WHOM TO BELIEVE

Recently, it seems as if I’m  living my life haircut to haircut and unbalanced checkbook to unbalanced checkbook—two predictable events I can always count on. However, these days it also seems as if the unpredictable has taken over the world.  

Machines are getting smarter and people are getting dumber, and the lines between fact and fiction have become more and more blurred.  For instance, when little green men finally arrived from outer space and enthusiastically shouted, “We have come in peace,” their ballon was shot down over Surfside Beach, South Carolina. Just ask any conspiracist.

Also, now people are wearing Dick Tracy watches that are so smart that those folks will never have to think for themselves again if they don’t want to do so. Those watches can check your pulse, check your blood pressure and let you know if you have died.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is becoming more and more abundant. Who would have predicted that an oxymoron would someday rule the world of information. Soon enough machines will create soulless music, art and literature, and people won’t know the difference. Granted, children will have another resource for information. Perhaps, that will be a good thing, but will they learn to debate and discern which information is valid, and be smart enough to question the source of this information?  It’s much easier to say, “I believe what I read.  That’s why it’s true.”

Granted, much good can come from the technology and the sharing of valid information. For instance, physicians all over the world can contribute their knowledge to recognize an unrecognizable illness, and the sharing of valid information can further many scientific endeavors.  Computers will probably predict the arrival of another pandemic, but what good does that do when false information prevents people from saving their own lives?

I admit that some AI is frightening. I find it very scary that an image of a person can be put on a computer and it’s really not that person speaking, and people think what is being said is coming from a reliable source. A false image of the President of the  United States might  inform people that China is sending sailboats to Taiwan, and that tourists from Russia are enjoying picnics in Ukraine, and that guns don’t kill people..people kill people, and  that you can now get a good haircut for $1.95.  

If we are lucky, people will still recognize that there is something wrong and will start questioning the $1.95 haircut.

Esther Blumenfeld