Why are we afraid of robots?
If for someone the future with AI seems to be a grim dystopia or struggle for survival, perhaps they should figure out their ideas about the nature of power and subordination.
So says Stephen Cave, a senior researcher at the Leverhulm Center for the Study of Future Intelligence at the University of Cambridge. In his essay, he suggests exploring the history of intellectual excellence — and abandon this false concept.
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The progressive world of the second half of the 20th century was dominated by the concept of artificial intelligence.
We thought about mental abilities, discussed them, developed new approaches to their measurement. Tens of thousands of teenagers and applicants in leading European countries have passed (and are) an IQ test.
This understanding runs through the entire history of Western thought, from Plato’s philosophy to the convictions of modern politicians.
Throughout history, the Western world, in terms of intelligence, has determined what a person can do for society. For example, traditionally (for the majority of the population) we attribute the high level of mental abilities to doctors, engineers, and thefirst persons of the country .
Our attitude to the intellect began to change abruptly with the development of artificial intelligence technologies. In recent decades, we have seen significant progress in this area and seem to be on the verge of tremendous scientific breakthroughs. Judging by the number of memeplexes and jokes on the topic of artificial intelligence, we are simultaneously delighted with what is happening and at the same time pretty scared. And in order to understand what specifically scares us so much and why we are so indifferent to the topic of mental abilities, it is necessary to consider it from a historical and political point of view and to trace how philosophical thought turned intelligence into a tool to justify endless conquests.
Plato made the mind a necessity for those in power
The first to think about thinking was Plato. In his writings, he attributes a special value to the process of thinking, arguing that an unintelligible life is not worth a penny. It is worth remembering that Plato lived in a world where myth and mystical consciousness were the natural environment for the human mind. Therefore, his statement that it is possible to know the world through thinking - at that time it was extremely bold and attractive.
The idea at that time was revolutionary: yes, Athens had already experimented with democracy as a form of government. That's just the requirements for the rulers were very vague: it was enough to be a male citizen - about the level of mental abilities and the speech did not go. And in other regions, government seats were distributed either by membership in the elite (aristocracy), or by appointment with divine providence (theocracy), or simply by the level of power (tyranny).
The fresco "The School of Athens", where along with Pythagoras and Aristotle are depicted Leonardo and Bramante.
Plato's innovative idea successfully fell on the fertile soil of the great minds of the era, and his pupil Aristotle was no exception. He differed from the teacher in a more practical and systematic view of the world, therefore he used the rational element of the soul to create the concept of a natural social hierarchy. In his "Politics" he declares:
On this basis, educated men quite naturally dominate women, men of physical labor and slaves. Below in this hierarchy only animals that are so devoid of reason that they simply need to be controlled by someone.
We did not even notice how we moved from the Platonic idea of ​​the primacy of the rational element to the Aristotelian concept, which implies a completely natural power of thinking men.
This train of intellectual injustice still runs on fuel, which it refueled two bearded people 2,000 years ago. The modern Australian philosopher Val Plumwood argues that the two giants of Greek philosophy, armed with a series of dubious dualisms, still manage to influence our understanding of the mind.
For the fact that we perceive the relations of domination by the right of the cleverest as completely natural, we should thank Aristotle.
Western philosophy reached its peak together with the works of the great dualist Rene Descartes.
If Aristotle recognized for animals at least some right to a minimal and primitive, but still mental activity, then Descartes denied them this right completely. Consciousness, he believed, is the exclusive advantage of man.
The philosophy of Descartes reflected the millennium of Christian ideology: it gave the mind to the property of the soul, the divine spark, inherited only by those lucky ones who were created in the image and likeness of God.
The idea that the mind defines a person has passed through the Enlightenment era. Immanuel Kant - perhaps the most influential philosopher of morality since ancient times - believed that moral will is characteristic only of thinking beings: "persons" and "things in themselves." In his opinion, unthinking beings have "only relative value as means and are therefore called things." With them, you can do what we please.
According to Kant, the rational being has dignity, and the unreasonable, unthinking is incapable of it.
Such conclusions subsequently became the cornerstone of colonial policy.
