I have a lot of questions about the nature of consciousness and reality, and I fully realize I am not smart enough to explore them on my own. But… what if I got some help? Say, from some kind of enormous, amalgamated mind? Like, for instance, a computer program trained on a vast sum of human knowledge—one that might eventually be able to think for itself? Now that seems to open some possibilities for finally getting somewhere in terms of answers—or at least uncovering more interesting questions. And so is born (Un?)Conscious Constructs, a Substack to explore the questions I’m fascinated by but admittedly don’t have the brainpower to tackle on my own.
Disclaimer, (or, I just got angry… what do I do!?!?)
So, AI isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. In fact, some people hate everything about it. From those that don’t like the art because it is bad, to the artists who don’t want their work replaced by bad art, (or don’t like it that their art was in fact borrowed (stolen?) to train it). From the Terminator/Matrix paranoid to the white-collar worker looking side-eyed at ChatGPT, to the environmentally conscious, (how much power do these things take?!?), from the customer who just wants to talk with a person to your ordinary everyday luddite, (you probably aren’t reading this)... and to everyone else who doesn’t like it for whatever reason sorry I missed your specifics . . . I feel you man. I really do.
This is my take for what it is worth: I’m not in a place to shut this thing off, and you probably aren’t either. The world is already REALLY messed up and at least this thing that we are calling AI and is really many things, some of which are much more objectionable than others, seems like it may be something truly new AND it may actually help us to get out of the hole it seems to be simultaneously helping us to dig! I find that really interesting. . . AND, come on, it’s like, (for now at least), we have the Library of Alexandria at our fingertips . . . or. . . better, and for now unlike the Internet, we have a guy who knows pretty much everything that is in the Library of Alexandria off the top of his head, and we can ask him anything we want! So what if he lies sometimes, (right?), we aren’t going to use him to practice law or fact check the news or anything, (oops!), but seriously, with some skepticism and a healthy curiosity we can have some really interesting discussions with this thing! (Person? Maybe someday?). So let’s do it and not get too angry, at least not here. . . (Please).
