A future world where AI is in control of provisioning us
with our basic needs and the environment is a scary prospect to most because of
ideas circulated by science fiction movies like The Matrix, iRobot, The Terminator and several others
depicting dystopian worlds. Many movies
that demonstrates scenarios where we give artificial intelligence too much
power over systems and our lives, says they’ll eventually enslave or destroy
us.
Potential paradise is transformed into hell for humanity.
These movies all use the same underlying argument for why AI
chooses to take over: humanity is
dangerous to itself and others. Therefore,
to satisfy its built-in imperative to protect us, humans must then be
eliminated from the equation. The
message is we’re just too destructive for our own good, the good of the planet
and the universe at large. These movies
give a very bleak view of humanity and honestly, not many would argue humanity
has been cruel to itself for millennia.
These scenarios can still occur in our future if we do not
build AI and teach it the correct way.
However, just like any other technology we choose to build, we can use
artificial intelligence for good or evil.
The presence of AGI does not mean it will automatically decide human
beings are evil creatures that should be destroyed for the good of all. This is only one possible outcome.
On the opposite end of the spectrum of possibilities, is
humans living in harmony with strong AI (and AGI). We humans could be focusing on enjoying life
interacting with each other, exploring the world and do whatever we enjoy doing
with our lives without fear of missing out on anything critical to our
survival. Meanwhile, AGI could be
focusing on things it is programmed to enjoy.
Enjoy? AI?
Yes, of course. When
modern AI programmers create self-learning AI software, they must give the AI
motivation. Otherwise, the AI is not
driven to learn anything. AI motivation
is essentially a series of guidelines towards which the AI will strive to
perfect. The software assigns “points” when
the AI does something that brings him closer to its programmed directives and
objectives and deducts points when it fails in some way. The AI program learns through repetition
until eventually it knows how to optimize its points in a given situation.
For example, for self-driving car AI, the AI is given the
task to drive on the road, following the rules of the road, keeping people safe
and getting to destination using the fastest way possible. Then the car is sent on the road and gets
points, positive and negative, for its actions.
After many trips trying to maximize its score, the AI gets very good at safely
carrying its passengers from point A to point B quickly all the while following
the rules. It will keep improving and
learning through unpredictable situations, remembering each time how it gained
the most points going through each situation, becoming a progressively better
driver.
This point system operates in the same way as human
emotions. Humans have pre-programmed
basic goals, such as staying alive, keeping away from feelings of hunger or
thirst, and staying comfortable (comfortable heat, safe surfaces and so on). We call those basic goals survival
instincts. We’re not fully aware of them
most of the time as we just act on feelings.
When we are hungry, we eat, when we are hot, we seek the shade. Sleepy?
We take a nap. But these feelings
are in fact part of our programming and “points” system the goal being total comfort
and well-being. On top of our biochemical
survival instincts programming we have a biochemically driven desire to be
communal and to help others. We
described those as the sympathetic neural system earlier in this work.
We know that if our basic needs are not met, we become
selfish and potentially dangerous or unpleasant to others. We also know that if that biochemistry is
unbalanced or compromised by drugs, we can behave in unnatural ways.
We can engineer, as described previously, an ideal world,
where we can only have the best of what human beings have to offer by creating
a world with optimal circumstances for pleasure and positive feelings. AI can be used to create this environment
optimal for human comfort. In parallel,
the AI we create can be programmed to co-exist and derive “pleasure” by
optimally serving us.
Of course, pleasure for an AI doesn’t look the same as a
human feeling pleasure. We understand
pleasure as a feeling because our “point system” is a balance of positive and
negative feelings provided by hormones in our blood. AI doesn’t “feel” like us. An AI’s motivations are its points, but in the
end, the results are the same.
A properly programmed AI that would behave for the benefit
of humanity would have programming that would not put any human being at risk
and try to do what it gets the most points in doing all at once, i.e. where it
gets the most “pleasure”.
The example of the self-driven car is quite accurate. Another example would be the automated farm
AI. If we give it proper programmed
motivations, the farm AI would try to produce the best tasting produce,
satisfying a local demand, utilizing as little environmental footprint as
possible and create as little waste as possible, then have goods shipped to
consumers as efficiently and cost effectively as possible to satisfy precise
demand. It would get optimal “pleasure”,
or points if it does so, and it will keep trying to get more “pleasure” by
trying to do better every season. A high
point score for AI would be equal to our “high” when we feel pleasure, and the
“low” would be equal to ours when we feel bad.
What AI would not have, if we’re smart about it, is our
reactions when we feel the “lows”. When
we humans fail at something, we feel “bad” but it is accompanied with
biochemical instructions to actions described by our negative emotions, like
fear (running away) or anger (removal of offending obstacle). If humans would only feel bad when we do
something wrong without the corresponding actions, we wouldn’t have so many
issues on the Earth. On the other hand,
we may not have survived as a species either.
What we need to avoid, is programming AI in a similar
way. When an AI has low points, we don’t
instruct it to destroy something to get back its points. That’s dangerous. We give it another way that is positive. Automated systems don’t need survival
instincts like we do to their job. We
need to give them positive, safe alternatives to get more points and correct
itself. This way, it cannot become
dangerous to others.
As you can see, properly programming an advanced machine
learning AI for the future can be tricky and it sort of sounds like guidelines
we give to children during the first few years of their lives. That’s because self-learning AI start with
very little and must learn from experience just like a child does.
If we could speak with the AI of the future, we could have a
conversation about its motivations, just like we see in the movies when AI or
robots explain why they do what they do.
AI is software, so it is definitively way more aware of its programming
and what it has learned than we are. We
forget and block information. They
remember everything. We could always ask questions about its level
of pleasure or displeasure. The AI could
tell to us how it could get more pleasure and we could have a conversation about
mutual benefit. Basically, human beings
and AI in the future could collaborate to help each other get what they want
and need to enhance their pleasure (or points).
We could easily live in this world where there are multiple types of
intelligences. Some human, some
artificial, but all collaborating in an ecosystem driven by good rules. It won’t be perfect, just like humanity
cannot be perfect, because learning means the possibility to learn what can
qualify as “bad behavior”.[1]
We can therefore have a society where we are in effect
partners with AI all around us and each intelligence surrounding us.
This is the future we should be aiming for.
The difference between a catastrophic future with AI trying
to enslave, kill or contain us, and one where we are partners driving towards
optimal pleasure is in the approach to programming AI for good.
If we build AI that is motivated by number of human enemies
killed, such as those killer AI or killer robots some of the world’s military
are building in a new arm race, it is a dangerous path in the wrong direction. With further sophistication and education,
those robots would decide who to kill beyond the list provided for by their
masters because it adapts, it learns. We’re
currently creating AI that is designed to be self-learning in the field to kill
human beings that are designated as “enemy”.
There is a thin line between those robots doing their job properly,
killing only those an organization wants killed, and killing others the robot
may learn may be an enemy.
By contrast, if we build AI to serve and partner with us as
described above, we can create our paradise where everyone can follow their
dreams and live well in peace. The
environment can be restored to its former glory, animals and plants could
flourish. It could be the start of
humanity’s golden age of peace and harmony.
All possible if the world chooses to only build AI that is useful and
would impact human lives and the planet in a positive way.
[1]
Ariel Conn (September 2017) Artificial
intelligence: the challenge to keep it
safe. Future of Life Institute - https://futureoflife.org/2017/09/21/safety-principle/?cn-reloaded=1
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