Can someone explain AI and why it’s set to change the world?

[Cheekyfuckerry]

So sorry to ask what is probably a ridiculous question but can someone explain what it is? How can it replace humans? What is chatGPT? (I may not have that phrase correct by the way)

I keep seeing threads about how our lives will change, how it will take over all our jobs etc, I can understand that maybe it will be able to answer phones and queries like the way bots on live chat / phones do now but what else is it able to do?

How can it change the world?

There’s a lot of change that will happen before annihilation that concerns me.

massive job loss, in groups that aren’t necessarily able to retrain. Taxi drivers, lorry drivers, anyone doing any kind of work that requires writing / data entry / content creation / analysis / interpretation skills. All of these tasks are very soon going to be done better by a machine, and as soon as it becomes cheaper to use a machine than a human… What do these people do to make a living?

Sam Altman (CEO of OpenAI) said in a podcast I listened to recently that UBI (universal basic income) was going to be an absolute necessity. Yet here I am in a country (France) where the government is fighting to make people work for longer because their pensions continue to be tied directly to the hours they have put in. Our social / legal / financial systems are totally unprepared. The huge financial rewards that accrue from these developments goes directly into the profits of private companies and the unbelievably wealthy individuals who run them.

Eventually the question would be: why do anything?

We'd be like animals in a zoo that are fed, cleaned and watered, and just sit there or walk back and forth aimlessly because there's no reason to use any of the remarkable capabilties we've evolved. That's the thing that really troubles me when I think about the possibilites of AI.

There are 8.9million economically inactive adults in the UK. Do you think that’s what they do all day?

And over 12 million receiving a state pension. What do you think they do all day when not working?

Are we in the equivalent of ‘dial up’ internet with AI? How long before if has ‘legs’?

Obviously that's not all they do all day - at the moment. The poster was talking about what could happen when AI takes over, and I agree with them. What will humans actually be required to do in the worst case scenario? They will no longer need to be creative, or even to think. Many skills people once had have already been lost, surely it is only going to get worse.

Imagine if AI had been invented in the 19th century. A time when 'sodomy' was illegal. If AI sentenced consistently would we ever have moved forward in our treatment of gay men?

@BillyBraggisnotmylover Uh, obviously I don't think that. Read the quoted extracts properly.

The quotes were about creativity but just because AI may develop excellent creative abilities doesn’t mean humans will lose theirs. Isn’t there a possibility that if humans are freed up from the monotony and mundanity (probably not a word) of work, more of us will have the opportunity to pursue creative interests that we’re too bloody knackered to do in our current society? The vast majority of people who paint or knit or bake or throw a pot or game or sing or play sport or make jewellery don’t do it as a job, they do it as a leisure activity, I don’t see why we would lose that.

what's the point of education if all knowledge is available at the click of a button?

This is already the case. Nobody need use mental arithmetic anymore now we all have calculators in our pockets. We don’t have to remember the dates of kings and queens’ reigns because we can just Google it. But we still teach and learn these things. Unless the rise of AI means we all have chips implanted that automatically update our understanding of the world every time some new information comes to light, we’ll still need to read and absorb and learn and apply whatever the machines are telling us.

There are already jobs that are obsolete but businesses maintain - supermarket checkout staff are technically not necessary now the ability to self checkout exists. I can’t see why in the face of increasing AI companies won’t make similar decisions to retain human roles for a variety of reasons.

Your point was that humans evolved to work and become depressed without goals but there are 20 million+ adults not working in the UK currently, presumably not all of whom will be depressed or unstable, therefore it must be possible for humans to realign their goals and definitions of “success” or “productivity” (as retired people will often have to do) outside of working.

WFH increases human interaction it doesn’t diminish it. Because we aren’t stuck on a train or in a car for 3 hours every day so actually have time to
socialise with our partners, children and friends during the working week, support local business at lunchtime, talk to neighbours at coffee break, do our own school pick up and drop
off rather than outsourcing it, help with homework, cook properly, not be absolutely knackered all the time.

Megan is the film to watch, its recent and a step up from terminator. It's a thriller but horrifying at the same time as this is exactly how it's going.

The vast majority of workers don't commute daily for 3 hours!

A very large number who commute into London do - walk or drive to station, train, tube to office can easily add up to 1.5 hours each way, and that's before accounting for delays. This is why WFH is such a massive thing in London - and why the City is basically a ghost town now.

Yes, London is an anomaly. But as I said, the vast majority of the workforce don't have that kind of commute, because the vast majority don't work in London!

AI like any new technology can be regulated and should be by a democratically elected government, those regulatory frameworks should not be influenced by profit making organisations or businesses who have an interest in this area I.e they should not have an input in to how to regulate their businesses.

