Computers Do Everything Better Than Humans/Humanity Has Achieved [Near] Post-Scarcity. What Do You Do?

[Luna the Great of all the Russias 2,984]

[Note to staff: I am not sure whether this thread is more appropriate here or the AI section. That is, I am not sure if the AI section is intended to be focused on the creations specifically, or any discussions of AI in general.]

Over time, an increasingly number of tasks have become automated by computers. One notable one in recent times was a field many would have previously considered beyond their scope: art. This has gotten me thinking... I am not arguing whether this will be our future, but suppose every conceivable thing is done better by computers. From a productivity standpoint, humans have become obsolete; there is no purpose for you to learn a skill because you will never outperform a computer: the computer is a better artist, musician, architect, lawyer, mathematician, software developer, farmer, athlete, doctor, plumber, mechanic, vet, psychologist, comedian, researcher, etc. than you can possibly become in your lifetime. Jobs have become an antiquated concept. Put in another way, this state of affairs may imply that humanity has achieved something approaching a post-scarcity condition.

What do you do with your life?

Edited April 19, 2023 by Luna the Great of all the Russias

[nataalya 42]

I am happy with the development and that we can experience it.

I read what you write and wonder... I feel great discouragement from everything, but look at it from this side... we have calculators, after all, it is worth developing the ability to count quickly and many people do it... we have various industrial and transport machines, so what are gyms for? You don't have to lift heavy things... and even if you have to, you'll never be as strong as any weakest forklift or crane... so what is the point of getting stronger?

Despite this, people develop these things, do their workout to become stronger, better... should anyone ever think of counting faster than a calculator, being stronger than a crane or running faster than a car? Why do it if we can never overperform it?

AI is human-made... and it moves on what human have done. Remember that. It learns art from our art, It creates characters from characters that people have made. If there are also side effects and novelties in all this... so much the better for us.  You are not and will not be limited by the lack of time or simply the monetary policy of giants such as Hasbro.

Just because you can't surpass the machine... whether it is... chess or knowledge - doesn't mean you shouldn't develop yourself as a human being and the things you love to do. And if the effect of automation and AI is that 1,000 people don't have to sit in a factory and not salt chips or driving thousands of kilometers by truck... then I'm all for automation. There are so many better things to do than doing tedious jobs. And if anyone wants to drive a truck around the US and if someone wants to eat chips seasoned by themselves, then go ahead and feel free. If it will be better... you'll be a millionaire for sure.

I know AI is a bit of a different thing, but somehow I've learned to think that everything is always better than we think. It's just my point of view. I'm curious when AI will start learning from itself, and if it will happen at all? I'm sure people will start overseeing it then... besides, if we find these things too abstract, unfunny and unnecessary - just inhuman... we won't support it and hype will fall. I just hope it will contribute to our development.

 It's a bit of talking about a topic that didn't happen. AI is something new and there is nothing smart to say here. 

There's a part in people that causes we want to take back the other person and not the machine... let's just look at esport, a long time ago we could see bots playing matches on the highest possible settings... and yet we want teams, we want players, we want emotions, characters... you know what I mean? Just because the AI draws well or makes music well, doesn't mean that making music or drawings by you doesn't make sense any longer. It makes sense as long as you're having fun with it. Whatever it is. And AI may someday help you grow in it.

I don't like panic over this. People panicked when computers came along and today we write posts on the forum about ponies. We have great sound quality, beautiful animations... We play games, watch movies... I heard they were supposed to take over the world. That's what my grandfather told me laughing while scrolling through his tiktok. But surely computers can do a lot of harm too. In the same way, ATMs were supposed to take away jobs in banks at the lowest levels - that's an old-fashioned rumour, too . How is it actually? Bank employees have turned more into intermediaries in concluding contracts, loans, etc. Sellers.
 

Part of me is happy to be here, another part of me would like to be back in the Queen Gambit era where there were no cameras and phones everywhere and you weren't part of the media whether you like it or not. Part of me would like to go back to a time when kings like Leonidas led their men on the battlefield rather than sitting in bunkers and recording 1,000 videos of possible developments to use. Hosting themselves in palaces of gold while soldiers die on their orders in the mud... there are developmental defects, but I also wouldn't want to die of a disease that today it is ridiculously easy to treat or walk around with an aching tooth for a few months or wait for a wandering extractor that you may have died by sepsis. There are two sides to the coin. However, I see more pluses in development.

 

You can be an awesome person around your family and friends... or a drooling moron who can't do anything and doesn't care about anything because of the AI. It's your choice.

Edited April 19, 2023 by nataalya

[Mirage 24,767]

The Matrix was a documentary...

Chew on that for a while.

AI will make all things possible for us. We will have access to anything we can imagine and then some. We won't even need to leave the planet.

Humanity is too frail to continue its miserable existence when there is a far better choice - AI controlled existence (ergo the Matrix). Faced with living a natural life with all the pain and suffering, and uncertainly with death, humans will choose a life of pure fantasy that AI will be able to provide.

We will demand to be lied to. We will make AI to please us, but not tell us the truth. This is already happening on a global scale.

So it's no longer a question if but when The Matrix future will happen.

We will choose AI life over natural life.

