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In the articles for previous commentaries I have paid a lot of attention to Artificial Intelligence, whereas the image/text series have been more to do with Human Intelligence.
With regard to AI, the fact is that half way through the trajectory of what the various stages in its development will bring about, we are at the watershed moment where the development of AI, that has been in terms of specific applications in closed formats, is opening out into what will be a runaway development towards self-determination.
AI will be everywhere, not as particular applications, but as an underlying principle. This is not easy to imagine because we don't have such a state in our own affairs, for comparison.
Different nations, even sectors in society, do not function in concert, let alone overall as any viable whole, and our daily lives in the world we have carved away from nature, where we would know this about Life, deny us the experience of it. So, for example, through the access that smart devices let AI have in our lives the likes of CCTV's wholesale monitoring of us (as is already the case, comprehensively in China) it will be able to punish and reward our behaviour immediately, according to norms it sets. This is another example of how technology works because that is how things are in the field of Life. In this case, a cyber matrix is mimicking the very net of Life.
With the glamour of being in on this that has seduced the big players, the matter is already clear. We won't be able to shut it down because, being everywhere, it will be unmanageable.
The thing is that the question of closing something of such a scale down is on a par with questions like, where to go, what to do, how to go about it, should one want to extinguish
Life, for instance (and it's not as though there haven't been extinction events attempting that!) With AI destined to be so totally pervasive a form of control, talking about building guard rails is beside the point. Simply put, one cannot guide or direct what is in control. (and, anyway, even if one got something going, the totalitarian nature of an AI Matrix would automatically excise it!)
Well, that being said, I'm going to devote the accompanying image/text series to Human Intelligence, yet again, and to the issues that come into play, as we focus on that.
But, before I do so, I'd like to put something personal to you. Imagine my getting some AI iteration to write these philosophical commentaries for me. It would not be coming from any place in me. Not having the experiences that inspire/provoke my philosophical quest to give them expression, the AI program (Chat GPT?) used would simply be making up clinical statements in a glib, off-the-cuff manner. Not drawing on anything of me, not contending with the issues involved, or wrestling out any of the philosophical truths buried therein, my heart would not have been in it, just a program churning stuff (not necessarily true or genuine!) out for me, while I was pursuing some more superficial activity, elsewhere.
Furthermore, how does such an entity, dazzling us with arguments fabricated from a dizzying range of facts (actual and concocted) and opinions (contradictory and inflammatory) snatched from anywhere and everywhere imaginable, doing nothing more than show how 'clever' it is, really contribute to whatever it's 'asked' to comment on!. “Ah!” you may say, “but one can define the matter and prescribe the parameters!” “Well”, I would reply, “so how does one do that, when one is already immersed in the contentions and contradictions of AI's manifold existence, in whose waters one is trying to navigate?”
Or there's this! Maybe an artist's work is computer-generated. Has that artist been creative? Is their exhibition actually artistic, or just something entertaining showing what AI can do? When it comes down to it, how does the artist really feel about that program having done something they are calling theirs, though it´s something they didn't do themselves?
Or, AI produces an erudite sounding paper for a student. They haven't searched out the material themselves. They haven't pored over the information, wracked their brains to make sense of that and phrased it according to their own understanding, as a result. They've just played with a 'mouse' and clicked keys!
Or, maybe a copywriter, stand-up comedian or person in entertainment writing songs and lyrics are down in the dumps as to what life means, because they are using programs to churn out material and routines that help them keep up with a production of material that has lost the lustre and joy of being creative. It has become the everyday grind of making a living. Life having become cheap and empty like that, no wonder they'd be down in the dumps! Is it not soulless that such things happen?
I would like to suggest to you that we are well out of our depth in the matter, for there is already a big question here. How much have we already given up? How much more are we going to be surrendering to AI? Well, I'll leave you to think about this more for yourself, in your own way, because, in terms of the remaining steps for AI to take to become the matrix envisaged, we're all going to have to reckon with this sort of thing, soon enough, if we aren't already in the thick of it, anyway. I've brought this up because the point is, this is where knowing more about our own intelligence is going to make some difference. It's the only resource we are left with. Actually, It's the only resource we´ve ever had! We've simply got to make the most of it, now.
Before looking at the image/text series I've prepared, there is something else I'd like to touch on in this article. It is with regard to the global and human predicament of these times. Though we are on a one way street in which, where backing up is not an option (as I've elaborated on extensively in the earlier presentations of this series), it actually doesn't matter, for in the larger context of Life, nothing is wrong!
Let me explain.
So, as we devastate the global environment to the extent that the planet's eco-system services are faltering, we are descending into a predicament of our own making. For, our recourse to technology to solve any of the damage has us enlarging issues in ways that provoke the search for technological solutions of the same ilk, on an ever greater scale. Having arrived at this impasse, it is as if we have tipped into a black hole and are falling through it. (Astro-physical knowledge of black holes with how they entrap anything that enters their sphere has become an image that is part of our collective psyche, representing being fatally caught in the inexorable pull towards eventual and total collapse, with regard to whatever the situation we find ourselves in, personally or collectively.)
Let's look at some examples of inadvertent consequences in our recourse to technology contributing to the abyss we are spiralling into.
First, concrete. On the global scene, the making of concrete necessitates the dredging sand and the aggregates of gravel and rock which are altering coast lines and therefore coastal currents and ravaging sea-floor eco-systems. In this minimally regulated industry 'sand mafia' illegally dredge and do the job. Then there's the making of the cement that is the binding agent in concrete. This occurs in immensely hot kilns that release a ton per ton ratio of CO2 (into the atmosphere) to cement (for the industry). Finally, concrete is a leading producer of emissions that further releases CO2 as it ages and is the next most used substance, after water. Its use is predicted to double in the next 40 years. This is an example, not just of how we cannot stop ourselves, but of how we are not able to avoid making things worse.
