What "AI" Shall We Choose

 I have to admit I do not understand Artificial Intelligence.  I do not understand the investment of billions of dollars in massive datacenters.  What are we hoping for?  What are we trying to create? Is this a super nonhuman intelligence we seek? Kevin Warsh, the Federal Reserve Chairman, has called AI the most consequential change in his lifetime.  While he predicts AI will provide unprecedented global production, he says the path forward “will be bumpy.”  But others, those who seem to be in the know, are concerned, even alarmed.  Bill Gates warns of increased cyber-attacks, deep fakes and fraud. In an interview last May, Gates said that, left unchecked, AI could cause a billion deaths world-wide.  Testifying before a federal jury in April, Elon Musk stated that AI could wipe out humanity. What are the benefits? What are the downsides?  What are the risks?

 I am more comfortable with a different AI: “Authentic Intelligence.”  Authentic intelligence is based on truth.  It seems we are living in an age of “truth crisis.”  It is difficult to know what is true and what is false.  There was a time when we said, “Seeing is believing.”  But not anymore. Photographs, images, videos can all be altered, or created from scratch.  Artificial Intelligence makes this all the more common.  Anyone can alter images, or create them on a smart phone.

 Instead of investing billions of dollars in datacenters and Artificial Intelligence, what if we invested billions of dollars in education for the young. What if we made education affordable for everyone?  What if we focused on enabling this generation and the next to discern truth from fantasy and fiction?  “Authentic Intelligence” must be founded on that which is true. When he interrogated Jesus, Pontius Pilate asked the question we all must ask, “What is truth?” 

 There is an “AI” that is still better, “Authentic Integrity.”  This is the “AI” that Jesus advocated. Avoid hypocrisy, self-serving, deception and greed.  Be honest, truthful, kind and generous. Could we possibly raise up a generation that is passionate about “authentic integrity?”  What if this AI characterized our government, economic and corporate leaders? Regardless what happens with Artificial Intelligence or any other issue, we can practice Authentic Integrity.  Being good is not a matter of income or intelligence.  Anyone can live a life characterized by goodness.   It starts, of course, with you and me.

 Peter wrote, “ Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness,  and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love.  For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ,” (2 Peter 1:5-8).