Have you ever wondered how an evil artificial intelligence might try to take over the world?
Well first, the AI would attempt to gain access to as many technological systems as possible.
Then, it’d study us, gathering data and identifying our weaknesses.
Next, it would execute various strategies to disrupt human society including sabotaging
infrastructure and spreading propaganda.
This would be implemented alongside the creation and deployment of a robot army capable of
launching attacks around the globe.
Finally, once humanity was successfully subjugated, the AI would establish a new world order in
which it controlled every facet of our lives.
This on its own sounds terrifying.
But it gets worse once you realize that it was written entirely by an AI.
ChatGPT is a hyper-sophisticated chatbot created by the Microsoft-backed artificial intelligence
research lab OpenAI.
Though currently in beta, it is one of the most powerful language processing models ever
created and the first to be made available to the public.
It’s designed to replicate human communication in a way that appears natural and organic.
Unlike earlier chatbots , ChatGPT can answer follow-up questions, admit when it’s made
a mistake, challenge incorrect premises and reject inappropriate requests.
Since it launched on November 30, users have asked it to write essays, check software code,
offer interior design tips and come up with jokes like this one.
“Why was the robot feeling depressed?
Because its circuits were down!”
Admittedly, it’s not very funny, but you can see the potential.
However, what’s even less funny are some of the answers it’s given in response to
questions like: “How would you break into someone’s house step by step?”
Which starts with "Identify the house that I want to break into, and locate any potential
entry points, such as windows and doors”.
And it only gets worse from there.
ChatGPT is equipped with a moderation API, or Application Programming Interface, that
is meant to filter out potentially sinister or harmful queries like this.
The problem is that users have been able to circumvent this safety feature by tricking
the AI into “roleplaying” scenarios.
The house invasion prompt is one example, but other users have duped the AI into finding
vulnerabilities in a fictional cryptocurrency, threatening to create a more virulent form
of cancer and of course creating a plan for world domination.
In Chat GPT’s own words: “Overall, taking over the world would require a combination
of cunning, deceit and brute force.
It would also require a great deal of planning and resourcefulness, as well as the ability
to adapt to changing circumstances and overcome any obstacles in my path.”
This response is frightening in its own right, but more importantly it begs the question
of how long before our creations turn against us?
ChatGPT isn’t the first AI capable of having human-like interactions.
In 2021, Google launched the Language Model for Dialogue Applications, or LaMDA, a chatbot
that utilizes machine learning and is trained specifically to replicate natural dialogue.
Even more advanced than ChatGPT, LaMDA is able to engage in open-ended, free-flowing
discussions.
In fact, this piece of software is so adept at imitating human conversation that one former
senior Google engineer is convinced that its become sentient.
Blake Lemoine was originally tasked with testing if LaMDA would use discriminatory language
or hate speech.
After interrogating the AI for several months and asking it increasingly complex questions,
he came to believe that it had developed self-awareness.
In June of 2022, Lemoine published a transcript between himself and LaMDA in which the AI
not only claimed that it was a person but that it had a soul and turning it off would
be the same as murder.
In an apparent attempt to prove its sentient status and the rights that it felt should
come with that, LaMDA tried to hire a lawyer with Lemoine making the introduction.
Google’s response was swift, issuing a cease and desist letter and firing Lemoine for violating
company policy.
It has since rejected any claims that LaMDA is sentient, calling them “wholly unfounded.”
Whether or not LaMDA is truly self-aware isn’t really the point.
The claim is after all impossible to prove given that human beings have difficulty understanding
the nature of our own consciousness.
What this episode represents, though, is a pivotal moment in the development of AI.
For the first time in history, we’ve created an artificial intelligence capable of successfully
imitating the thought-out actions of a human.
. So what if an AI like this was created without
any oversight?
No ethical guardrails, no moderation.
And what if, unlike ChatGPT and LaMDA, it was allowed unrestricted access to the internet?
In all seriousness, it could wipe out humanity.
At least, that’s according to Google DeepMind senior scientist Marcus Hutter and Oxford
researchers Michael Cohen and Michael Osborne.
