Recently, we’ve heard the shocking warning by tech experts and researchers that Artificial Intelligence may destroy mankind in the near future. Evan Hubinger, an Anthropic scientist said that without proper appropriate guardrails, AI could wipe out humanity within a decade.
Technology expert Bill Gates warned of mass casualty events. Even back in 2014, physicist Stephen Hawking warned that artificial intelligence could “spell the end of the human race.”
Tech CEO’s have called for federal oversight of the AI industry because they understand any piecemeal regulation would be inadequate in controlling its power. Further, there must also be global cooperation and agreed upon guardrails since a single rogue platform could create disaster.
Yet, President Trump blithely believes the dire warnings about AI are “a hoax.” Further, he’s claimed that the only guardrails AI needs is a “strong and smart (High IQ!) president.” He sees the development of AI as an economic and military race with China. “I’m for. ‘Let’s go and let’s win.’”
We’ve seen this story before; it’s as old as humanity. We find it in mythology, history, science, even the Book of Genesis and the fall of man. It’s an archetypal story about the unintended consequences of man’s desire for knowledge, wealth, and power. Unfortunately for all of us, the American president doesn’t read.
If he did, he’d know that in the Book of Genesis, Adam and Eve eat fruit from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, “a tree to be desired to make one wise,” and, according to the subtle serpent, to “be as gods, knowing good and evil.” In their desire for God-like knowledge, however, they and humankind suffer unintended consequences: a permanent eviction from Eden; the loss of immortality and the introduction of death; and the subsequent history of human suffering.
Another archetypal story that may serve the president is Christopher Marlowe’s “Doctor Faustus,” in which a German scholar desires absolute knowledge that he achieves by making a deal with the devil. While the doctor gains the knowledge he sought, he loses his soul and suffers in Hell for eternity. Evidently, the so-called author of “The Art of the Deal” believes he can outsmart Mephistopheles.
The same pattern of short-sighted desire occurs in Ovid’s story of King Midas who foolishly wishes that everything he touches turns to gold but fails to consider the effect on his diet, his health, and his daughter. The moral, again, is to be careful about what you wish for—you might just get it. (Perhaps Mr. Trump read the first part of this one.)
History and science has its own cautionary story of humanity taking a bite from the apple of knowledge when it desired to harness and unleash the power of the atom. After America weaponized that knowledge and dropped the atomic bomb, Bertrand Russell and Albert Einstein left the following message to posterity. “We appeal, as human beings, to human beings…. Remember our humanity and forget the rest. If you do so, the way lies open to a new paradise; if you cannot, there lies before you the risk of universal death.” Even the “Father of the Bomb,” Robert Oppenheimer, called international cooperation and arms control a “desperate necessity.” Though America may have won the arms race, it ignited nuclear proliferation, an existential threat still dangling over humanity like the Sword of Damocles.
Presently, despite these cautionary tales, historical precedents, and nightmarish warnings by tech experts requesting federal oversight of AI, President Trump remains defiant, saying the US would reject “any attempt to construct a globalist scheme to control” AI. Instead, like some latter-day King Midas, he brags of ushering in a “New Golden Age” of technology. But like a modern version of Dr. Faustus, Trump’s obsession to “win” the race for “superior intelligence,” ignores what may lie at the finish line for humanity.
The “High IQ President” hasn’t considered the possibility that the “superior intelligence” may simply decide that the easiest and most efficient way for America to win the AI race is to eliminate the competition, a pre-emptive nuclear strike that would trigger nuclear Armageddon. In that case, America wins the AI race. As for humanity—end of story.
Thomas Cangelosi lives in Avon.