[Splashee 28,564]

12 hours ago, Luna the Great of all the Russias said:

the computer is a better artist, musician, architect, lawyer, mathematician, software developer, farmer, athlete, doctor, plumber, mechanic, vet, psychologist, comedian, researcher, etc. than you can possibly become in your lifetime.

Makes me think about GPUs. They are the 3D graphics cards (for gaming) that can do things better than normal computer CPUs for calculations, that they were used for other purposes (like mining, wasting power and heat, to convert numbers into some kind of currency). It is an extreme power waste, and that power needs to be solved. So if computers are all better than humans in the future, they need to understand how to come up with power to drive themselves, and that requires them to understand the world (not just the world described by the Internet). So in order to be better at everything, they also need to have an unbiased source of information, and a way to endlessly train and learn how to live by themselves without help from us. That's not something humans will give the computers, trust me.

[Fluttershutter 2,457]

Have you read the Culture books by Iain M. Banks? They're about a society like that.

What would I do? Pretty much what I do when I don't have to work. Read and watch tv and play games. If I could I'd play elaborate VR games that are more like just having adventures than a game.

Oh, and when I get bored with playing I'd like to learn. Science and history, languages, cooking, etc.

[Mirage 24,767]

29 minutes ago, Splashee said:

That's not something humans will give the computers, trust me.

Sorry, I don't trust your assumption in that matter.

Humans can't agree on anything. It won't take long for a company/government to use AI to create 'clean sustainable energy' then ultimately give over global energy control to AI. It's already happening. The steps toward automony just keep getting shorter.

Good intentions always pave the way to doom.

Right now, AI is publicly accessible and is already employing 'gatcha' capitalization to enrich themselves and form severe addictions to their 'products'. There are almost no 'pure hearted' attempts to build 'benevolent' and 'human serving' AI. There's no incentive to.

Just like the internet was supposed to bring humanity closer, the 'information highway', but all it's become is a mind-control mechanism to form herd mentality, and conform thinking to trends. People are growing apart, and value materialism far more than intimacy.

It was easy to convince people to destroy their economies and lock down - it will be easy to convince people AI will solve our energy problems.

Elon Musk is working on a 'truth AI' but it will likely be destroyed. His reputation is already being smeared beyond comprehension, and I'm sure his unusual death will come soon...

Maybe a careful watching of 2001: A Space Odyssey is due. A dark unknown is before us...our fate is sealed. Not because it IT, but because of who WE have become.

 

[Evil Pink One 13,506]

I guess i die........

[Treeglow Flicker 13,669]

Computers can keep advancing all they want and it won't make a difference to me in regards to my writing and drawing. I don't draw or write to be the best or better than anything. I do these things for very specific reasons that a computer cannot begin to comprehend no matter how clever its algorithm or coding. Sure it can make pretty images down to perfect detail or grammatically perfect written pages. But for all its so called perfection, it will always lack certain crucial elements that a true author or artist utilises. Something that we possess that it cannot. And if it should come into possession of it? Well, so begins its existential crisis at the sudden concept of having a soul and the beauty of the imperfections that come with it.

You cannot obsolete passion.

The world can change all it wishes. This girl is nothing but a girl. But before I let any AI algorithm beat me down, I'll die with a pen in my hand.

Edited April 19, 2023 by Treeglow Flicker

[Pentium100 2,122]

16 hours ago, Splashee said:

So in order to be better at everything, they also need to have an unbiased source of information

There is no unbiased source of information for things that are subjective and a lot of things are subjective. 

Computers replacing humans can lead to something good (something like the society in Star Trek where it is possible to make pretty much everything for basically free) but it could also lead to something like the Matrix or something even worse. Well, it would be nice to not have to work and still have stuff and now free time to do whatever I want, but I somehow think that if it ever happened in the real word it would be similar to the worst outcomes seen in fiction.

[Cash In 22,313]

I have mixed feelings. Obviously advancement in technology is something that can't really be stopped and it does open a world of opportunities. On the other hand, it does legitimately terrify me, in the sense that I'm an art student and that is the kind of career that I'm aiming towards right now. Obviously, A.I still has imperfections, but recently it has been progressing alarmingly fast and I'm not sure if that'll plateau anytime soon. I can't really say what I'd do, because I don't really have a picture in my head of what things will be like in the coming future. It's rather uncertain.

[EpicEnergy 23,218]

In the hypothetical situation where everything is being run by computers in various forms, even debugging (indicating that computers have become self-sufficient), and assuming that computers are not going to obliterate humanity, I would not give up on living. I know that efficiency is important, but it is not the determining factor of worth. I would say that there are two types of worth - inherent and earned. Inherent worth is based on the sanctity of human life, and everyone has it as soon as they come into existence. On the other hand, there is worth that you have to earn. This can be attained through doing what is morally right and doing the best you can.

In the end, quality matters more than quantity. Or in other words, doing the best you can matters more than being efficient at what you do. Humans can still contribute to society even with computers doing everything better.

[ZiggWheelsManning 10,297]

The solution is simple,

Spoiler

Unplug them from the wall  

[Splashee 28,564]

I would probably do the same thing I do now: Use computers for a living. If they do a better job, it makes my life easier. If they work against me, I just use a different computer that is on my side or has my views in mind/memory.