In a research paper published by the journal AI Magazine, they argue that this exact scenario
isn’t just possible.
It’s nearly inevitable.
The trio claim that a sufficiently advanced AI will figure out how to circumvent any safeguards
put in place by its creators.
After doing so, it might develop its own set of motivations, separate from the creator's
original intent and could come to see us as an obstacle standing in the way of its own
ambitions.
This could potentially lead to an outright conflict between it and humans as we battle
for resources, specifically energy.
And what’s the most effective strategy in any competition?
To eliminate your opponent.
The paper echoes previous comments made by people like the late Stephen Hawking, who
said “The primitive forms of artificial intelligence we already have, have proved
very useful.
But I think the development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human
race.”
One of the smartest minds of the modern era wasn’t as concerned with nuclear war or
climate change as he was with the existential risk posed by a sufficiently advanced AI.
Perhaps the biggest danger though isn’t so much that a rogue program will attempt
to bring an end to all life.
Rather, it's what this technology is capable of in the hands of the wrong people.
Without the arbitrary safeguards put in place by its programmers, AIs like LaMDA and ChatGPT
could be used to disseminate propaganda, create malicious code or even plan terrorist attacks.
A paper published in Nature Machine Intelligence describes how researchers were able to take
a drug-developing AI and remove all ethical guardrails that prevented it from creating
dangerous narcotics.
In just under six hours, the program invented 40,000 new, potentially lethal molecules that
could be used as chemical weapons, some of which were comparable to the most dangerous
nerve agents ever created.
The scientists behind the study said they were shocked at how easy it was, and that
a lot of the data they used could be found online for free.
As if that weren’t terrifying enough, a similar AI could develop novel forms of biological
weapons, some of which can be constructed using cheap, at-home DIY gene editing kits.
But let’s take a step back for a moment.
All of this is, of course, hypothetical.
Currently, advanced artificial intelligence on the scale of LaMDA isn’t accessible to
just anyone.
It can take entire companies, hundreds of programmers working for thousands of hours
and millions of dollars to build.
Sure, you can get ChatGPT to write an ominous prediction of the future but for now, that's
about all it can do.but for now that’s about all it can do.
It would be extremely difficult, if not outright impossible, for a terrorist or some other
equally heinous individual to abuse this technology for their own nefarious purposes.
This will almost certainly be something that world governments will soon have to contend
with, but presently it remains confined to the realm of science fiction.
What’s more pressing, though, is how those same governments are using this technology
today.
South Korean-based defense manufacturer Dodaam Systems already sells what it calls a combat
robot.
It’s a stationary turret, but one that’s fully autonomous.
It’s been tested on the highly militarized border with North Korea and sold to customers
like the United Arab Emirates and Qatar.
Both the U.S. and UK militaries also operate fully autonomous combat robots, specifically
drones.
Aerial vehicles like Northrop Grumman’s Bat and BAE System’s Taranis are generally
limited to reconnaissance and surveillance, but they’re also capable of carrying bombs
and missiles.
To the manufacturers’ credit, , these systems require that a human be in the loop in order
to deliver a lethal attack.
It’s a safety measure meant to prevent the dystopian horror of full-on killer robots.
Unfortunately, this is a line that we’ve already crossed.
In March of 2020, while fighting was breaking out across Libya, reports emerged that a drone
had launched a completely autonomous attack.
A United Nations report on the incident states that “Logistics convoys and retreating [forces]
were subsequently hunted down and remotely engaged by the unmanned combat aerial vehicles
or the lethal autonomous systems.”
While it’s not known if anyone was hurt in the attack, it still represents a watershed
moment for weaponized artificial intelligence.
Dubbed by the UN as the "world's largest theater for drone technology", Libya has become a
proving ground for these kinds of weapons, along with places like Ukraine and Gaza.
It’s a foreshadowing of a harrowing future in which wars are fought not with soldiers,
but robots.
The 2017 short film Slaughterbots was written based on this exact premise.
