I have been thinking about AI (Artificial Intelligence) and how it will effect our lives. First, know that I have little understanding of how it works. I have always been an early adopter, a person who likes to try to new programs, look for innovative ideas on how to be more efficient. I love technology. But this AI is taking it to a different level and I am worried that this will make our world even less human. I already feel we live in a time when people matter less then things. It takes time to get to know a person, trust a person, share life together, and really care for each other. To be honest, sometimes I sit at home with Jim and we are both of on our computers and we are so engrossed in what we are doing that several hours can go by before I look up to realize that a living human being is sitting beside me, especially when I am tired and I go to short stupid videos that have no value other than wasting my time.

Anyway, my concern with AI is that our voices are no longer heard, that our news becomes even less reliable, our thought process more convoluted and less deep. I am concerned that history is being rewritten, stories change their meanings and information is filtered even more. But most of all I am concerned about our own ability to determine truth from falsehood, right from wrong, losing our moral compass on what really matters in life. When production comes before people, when technology comes before relationships, when politics come before values, then we have a problem. Does AI have it’s place, absolutely; it is great for research, great for developing new processes, but I think we have to be careful when it intersects with our personal lives, when it determines our options or how we should live. In Wizard of Oz, Dorothy ended up in a world that was so ‘out there’ that her personal senses were overloaded and nothing made sense. I feel we are entering a world where we can not make sense of it any longer and that is a dangerous place to be, because unlike Dorothy, we cannot return from that world.