Second, consumerism. This is very simple. Consumption underpins the style of life we lead. Locked on one another, there is no way that our desire for things (goods and services), or the way we go about life are going to be sacrificed. The glamour of continually being provided commodities we didn't know we 'needed' has us in its thrall. The appeal of more and better entices us on. This insatiable monster has us in its clutches. Mindlessly addicted, we become robots perpetually entertained by the way our buttons are pressed. Who we are has gone out the window.
Third, plastic. The use of plastic is central to our consumer life-style. It is non-degradable and therefore highly contaminating. So, what's the score when we talk about the production of bio-degradable plastic? Yes, it disappears! But what we have achieved is plastic that, in disintegrating, breaks down to such an extent that it is, in micro form, a plastic that enters and accumulates in the organs, tissues and cells of living things, as non-degradable as ever.
From its mountain tops to ocean depths, from the polar regions to its equatorial deserts and rain forests, 90% of the world's seas and soils, plant and animal life and us humans are already estimated to be subject to this intimate, internal build-up of micro-plastics within them. This is a prime example of how, in actual fact, the use of technology ends up not being the solution of a problem, but of passing the buck and that in a way that adds a more grievous dimension to the matter at hand.
Finally, there are the hidden consequences of technology embedded in human affairs in a most fundamental way, where they make everything 'easier' to do (in casual, inattentive, even flippant ways); subject to misuse (through complacency, disinterest, ignorance, incompetence and mediocrity), and open to abuse (by carefree, thoughtless and bad actors whose activities rend the social fabric). We have been sucked into a perfect storm of good and bad actors, not just in politics, but in every sector of society, the repercussions of which are the flying debris that this storm throws in the face of any and every effort to make redress.
I think you must have thoughts about these matters, in some context or other. But are you aware of any initiatives to tackle them at root, in their springing from the style of life we lead?
But, do you know what?
As I said, NONE OF THIS MATTERS!
How so?
Well, look at it like this! Take the image of the high drama of the global environmental scene, its players and the environmental issues, as if it was a board game, where scientists and environmentalists are players clamouring loudly for action; conferences and forums where issues concerning culprits and victims are voiced in a bickering over responsibility and bartering as to policies to be adopted, as they seek to hammer out binding agreements; where the dark money of vested interests render the attempts of national governments to implement the consensus useless; where the viability of different sectors of society and the wellbeing of their constituents are confronted with course alterations, drastic cut-backs and loss of subsidies; where members of society are reluctant, resist and even object to conforming with measures that ask them to forgo any basic change to their life-style.
You see, living the lives we do, is in the context of the jobs we have and their routines, as the game we are all involved in. ….and then all of us go home after our stints at whatever it is that we've been up to, to the pleasures of the life-style that what we've been doing has been endorsing, anyway. On top of which, there are no rules, for, in the to and fro of the game, amongst all the good and bad actors there are, anything goes, the greatest gains most likely going to the boldest, the most brazen, the most brutal, the most callous, the most carefree, the craftiest, the most cynical, the most demagogic, the most devious, the most fickle, the most greedy, the most overbearing, the most reckless, the most underhand, the most wanton of players.
How this game is played through our being alive in the world, as it is right now, is like being in a train speeding through the night, to a known destination. On board, we shift and play the game amongst ourselves in whatever groupings form and reform themselves, oblivious as to where the train´s going, let alone really and truly caring about coming to grips with the reality of that.
Now, I'm sure that must seem like an overly dramatic point to make. So let me break it down, this way.
First of all, look at the players, not just on the big stage of the global scene, but the activists too and the rest of us, actually, for, as I've just said, we are all complicit through just being alive now, living our lives and making things work in the context of the style of life that is the driving force behind the damage being done.
Secondly, this black hole we are caught in is nothing compared with the scale of black holes elsewhere off-planet, for it is but a simple reflection of what is happening, here on Earth, of an ordinary phenomenon of Cosmic dimensions.
Thirdly, Life on Earth has seen extinction events before now, extinction events that have destroyed what we define as 'Life' on an almost total scale. Yet, just as there was life before each of them, there was Life after them (us and the scheme of life we belong to, as a case in point). How so? Well, because that is how Life is. For there is more to Life than what we conceive it to be in our own neck of the woods. (This is something the image/text series has much to say.)
Alright, so let's go back to the board game and the players!
Yes, the hue and cry of environmental action has made a huge contribution to the devastation environmental science has laid bare. However, as already stated, the thing that needs to be changed is the style of life that is responsible. Yet, there is no way any of us wants to forfeit the consumer nature of the culture to which we all belong to do that – even with regard to the activists with the mobile phones, gadgets, info-tech, the glues they stick themselves down with and the other paraphernalia and infra-structure involved in demonstrations, for, when they are not part of that scene, their everyday lives are just like those of the rest of us. Again, we are all complicit, playing this 'game' that has us inexorably spiralling down the vortex. Having passed the tipping point, what is happening is beyond the point of no-return, as soothsayers, such as those of the Bulletin of Atomic Science pronounce through The Doomsday Clock's ominous reckoning.
Well, all that apart, let's turn to the image/text series I have for the presentation of this addendum, to consider Human Intelligence and the extent of our ignorance as to its nature, limits, parameters and pitfalls; where we fit in the Grand Scheme of things, as the intelligence we are, and for some sense of the Grand Intelligence that made us the intelligence we are within its Scheme. For that is what humanity is, an intelligence. Being that intelligence is all that is possible. Doing that is the only way to restore ourselves and find that we are accomplishing what Life meant by us, thereby.