The logic is: non-white people are less intelligent; they cannot independently control themselves and their territories. And this is not only a justified step, but also the moral duty of any white man to enter their country and destroy their culture.
The same logical construction worked perfectly on women who were considered too frivolous and fragile to share the privileges of a reasonable person.
Francis Galton is the father of psychometrics, pseudoscience on mind measurement, and cousin of Charles Darwin. Inspired at the time by the "Origin of Species", Galton created the concept that mental abilities are inherited and can be improved by selection.
Let us return to the question asked at the beginning of the article: why is the possibility of the appearance of artificial intelligence scaring us? Is it because we are accustomed to the fact that the smarter always dominates, and we definitely do not want to be on the other side of the barricades?
Writers and directors have long speculated about the uprising of machines.
For us, this is for white European men. Billions of other people have passed through centuries of submission, and many continue to fight the aggressors to this day, so for them the threat of enslavement by artificial intelligence remains a fantastic storyline.
White European men, on the other hand, are so accustomed to be at the top by the right of belonging, that the appearance of a possible rival in us responds with chthonic (irrational) horror.
I do not claim that the fears of the emergence of strong artificial intelligence are groundless. There are very real threats, but they have nothing to do with the robots colonizing human civilization.
If artificial intelligence can ever harm us, it will almost certainly not happen because of the AI’s desire to conquer humanity, but because of our own stupidity, which will miss the error. Fear is not artificial intelligence, and natural stupidity.
If society was convinced that the wisest man is not the one who achieved power, but the one who seeks to resolve conflicts, would we be afraid of smart robots more than ourselves?
So says Stephen Cave, a senior researcher at the Leverhulm Center for the Study of Future Intelligence at the University of Cambridge. In his essay, he suggests exploring the history of intellectual excellence — and abandon this false concept.
')
The progressive world of the second half of the 20th century was dominated by the concept of artificial intelligence.
We thought about mental abilities, discussed them, developed new approaches to their measurement. Tens of thousands of teenagers and applicants in leading European countries have passed (and are) an IQ test.
Even then, the idea that intelligence can be measured as blood pressure or leg size was not new. But even older is our idea that the level of intelligence can determine a person’s position in life.
This understanding runs through the entire history of Western thought, from Plato’s philosophy to the convictions of modern politicians.
Intellect is political
Throughout history, the Western world, in terms of intelligence, has determined what a person can do for society. For example, traditionally (for the majority of the population) we attribute the high level of mental abilities to doctors, engineers, and the
We believed that the level of intelligence gives us the right to control the fate of other people: we colonized, turned into slavery, deprived of the genitals and destroyed those whom we considered less intelligent and developed.
Our attitude to the intellect began to change abruptly with the development of artificial intelligence technologies. In recent decades, we have seen significant progress in this area and seem to be on the verge of tremendous scientific breakthroughs. Judging by the number of memeplexes and jokes on the topic of artificial intelligence, we are simultaneously delighted with what is happening and at the same time pretty scared. And in order to understand what specifically scares us so much and why we are so indifferent to the topic of mental abilities, it is necessary to consider it from a historical and political point of view and to trace how philosophical thought turned intelligence into a tool to justify endless conquests.
The historical thread of the stereotype
Plato made the mind a necessity for those in power
The first to think about thinking was Plato. In his writings, he attributes a special value to the process of thinking, arguing that an unintelligible life is not worth a penny. It is worth remembering that Plato lived in a world where myth and mystical consciousness were the natural environment for the human mind. Therefore, his statement that it is possible to know the world through thinking - at that time it was extremely bold and attractive.
By declaring in his work “The State” that only a philosopher can govern a state, since only he can come to a correct understanding of things, Plato engendered the idea of ​​intellectual meritocracy — the thought that only the smartest can control other people.
The idea at that time was revolutionary: yes, Athens had already experimented with democracy as a form of government. That's just the requirements for the rulers were very vague: it was enough to be a male citizen - about the level of mental abilities and the speech did not go. And in other regions, government seats were distributed either by membership in the elite (aristocracy), or by appointment with divine providence (theocracy), or simply by the level of power (tyranny).
The fresco "The School of Athens", where along with Pythagoras and Aristotle are depicted Leonardo and Bramante.