From the outset we need to decide who uses them, for what purposes they're used, and who they're used on. A PP described visions of the recruitment process being wholly AI based but under Data Protection laws in this country and the EU for example, with automated decision making individuals have a right under the law to request a human review of the decision. I asked for my DD's secondary school appeal to be reviewed by a human and as the prioritisation of places is automated. What was noticeable in the appeal was that the committee didn't have a clue about the data protection laws on this and IME as I work in this area, the main problem is that people have no clue as to what they are signing up to, what is happening with their data, how it is being used now and what that data will be used for in the future.

Even with CCTV footage, there are lots of regulatory requirements around it, where it can be, the signage required, how and if it is shared with law enforcement agencies. We don't really need to know technically 'how' CCTV works to know the impact of such technologies and this is what you use regulation for to decide how and why.

But even if the WFH full time is a contributor to this problem, i.e a disconnected human race, reducing our empathy, are concern for the communities we live in, we need to look at why it has happened, we can't just say, 'stop WFH full-time' and that will limit the impact of AI. In London this has been driven by the very high housing costs, if that was tackled and people lived nearer to their offices then maybe they would be more willing to go to the office. I WFH some days and I have decided that I actually prefer escaping to an office if it is an attractive prospect, I e a peaceful and attractive working environment but my office is not that at all so I don't want to be there.

The average commute in the UK is around an hour. Split by region that's fairly consistent, London being an outlier but not by as much as you'd think.

Work From Office has largely been driven by the interests of commercial landlords and the hedge funds that have invested in the office developments. There isn't a technological need for offices for most jobs. An office in London is a status symbol. Most businesses with offices for 200+ staff would be better served with two or three regional offices outside London and hybrid working models.

@Goldenbear

AI like any new technology can be regulated and should be by a democratically elected government,

Unfortunately, like the internet, global tax avoidance, etc., no single government can exert that much control anymore. No country can dictate what another country does. It's a shame we can't have more multi-national agreements, but that's already proving impossible trying to tackle global tax avoidance and protection against online porn across country borders.

Sadly, governments these days are always several years behind technology etc and are only re-active once problems have arisen instead of trying to be proactive and stop problems before they happen.

Well, yes, we've had a few decades of firms/organisations closing down regional/local offices and concentrating their offices in London. That was never actually "needed", it was mostly for status/image and, funnily enough, cost savings of not having several smaller offices dotted around the country. Inevitably, it drove up costs and house prices, due to scarcity of supply, so they didn't save costs as expected at all! It would be absolutely brilliant if we could get back to having more regional/local offices instead of centralisation, but I doubt it will ever happen. Far more likely that people will continue to be expected to live within commuting distance of London, even if just for 1 day per week.

It would be absolutely brilliant if we could get back to having more regional/local offices instead of centralisation, but I doubt it will ever happen
It's already happening with some city firms. Look at the insurance sector. Two or three of the big underwriting groups have started closing large city offices in favour of smaller offices (admittedly still in the big cities) and hybrid working. Several of the larger banks had started to withdraw staff from London before Covid, and relocating public sector organisations has been part of the Levelling Up agenda.

Then no-one is stopping them from commuting to work as normal. The original post was claiming that WFH is really bad for people because then apparently they don't socialise or ever interact with other people. I was offering a counter argument that for those of us who previously had long commutes WFH means we have more chance to socialise and spend time in our communities interacting with people.

Hey, no worries, it's not a ridiculous question at all! ChatGPT is basically an AI that can understand and generate human-like text. Think of it like a super advanced version of the chatbots you mentioned. It can do a lot more than just answer phones and queries.

For example, I recently came across ai fashion design, where AI helps create new clothing styles. I was curious and tried it out—ended up with some really unique pieces that I'd never have picked out myself! It doesn't replace humans but enhances creativity and efficiency.

I find it quite frightening. In a Westworld or "AI causing a drone on an attack mission to kill its operator when the operator tried to abort the mission. "

I don't find it a threat to our jobs or existence. That's fine, we'll adapt. We'll get it to do the basics and humans will finish it off. That's fine with me.

But where it leads, it getting out of control, now that is a real possibility, and that's worrying.

What about salespeople? Like salespeople in shops or people selling you insurance or anything that you get sold via phone? Or email as well as in person? And what about staff in places like restaurants and hairdressers? Will all of these disappear as well because they will be replaced by AI?

We are already using AI in my workplace (huge employer, service used my millions daily) . If you email us a simple query you are getting an AI response and our chat bot deals with 90% of queries without human input.