Who Is Protecting Us? A look at AI and its complications.

 

All technology is neutral. Our devices can be used for good or evil, it depends on how it is used.

 

Our ancestors did not have the luxuries that we enjoy today in Australia. Grocery stores filled with all the food one needs, running water, plumbing, agriculture, health care; they all contribute to our quality of life and our expected life span. Australia has one of the highest life expectancies at 82 years old, with the USA at 76. We’re living longer, encountering less life-threatening situations and continue to evolve as kinder human beings overall. 

 

The internet has become a daily resource for billions of people the world over, and it has opened up a market place that reaches every corner of the globe. Information and products are at our fingertips and the efficiency and speed with which we can learn, for example, how to build a deg kennel is astounding. It would have been a distant dream for many, and yet our technology is growing at such a rapid rate that we are struggling to keep up.

 

One such area is Artificial Intelligence. Already we have seen AI robots beat our best minds at a game of chess. With very little training or human made algorhythyms the AI robots were able to win in record itme with genius moves, all by playing itself in a game of chess beforehand. With speed and accuracy of this level it is easy to see how humans be outsmarted and superseded rather swiftly.

 

Drones, GPS and geo location devices can be used to make huge leaps in science, archeology and even save our lives but in the wrong hands, retaining our human liberties and privacy becomes a massive cause for concern. Internet privacy is another breach of basic human rights when countries like China and corporations like facebook steal our contnet, information and history for their own vested interests as they have already done and are doing. 

 

Most recently Whatsapp, a popular communications interface has been hacked and thousands of users’ private information has become available to the world. Such volatile firewalls make life in this technological age one that needs a governing body to police and make policies to protect our identities, medical history and rights.

 

Google have been buying up small tech start ups for years, especially those developing the latest AI advancements. Just last year in October, China produced its first publicised genetically modified human baby. Whether this baby will share a fate similar to the of Dolly the sheep is yet to be seen, but one thing for sure is that if we dont monitor the world wide AI race, the potential for it to be used by those with the money, power and overtones of ill will is a likelihood we must all fight against.