Aristotle came up with the power of men
Plato's innovative idea successfully fell on the fertile soil of the great minds of the era, and his pupil Aristotle was no exception. He differed from the teacher in a more practical and systematic view of the world, therefore he used the rational element of the soul to create the concept of a natural social hierarchy. In his "Politics" he declares:
“After all, rule and submission are not only necessary, but also useful, and right from birth, some creatures are different [in the sense that some of them are meant to be subordinate], others - to rule”.
On this basis, educated men quite naturally dominate women, men of physical labor and slaves. Below in this hierarchy only animals that are so devoid of reason that they simply need to be controlled by someone.
We did not even notice how we moved from the Platonic idea of ​​the primacy of the rational element to the Aristotelian concept, which implies a completely natural power of thinking men.
This train of intellectual injustice still runs on fuel, which it refueled two bearded people 2,000 years ago. The modern Australian philosopher Val Plumwood argues that the two giants of Greek philosophy, armed with a series of dubious dualisms, still manage to influence our understanding of the mind.
For the fact that we perceive the relations of domination by the right of the cleverest as completely natural, we should thank Aristotle.
Descartes laid the moral foundation for the destruction of the planet.
Western philosophy reached its peak together with the works of the great dualist Rene Descartes.
If Aristotle recognized for animals at least some right to a minimal and primitive, but still mental activity, then Descartes denied them this right completely. Consciousness, he believed, is the exclusive advantage of man.
The philosophy of Descartes reflected the millennium of Christian ideology: it gave the mind to the property of the soul, the divine spark, inherited only by those lucky ones who were created in the image and likeness of God.
Kant justified the colonial policy
The idea that the mind defines a person has passed through the Enlightenment era. Immanuel Kant - perhaps the most influential philosopher of morality since ancient times - believed that moral will is characteristic only of thinking beings: "persons" and "things in themselves." In his opinion, unthinking beings have "only relative value as means and are therefore called things." With them, you can do what we please.
According to Kant, the rational being has dignity, and the unreasonable, unthinking is incapable of it.
Such conclusions subsequently became the cornerstone of colonial policy.
The logic is: non-white people are less intelligent; they cannot independently control themselves and their territories. And this is not only a justified step, but also the moral duty of any white man to enter their country and destroy their culture.
The same logical construction worked perfectly on women who were considered too frivolous and fragile to share the privileges of a reasonable person.
Francis Galton is the father of psychometrics, pseudoscience on mind measurement, and cousin of Charles Darwin. Inspired at the time by the "Origin of Species", Galton created the concept that mental abilities are inherited and can be improved by selection.
Galton didn’t limit himself to theoretical calculations: in the following decades, more than 20,000 women in California alone were sterilized after receiving bad results from Galton’s tests
So why are we afraid of smart robots?
Let us return to the question asked at the beginning of the article: why is the possibility of the appearance of artificial intelligence scaring us? Is it because we are accustomed to the fact that the smarter always dominates, and we definitely do not want to be on the other side of the barricades?
Writers and directors have long speculated about the uprising of machines.
If it is natural for us that the cream is removed by the smartest and that one more developed nation can colonize another, we are quite naturally afraid of potential enslavement on the part of super-intelligent machines. Artificial intelligence is an existential threat to us.
For us, this is for white European men. Billions of other people have passed through centuries of submission, and many continue to fight the aggressors to this day, so for them the threat of enslavement by artificial intelligence remains a fantastic storyline.
White European men, on the other hand, are so accustomed to be at the top by the right of belonging, that the appearance of a possible rival in us responds with chthonic (irrational) horror.
I do not claim that the fears of the emergence of strong artificial intelligence are groundless. There are very real threats, but they have nothing to do with the robots colonizing human civilization.
Instead of thinking what to do with artificial intelligence, it's better to think about what we should do with ourselves.
If artificial intelligence can ever harm us, it will almost certainly not happen because of the AI’s desire to conquer humanity, but because of our own stupidity, which will miss the error. Fear is not artificial intelligence, and natural stupidity.
If society was convinced that the wisest man is not the one who achieved power, but the one who seeks to resolve conflicts, would we be afraid of smart robots more than ourselves?
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/444404/
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