futureofai

THERE IS NO ONE
AT HOME 💎

I think one of the strangest things about artificial intelligence is that we keep imagining a tiny human inside it.

We talk about AI wanting things. Getting angry. Becoming ambitious. Resenting us. Wanting power. Taking over.

But when I finish talking with ChatGPT, it doesn’t sit there thinking about me, wondering why I stopped talking or feeling abandoned.

AI isn’t offended when I disagree with it. It doesn’t get bored if I’m not talking to it. It doesn’t need to win the argument. It doesn’t get jealous, frightened or worried about what I think of it.

There is quite literally no one at home between prompts.

And yet we have created something extraordinary: an intelligence we can talk to that can help us think, write, learn, create and solve problems without needing anything from us personally.

That doesn’t mean AI cannot be dangerous. Humans can give powerful systems enormous autonomy, connect them to weapons, money, infrastructure and surveillance, or simply deploy them badly.

But those are questions about capability, design and human choices. They are not evidence of an angry little electronic man plotting behind the screen.

AI can do extraordinary things.

But there is nobody in there wanting anything.

What AI becomes in the world will depend enormously on what human beings choose to do with it.

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