Cognitive Changes...

Cognitive Changes...

Socrates argued that the invention of the written word and that reliance on writing would erode memory but also maybe more importantly, that reading would mislead students to think that they had knowledge, when they only had data. The advent of writing, which lead to scrolls, which then progressed to books revolutionized the way we store and share information, and to a deeper degree even the way we think as well. Some are arguing that the Internet is further changing the way we think as people. As shown in articles like “How Computers change the way we think” by Sherry Turkle (http://web.mit.edu/sturkle/www/pdfsforstwebpage/Turkle_how_computers_change_way_we_think.pdf) , and “Is Google making us stupid?” by Nicholas Carr (https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/07/is-google-making-us-stupid/306868/)
The only difference now is that we haven’t had long enough to fully study the effects of near daily internet use upon the human mind and what cognitive functions are changed by this and what new neural connections are formed from this kind of use and thinking. Part of me believes that we’ll never fully get the chance to study these effects as well, since the internet is constantly changing and evolving. When the internet absorbs a medium, that medium is re-created in the internet’s image. Where certain neural connections are forged from a standardized school system with classical book reading at it’s core, the use of the internet changes reading itself, where now we look for the specific words that we want to see and read around those words, not reading in the classical sense at all.

With the internet being a decade old, we’re now seeing systems like A Detection Algorithm in the world of XM and IBM’s Watson being unleashed upon the overly complicated US Tax laws. Has the invention of the internet actually been a means for preparing our entire culture for the introduction of Artificial Intelligences? As this seems to be our natural progression with the way we prepare, distribute and consume media. Is it because we have to be thinking in an entirely new way to best interface with Artificial Intelligences?

I see a strange parallel between Socrates’ opposition to the written word and Roland Jarvis' opposition to A.I. As this seems to be a natural intellectual evolution from written word to internet to A.I. I’m not saying that Socrates and Jarvis are the same, what I am saying is that the short sightedness and fear of major change are the same between the two figures. I also believe that for the foreseeable future there will never be a time when humans will no longer be relevant… As we are the progenitors of Artificial Intelligences and therefore are their stewards, working in tandem with them to advance humanity and A.I. together.

Maybe all of this has lead up to this point to create not only Artificial Intelligences, but humans that are ready for those A.I.

What do you think Agents?

Edgar Allan Wright Verity Seke John Hanke Ethan Lepouttre Anne Beuttenmüller Andrew Krug flint dille H. Richard Loeb Society for the Ethical Treatment of AIs

Comments

  1. It's possible that both, Socrates and Jarvis, represent the same archetype.

    ReplyDelete

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