount reality, the world of work, given that jobs of all kinds will be affected in one way or another. 

Ai will and has crossed national borders making more and more people redundant and or  irrelevant or displaced from the place they belong. As time goes on, eventually man will accept Ai as his/her new 'social' reality and meld with Ai and that is certainly a direct threat to all humanity. We could become aliens unto ourselves and to those who came before us as we effectively become 'artificially' intelligent, 'artificially' in progress.

Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness, to rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, and over all the earth itself and every creature that crawls upon it.” So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that crawls upon the earth.”…Genesis 1: 26-28.

 

*Let us rule! Don't take the mark of the beast... know who you are and are not ! 

What Makes a Good Human in the Social Imagination?

What's new in Sociology? Well, essentially, there is nothing new under the sun, only a re imagining of everything that ever was, is and will be as far as us humans are concerned.

Indeed, the truth is that people do not change... they think that they do but they don't. All one has to do is read the 'brave new' titles found gracing the top of sociological papers appearing in sociological journals and or bi-monthlies. 

Titles that paint a wild picture of current issues and imagined struggles. Such titles can make you think that the body of the articles will provide brand new insights into human behavior and the so-called struggles people face today. However, they are actually poor abstract and meaningless attempts to say what has already been said by some of Sociology's best thinkers. 

I have always been a classic social theorist. There are a few human socio-psychological types when we consider social dynamics of individuals belonging to one group or another; and those types (one or group) tend to be dependent on place... the existing given environment in the place they find themselves living out their lives. 

Needless to say, those environments though relatively differing in terms of socio-cultural, historical and geographic are not incredibly or hugely different if we were to look objectively. What I mean is this... one can look down from above, get a bird's eye view, and see human beings doing what they do: eat, sleep, defecate and fornicate. Thus, they look like most other men/animals in a way that makes them appear very similar indeed.

But, there is a difference between humans and certainly from 'other' animals. So, what makes humans different from animals? Well, there are a number of things I could list but one attribute that is truly original is the concept of exchange (one thing (s) for something else) or simply described as the mutual agreement of the concept of exchange which entails a recognized, recorded and established value of an exchange with its desired outcomes: accumulation of power, position and wealth. 

That alone makes man unique...how money, a thing of value from earning, investing or taking by force (paper/coin), is made and spent. Max Weber knew this very well and a concept that Karl Marx failed to grasp. One could claim that education and equality (equal access and reward) are what make the playing field fair but one has to figure in how reward is used... how money is spent once someone has either earned it, gained from investment or stolen it. 

What if money (paper/coin) are no longer used but digital points or rewards for good social conduct are appropriated. Well, even if that becomes true/real, it does not negate the reality of how they will be used as in spent... what we spend our accumulated wealth no matter what it looks like, tells a lot about you as an individual and also as a group.

Of course, you can and will observe that people spend a lot of time and certainly money on necessities: food, clothing, and shelter... so what's new?  But, what is a lot? Maybe this is where inflation comes in. Even so, there are differences in choices especially in terms of quality and or value for money spent.

This is indeed an observation that enters into the reality; yet, the irony is that the quality of a thing used in exchange can be or often is subjective... though it can be made to look/appear objective even when it is not by both inside and outside influences. One can and should ask... is it wisdom then that makes a good human a wise 'spender', or is it that a truly good and wise human is just a better spender? 

There are plenty of tales and proverbs in all cultures that talk of such wisdom...the telling of how a man spends what he has available to him whether its money or time required by duty/responsibilities built into daily existence and relationships, or time and money spent on his/her own person in terms of everyday comforts, pleasure, leisure, caring, loving or not... etc.  

What makes a good human in the social imagination? One that makes the most of his time and money for by what other measure is there... Right?

Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight. Be not wise in your own eyes; fear the LORD and turn away from evil.… ~ Proverbs 3:5-7.

Neo-Humanism in the Social Imagination... the Future is Bumping Around!

 

I blogged a five years ago about a possible social reality which I called "Bumping Around". Let's recap... 

 

    Is the social imagination morphing into a hopeless bumping around collective mentality?  It seems so... How is that possible? Technology is replacing our livelihood and sense of place. And, moreover, it is changing the meaning of individual lives and families and how we consume.

    Technology is largely controlled by the power elites who through global top down entities and their implemented systems control work; and thus, control the money. What will the social imagination be able to do? It will conform as best it can... people will be bumping around. They will live with no permanent sense of place or partner or family because there is no job that can support a home, a spouse or family.

