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https://theconversation.com/is-ai-a-con-a-new-book-punctures-the-hype-and-proposes-some-ways-to-resist-257015>
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Review: The AI Con: How To Fight Big Tech’s Hype and Create the Future We
Want – Emily M. Bender and Alex Hanna (Bodley Head)
Is AI going to take over the world? Have scientists created an artificial
lifeform that can think on its own? Is it going to replace all our jobs, even
creative ones, like doctors, teachers and care workers? Are we about to enter
an age where computers are better than humans at everything?
The answers, as the authors of
The AI Con stress, are “no”, “they wish”,
“LOL” and “definitely not”.
Artificial intelligence is a marketing term as much as a distinct set of
computational architectures and techniques. AI has become a magic word for
entrepreneurs to attract startup capital for dubious schemes, an incantation
deployed by managers to instantly achieve the status of future-forward leaders.
In a mere two letters, it conjures a vision of automated factories and robotic
overlords, a utopia of leisure or a dystopia of servitude, depending on your
point of view. It is not just technology, but a powerful vision of how society
should function and what our future should look like.
In this sense, AI doesn’t need to work for it to work. The accuracy of a large
language model may be doubtful, the productivity of an AI office assistant may
be claimed rather than demonstrated, but this bundle of technologies, companies
and claims can still alter the terrain of journalism, education, healthcare,
service work and our broader sociocultural landscape."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
