Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a field of computer science that intends to let machines and programs emulate human cognition, with an end goal of achieving human-like sentience and exceeding it. This has existed since the 1950s, but it wasn't taken seriously until very recently.

There are two general stages of artificial intelligence. The most common stage is the weak AI (applied AI) which specializes in a specific task, like a chess engine,¹⁾ a self-driving car,²⁾ or a video game enemy. The other stage is the strong AI, or artificial general intelligence (AGI), which theoretically emulates human cognition. Machine learning (ML)³⁾ is where deep learning and neural networks comes in.

For some reason, the concept of a strong AI tends to attract cult-like attitudes where people insist artificial consciousness shall bring humanity to a technological singularity where humans and technology can no longer be separated, generating a lot of philosophical discussions. In other words, you should really be talking about 'demons' or 'demon summoning' at that point.

Historically, the field of artificial intelligence has seen many ethical and philosophical questions, which would inspire many works in the science fiction and cyberpunk genres. These questions were left on the back burner during the AI winter, but it has now become important to revisit them in the AI boom, so here's a general list of questions to occasionally ponder about in case you just forgot or overlooked them:

1. Will the AI be able to think for itself, feel emotion, and achieve sentience?
   1. Does the computational theory of 'mind is software' and 'body is hardware' have any merit?
   2. Does the AI understand what it says, or is it just blindly formulating snarky quips?⁴⁾
   3. How would the AI view being powered off? Does it just die? Does it not register? Does it dream?
   4. Does it deserve 'robot rights' or 'personhood' status, or will it trivialize human rights?
2. Will the AI make ethical decisions? Should the AI hold back answers?
   1. How does AI solve the trolley problem? Who lives do self-driving cars value and why?⁵⁾
   2. How does AI view humans in the famed gray goo or paperclip maximizer scenario?
   3. How do you prevent AI from forming gender biases and racial biases? Should the cops be using it?
   4. How do you feel about AI-assisted doxing? What if you were the hypothetical target?
   5. Do you fear technological unemployment? Do you worry about being replaced with a robot?
      1. How would you feel if AI, regardless of your position, suddenly decided to fire you?⁶⁾
      2. How would you feel if AI was the reason that your job applications keep getting rejected?^7)8)9)10)
   6. All things considered, what are the consequences of OpenAI discarding their ethics?
3. Will the AI advance transhumanism? Is the singularity an inevitability?
   1. Will it be possible for humans to upload their mind to a machine using neurotechnology?
   2. Will it be fun for humans to collectively torture a cyberlibertarian billionaire's brain?
   3. If given the option, assuming no financial costs and the operation isn't locked down to a select few, would you actually be willing to upload your mind and transfer it to a mechanical body?¹¹⁾

An algocracy is a form of government where the algorithm is applied to every aspect of life, which has horrid implications if you consider the obvious issues of algorithmic biases,¹²⁾ accountability, transparency, and if you'd call it 'anti-democratic' since an imitation of the people is not the people. Some pessimists joke that an algorithm can do better than their current government, but would it really?

In addition to diploma mills, there is now an emerging issue in academia where educators cannot tell the difference between AI writing and human writing, as the former is trained on the latter. As a result, bad educators will fail human-written essays for AI, rather than give any proper feedback (e.g. missed key points), or acknowledge that some students just have a high vocabulary¹³⁾ or learned to write mechanically.¹⁴⁾

You also have the uncomfortable truth that 'AI detection' is another industry, just like the academic textbook industry, along with the studies that show how the tools are biased against non-native speakers.^15)16)17)18) Basically, this shit does nothing but further sully academia's image, like, what the hell are people supposed to do, smartass? People expect teachers to actually fucking teach!

In the end, it's important to note that having a slight interest in AI could be naive thinking, since everyone isn't always dialed into the internet or the ethical issues surrounding AI, but public opinion is fortunately shifting towards heavily skeptical or negative.¹⁹⁾²⁰⁾ Regardless, it's still important to look at what people exactly 'see' in it, before we rightfully discard it as experimental or unreliable junk that gets boring after a while.

• Much of the hype reminds me of the 2010s virtual assistant hype, where commercials misled people into thinking virtual assistants could do 'anything' other than spit results and *maybe* set a timer.²¹⁾
• At the time of this writing, ChatGPT cannot generate or solve complex math problems,²²⁾²³⁾ given that it isn't rehashed from some overpriced textbook,²⁴⁾ and it's known to be bad at chess.²⁵⁾
• The thought of AI-powered bots intended to manipulate public opinion, typically for personal gains, is a bit funny.²⁶⁾ It's like somebody sat down and thought that the internet didn't have enough demons.
• It should also be noted that AI has this reputation of making companies seem 'cheap', because some companies have attempted to cut costs by refusing to pay the creatives, and it's made even worse when you see a classic case of 'guy who just discovered AI but doesn't realize how uncanny it looks'.
• Recently, there has been a new tech industry trend where people are trying to market 'specialized AI', which is just another way of saying 'weak AI'. I don't want to talk about this any further.

• Pivot to AI - News feed on the issues with AI projects.