For a long time now I have hummed and harred about writing this post. I have written similar to what is published today in the past but have decided against publishing for reasons given below. However, the situation has developed to such a point where I feel I must publish.
Why?
Because of the girl in the image above. I don’t know who she is. I do know that she is a child fashion model – it was the website of an online clothes retailer from which the image was pulled.
What I do know is that in forty years time I and most of my readers will be dead but, God willing, this young girl will be a happy and successful middle aged woman living a good life.
However, I fear that her future may be a very troubled one. Which brings me to this point: Most bloggers want their posts read by as many “cyber-surfers” as possible. Normally this is what I would hope for. However the one set of “cyber-surfers” I do NOT want this post to be read by are those young people represented by the child above. This because I do not want them to start worrying and fretting that their future is bleak.
Let us face it, this girl and others of her generation are being fed doom laden propaganda from the climate alarmist brigade. I do not want to add to this!
The reason why I fear a dystopian future for this child is to be found at the YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/@AnastasiInTech/) of a highly intelligent and knowledgeable young Austrian lady called Anastasiia (and she does spell her name with two “i”s). Anastasiia works as in Chip Design – which I assume means chips of the electronic non edible variety! In her spare time she creates videos about Deep Tech & AI.
It seems that there is on the horizon such a thing as “Artificial General Super Intelligence” or AGSI. There is also a postulated point in the future known as the “Singularity”. Now, those of us with an interest in Sci-Fi will recognise the term singularity and think of the astronomical objects known as “black holes”. These are objects which things fall into and cannot escape and are crushed out of existence by the gigantic gravitational tidal forces present inside them. There is something known as an event horizon past which there is no going back. A point of no return so to speak!
As applied to “Artificial General Super Intelligence” the term singularity is applied to a point where machines become self aware and possess a consciousness of their own. Were – and many knowledgeable people say it is a case of when – Artificial General Super Intelligence becomes self aware and possesses a consciousness of it’s own, I would suggest that we humans have reached another point of no return!
There are many knowledgeable people who fear a dystopian outcome to this. They suggest that the machines possessing AGSI will form a “hive mind” and rapidly speed up change on many fronts. A lot of this will have the enthusiastic and willing co-operation of the humans who have constructed and programmed them as there is great wealth to be made from this!
It MUST however be said that there are also many knowledgeable people who look forward to a utopian outcome from this. They suggest that the machines possessing AGSI will bring forth an era of unending health and wealth and happiness to all humanity (or at least all who wish to embrace that which is offered). They suggest that scientific developments will speed up exponentially and maybe human beings will be able to choose to become physically young again and in a process known as DNA resequencing change their physical form and intellectual abilities radically. They go onto suggest that the life expectancy could be increased greatly and that all or virtually all diseases will be curable. Others suggest a merging or joining of human beings and artificial beings to become “cyborgs”
What is of great interest is that these future developments were predicted a long time ago. The BBC Horizon programme did two broadcasts which are particularly apposite!
The first I draw your attention to is one made in 1964 by the late Sir Arthur C Clarke: https://youtu.be/YwELr8ir9qM
The second I draw your attention to is one made in 1962 by the late Raymond Baxter of “Tomorrow’s World” fame: https://youtu.be/Do_WyMawgFM
Happily the one thing the BBC got wrong – at least for the moment – is that we are not cursed by the obnoxious sound – the word “music” is not applicable – shortly after the start of the broadcast!
I do however have one suggestion. That a five letter word dreamed up by a BBC writer be adapted as an five letter acronym, this to be: DALEK (Digital Artificial Living Electronic Konstruct)!
It seems appropriate somehow!