ARTIFICIAL Intelligence (AI) seems to be the hot topic these days since ChatGPT has made inroads in our lives. Its use might still not be as widespread in India as it is in the West barring in some pockets. But it is gathering pace, and AI becoming a part of our lives seems inevitable. Recently I was shocked to hear a friend tell me that one of her friends abroad used ChatGPT to write mails, articles, research papers, prepare workout and diet plans and what not. Why even my own colleagues seem to be using it to write mails, to write code, and what have you! That sent my mind reeling. It’s shocking and crazy to hear these things. The truth is that though everybody has something to say about AI, no one really understands it. Not even its creators, if some reports are to be believed. AI has left everyone confused. No one really understands how it works, and everyone wants a share of the pie in its usage. I remember that one time when my keyboard had malfunctioned and letters were getting typed on their own. The thought of AI evokes the same eerie feeling! Even the creators of these AI tools seem to be distancing themselves from these beasts and cautioning against their uncontrolled usage. Human brain evolved over centuries with experience, and cumulative knowledge of those centuries.

 

The biggies in the business feel that AI too could get sentient this way, considering it has access to all that experience and knowledge right away combined with the processing power of machines. This seems to be straight out of some science fiction dystopian novel now! Imagine AI taking over the world, and subjecting humans to slavery! Curiosity-driven, people try their hand at these AI tools, and then get sucked to being completely dependent on them for everyday tasks like writing mails. It seems as if humans are not going to use their brains at all now, and just command these beasts to do everything. That day is not far when by our own training, these AI tools will become smarter, and us dumber! It’s as if we will become robots, and these tools will strengthen and sharpen their artificial ‘brain’ by doing all our jobs. The future looks uncertain. What sort of a world are we heading towards? Too much reliance on these beasts- on something we don’t even understand well, does sound scary! Even after being in a profession based on Science and Technology, I try to keep technology at an arm’s length. Hence I’ve personally not used ChatGPT beyond whatever new prompts Bing gives daily for people to try out.

 

Already the brains of most people of our generation have stopped doing calculations mentally because we’ve been handed down calculators since we were kids. Now the new generation will be born in a world where even content is created at the click of a button using these AI tools. How unused their brains will be is unimaginable, shocking, scary to even think! The fact that this Frankenstein of an AI can create content is frightening. How do you differentiate between an article written by a human and that by one of these tools? How do you verify the truthfulness of what you’re reading- whether it is correct information or the work of a nasty artificial brain? How would minds of the younger generations, who would feed on falsehoods dished out by these AI tools, evolve over time? Questions abound, answers elude.