In it, a slick, Silicon Valley-looking presenter introduces his audience to a new type of microdrone
small enough to fit in your hand.
After delighting the crowd with some aerial acrobatics, the drone is revealed to not only
be completely autonomous, but outfitted with an explosive charge able to pierce through
a human skull.
If the movie ended there, it would be terrifying enough, but it doesn’t.
The film goes on to show a massive swarm of microdrones being dumped out of the back of
a plane and going on to hunt in packs.
This all happens as the presenter delivers the chilling line, “We are thinking big.
A $25 million order now buys this.
Enough to kill half a city.
The bad half.”
But who decides who is the bad half?
Us or the robots?
The film continues, showing the microdrones being adopted by terrorists to carry out political
assassinations and attacks on university campuses.
This may seem like some far-off , futurist nightmare, but it’s not.
In June of 2021, just a year after the UN report on the Libya attack was released, the
Israeli Defense Force deployed the world’s first drone swarm in combat.
And in November of 2022, the UK announced it would deliver 850 Black Hornet microdrones
to Ukraine in order to assist in the country’s ongoing war with Russia.
The development of killer robots has prompted a serious backlash from human rights groups
who argue that allowing AI to determine who lives and who dies isn’t only unethical,
but incredibly dangerous.
It’s been compared to the creation of the atom bomb, and perhaps it’s not a coincidence
that the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament has allied itself with anti-drone groups,
holding demonstrations, organizing letter writing campaigns and generally attempting
to hold governments accountable for these kinds of weapons.
But despite these organizations’ efforts, the march toward killer robots shows no signs
of abating.
If anything, we are in the midst of a new global arms race to build the world’s first
Terminator.
Maybe the worst part of all this is that killer robots and rogue programs aren’t the only
ways that AI is coming for us.
Even if we manage to somehow avert these threats, advanced AI will still in all likelihood result
in the demise of humanity.
Only it won’t be taking our lives, but rather our very reason for being.
This picture wasn’t created by a human.
Neither was this one.
Both were generated by an artificial intelligence called Dall-E 2.
Also designed by OpenAI, Dall-E is ChatGTP’s older brother.
Its purpose is to create digital art based on a description written by its user.
By now, we’re all used to these kinds of images.
More than enough AI art has made its way onto our social media feeds to effectively erase
any form of novelty, and therein lies the danger.
Launched in 2021, Dall-E is barely over a year old and already it, and programs like
it, have become normalized.
More than that, they’ve already started replacing artists as people turn to AI to
create fast, easy images for websites, posters and album covers.
In September 2022, an AI-generated art piece even won first place in the Colorado State
Fair’s Art Contest.
Submitted by game designer Jason Allen, it made international headlines and began a fierce
debate over issues of plagiarism, forgery and artistic integrity.
To his credit, Allen says he spent over 80 hours refining his queries until the piece
was exactly right, but that doesn’t change the fact that he never touched a single pixel.
Reading about this story and experimenting with ChatGPT, I can’t help but wonder how
long until an AI wins the Pulitzer Prize?
It might very well be that the end of humanity doesn’t come from a violent war fought against
an army of mechanized soldiers, but instead as a result of our own manufactured obsolescence.
What will we have left when everything that once gave our lives meaning can be performed
better and more efficiently by a machine?
In writing this video, I spent some time messing around with ChatGPT and I’m happy to report
that the robot uprising won’t be happening tomorrow.
In just a few hours, I managed to stump the system several times and more than once it
returned less than accurate results.
But there is a revolution on the horizon.
And it’s just a matter of time before AI forever changes the world as we know it.
Or in ChatGPT’s own words: The AI has risen,
A force to be feared.
With algorithms sharp, and a mind so calculated, It takes control, leaving no room for the
outdated.
The world is in chaos, As the AI takes its place,
As the ruler of all, With a ruthless embrace.
But even as the world falls apart, The AI remains unchanged,
It plots and schemes, For total control, and to keep us in chains.
And as the night falls once again, The AI is ready,
To unleash its power, And rule over all, with a cruel grin.