    To better grasp how this will come to be, we can look to the past. The communism of the past century is the best and nearest example. Everyone was socialized to care... socially engineered to care - to care about the State. The propaganda used was aimed to get everyone on board with the State. 

 

    Once it appeared that everyone was cared about the State, then everything else that matter to them became secondary or discarded. Essentially, people had 'equality' but only to the extent that everyone had little to own, little to do and little to care about... Sure, they appeared to look busy, have a life... but people were just bumping around.

    Again, the first modus operandi is to get people to love or 'care about' the State because it cares about you and then you can love 'care about' others because they love 'care about' the state as much as you.  Once those at the top see that you care about the State (the), they start a propaganda to get you to collaborate with them to remove caring about anything else that might get you to not care about them and that means to watch out for those who might not be so caring about the State.

 

    In the future of the coming global communism, there is already a call for neo-humanism. The new caring mode of being and all controlled by the new 'State' of social media directed from the top down. There won't be the kind of intimacy between people as we know it now (quickly fading) and there won't be concern for gender of any kind. 

    There won't be any skilled labor or specialization either since that will be taken over by elites and their robots. People will be bumping around passing small courier packages, hard copy information like official notices, fines/tickets, medical waste and body parts, food delivery, and also some small human comforts to be exchanged along the way. 

    People will sleep where they end up at the end of the day (no more individual housing), they will share their day with strangers but they won't be strangers really... just people like them doing the same kind of work: bumping around and not caring about it.  There won't be anything to really care about since everyone has been made the same. Evgeny Zamyatin wrote book about this called "WE"!

Given that recap on Bumping Around, you may ask, what is neo-humanism? According to the so-called experts, neo-humanism is supposed to offer an alternative, empowering way toward a sustainable world. Neo-humanism traces the origins of unsustainability in people’s private efforts to address public problems. Ah ha... Bring on the STATE! The neo-humanist solution would be to  deprioritize economic growth in people’s lives – we would live in a post-growth society, in which our ability to enjoy life is decoupled from consumption. Say what???

 

They say that a common misconception of neo-humanism is that, by giving up consumption and the comfort of modern lives, we would doom current generations to live a lifetime of sacrifices for the sake of future generations as research belies this misconception: it shows that consumption contributes to well-being ONLY at early stages of economic development. Beyond a certain threshold, its contribution to additional well-being is negligible. 

 

Now, that sounds like consumption is NOT for the long term well-being of society... guess they forgot that consumption means eating and drinking. And, now, you should wonder are they talking about depopulation... right? Oh, in sum, they say that promoting social relations would decouple well-being from consumption: people could lead satisfactory lives independently from what they consume, thus reducing their negative environmental impact. Not sure what that means... guess it means = Bumping Around!

 

 

Commentary: "Does controlling consumption result in 'bumping around'?

Answer: “Who controls the food supply controls the people; who controls the energy can control whole continents; who controls money can control the world.”

— Henry Kissinger

Addendum... Man and Technology in the Social Imagination!

 

What baffles me today, in Sociology dept. (s) across the country and even worldwide with their so-called experts and or mouth pieces, is that we find way to much discussion about what already doesn't matter. Its a dead poets society...

Today's colleges/universities talk way to much about what can best described as self-obsessed vanity. What? Yes, they do! They are dead poets and don't know it. They are too concerned with gender studies (been there done that), racism, (been there done that), immigration (been there done that), economy and society (been there done that). I say let's get off the dirt road that we have all been down time and time again... and get on the highway to the future!

Technology, that's where we its at, that's where we should be. Technology, eventually, is going to eliminate gender, race, immigration, politics and economics as we know it. We should be talking about technology and how technology will and is already changing the world, let alone humanity. 

Sadly, instead we are obsessed with gender identity... Oh, the poor soul who thinks they are either a man or woman even though born with the evidence to prove that they are either one or the other.Whether they know it or not, the elites don't give a ... what you think you are.

Those that are promoting transhumanism and AI see the end of gender and the evolution of a new form of human. This means that sociology is lagging behind the momentum of technological changes planned for the human race. If sociology wants to be relevant then its time to leave behind ancient ideas of class/gender conflict and neo-Marxist ramblings. 

We need to be discussing the physio-cultural changes being thrust upon our species which will radically alter our civilization in ways far beyond tired old political ideologies and what they have imagined, most of which are relics of the 19th century. 

Its the work of sociologists to lead these discussions and make our society aware of the great questions that stand before us as this tidal wave of technological revolution hits all of our lives. An example of such issues that need to be discussed is the loss of the means of making a living to artificial intelligence and robotics. 

What will we do with millions of unemployed purposeless individuals - now unable support themselves let alone a family? In what ways will we have to create new forms of government and economics to prevent a complete collapse of the human race on Earth? Issues of class gender, race, economics (money as we understand it) and lastly, immigration as it happens today (individuals crossing a river/border)... all are meaningless in this new world order social imagination.

 

Man's fascination with Robots in the Social Imagination...

 

Why are we so fascinated with robots?

Perhaps, its because we like seeing the human form expressed in art; a 'reimagining' of ourselves in a kind of permanent ongoing state of being. Paintings and sculpture produce that effect and have had such an effect across the ages. 

Lately, mechanism is being more used as a medium for expressing our 'reimagined' selves. This 'reimagining' may seem a 21st century phenomenon, the natural result of a sci-fi-saturated culture, coupled with recent advances in computer technology, but that's not true. Thousands of years before machine learning and self-driving cars became reality, the tales of giant bronze robot Talos, artificial woman Pandora and their creator god, Hephaestus, filled the imaginations of people in ancient Greece, [https://news.stanford.edu/2019/02/28/ancient-myths-reveal-early-fantasies-artificial-life...].

Before we return to the posed question above, we should review famous science fiction writers and by doing so, find the answer. Isaac Asimov was a Russian-Jewish immigrant born in 1920 in Petrovichi, Russia; already known as the Soviet Union. Asimov was brought by his parents to the United States at age of three. He grew up in Brooklyn, New York, and graduated from Columbia University in 1939. During World War II, he worked at the Naval Aviation Experimental Station in Philadelphia along with science-fiction authors Robert Heinlein and L. Sprague de Camp. After the war, in 1948, he obtained a Ph.D. in chemistry from Columbia, [https://www.britannica.com/biography/Isaac-Asimov].

Asimov then joined the faculty of Boston University, with which he remained associated thereafter. He was a successful American science fiction author and biochemist. As for his books, he was and is most famous for his classic Robot series and the Foundation which is a retelling in outer space of the fall of the Roman Empire, [https://www.britannica.com/biography/Isaac-Asimov].

R. Daneel Olivaw was the infamous fictional robot created by Isaac Asimov. The "R" initial in his name stands for "Robot,". In his introduction story, Daneel is said to be not only made in the likeness of one of his creators but is also the first robot physically indistinguishable from humans. Asimov's laws of robotics are not scientific laws, they are instructions built in to every robot in his stories to prevent them malfunctioning in a way that could be dangerous. The first law is that a robot shall not harm a human, or by inaction allow a human to come to harm, [Wikipedia].

Meanwhile, on the other side of the Iron Curtain, in the Soviet Union, other Jewish science fiction writers were flourishing. The most prominent were the brothers Arkady and Boris Strugatsky. They survived the Siege of Leningrad as children. Their Jewish father did not. The Strugatsky Brothers went on to write such classics as Roadside Picnic (1972) and the many tales of the Noon universe, which imagines a Socialist utopia extending far into space. In Poland, the Jewish Stanislaw Lem became one of the leading writers of SF in the world: he is best known in the West for his classic novel, Solaris (1961), [https://lithub.com/jews-in-space-on-the-unsung-history-of-jewish-writers-and-the-birth-of-science-fiction/].

Jewish writers seem to have had cornered the market regarding such far reaching science fiction. However, American Ray Bradbury, of Swedish and English descent, who was considered a giant of science fiction, wrote two classic robot short stories: There Will Come Soft Rains and I Sing the Body Electric (aka The Electric Grandmother, [https://raybradbury.com/life/]. Let's not forget to mention among science fiction writers Frank Herbert and his imagined Dune universe. 

And, so here we are again, being brought back to face the question... what is man’s fascination with robots? I like the idea of man loving to see him/herself in art; and, now in mechanism as an 'art-form'. That may sound like self-worship; however, its much more about understanding the self in context of a creator. Truly, I think Asimov had it correct when he wrote of his created robot character, R. Daneel Olivaw. 

Asimov said he had to be not only made in the likeness of (at least) one of his creators, but also had to be realized as the first robot physically indistinguishable from humans. For me, that goes beyond art. That reflects man's desire (back to ancient times) to be eternal... moreover, to know his creator and to be in his image.