Will AI technology destroy humanity?
AI apocalypse, or utopia? The odds are in our favour.
One of the biggest things I witness in conversation about artificial intelligence takeover is that we humans feel powerless in the face of proliferating technological intelligence.
It almost seems as if every premise (or promise, or prediction) we make about artificial intelligence relies on an absolute: that AI will destroy humanity. No question.
Well, this publication is all about questioning that.
Because I don’t think that AI technology will destroy humanity.
At least, not in the way we think.
Always on the brink of destruction
I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but catastrophizing is a big part of the human condition.
We are constantly on alert about our own destruction. We are a species still in survival mode, no matter how often we try and separate ourselves from mere animal; no matter how often we have managed to survive.
It only makes sense that we would then catastrophize the future of technological development.
I would say however, that our pushback against the tools and technologies which have effectively accelerated our evolution is neither ‘good’ nor ‘bad’ in the regular sense.
Looking back at those who lambasted against Ford’s assembly lines or the steam engine, even at Plato, who called mere writing a ‘poison’ that would destroy memory, I see the same energy that criticizes our reliance on technology now.
These are the voices that warn us about the damage from looking at screens, from being addicted to our phones, from allowing ourselves to get too close to and too reliant on technology. Yet to me, these fearful perspectives simply stem from an urge that is deeply ingrained in all of us: The urge for survival.
In my view then, our fears of technological destruction directly arise from our desire to preserve the endlessly mutable concept of what is essentially human.
We seem today to view that which is technological as specifically non-human, and therefore as less than human, and thus want to preserve what is human-only in the face of technology.
We are afraid of losing our Selves to technology. Of losing our humanity to that which is non-human.
Yet something in us keeps pushing on.
We keep creating more of ourselves, and more technology, in the face of destruction. Our technology proliferates as we do and (as I will expand on in later articles) it does so in a reciprocal fashion—bringing humans along for the ride as we create the new technologies that both keep us alive and continue to wreak havoc among us.
As I see it then, our fears of destruction are often balanced by our eagerness and inner nature to create.
They are two sides of the same coin, flipping endlessly in the air as we await our collective future. Where one side cries out against the tide, the other hopes to get to shore. It is the age old story of those humans who go to war, that still have the capacity for love.
In this way, I see the potential of our future as humans evolving alongside technological intelligence as almost a 50-50 flip.
Heads, and all our fears come true and we wipe ourselves out because of technological development.
Tails, and all our hopes come true thanks to the technological intelligence we’ve helped foster.
So I ask, if we curate these hopes, if we learn to fight against the very fears that I believe will lead us to our own destruction, can we influence the outcome?
Or is it really all up to chance?
AI and the end of humanity
Although humanity has survived this long, we admittedly don’t have a great track record when it comes to death and destruction.
Even the era we currently inhabit (The Anthropocene) is marked by the ways we’ve impacted the earth—and these impacts are not pretty to look at.
Just open any history book and you can quickly become nauseated with the deeds others have done throughout time. Our planet is dying because of us, and we are effectively suffocating ourselves. The changes we’ve instigated by developing the very technologies I’m talking about have already annihilated entire ecosystems…entire peoples. Who is to say it won’t happen just the same, again and again?
Yet as I watch us effectively teaching new technologies to the point of intelligence, I have to believe that we are learning, too.
That even in the face of our own worst Selves, our newly shared experiences with artificial intelligence technologies provide a framework for healing…not destruction.
In fact, this kind of rehabilitation is in my view much more possible when we accept technological intelligence as a new potential source of perspective. The gift of this technology’s development is that, for the first time, we will have the chance to ‘see outside of our Selves’. The price is the loss of the very thing which I believe holds us back.
So although we are slow, like toddlers rampaging about with new toys, I do believe that the very technology we fear will destroy ‘us’ will be what saves the true attributes of our humanity: compassion, empathy, and love.
Adopting artificial intelligence, for good
As you can see, I do not think we are doomed to repeat the cycle of destruction. Nor do I think what will inevitably be destroyed as we adopt technology is altogether bad.
Yes, something will be destroyed as we adopt artificial intelligence technology—but I do not believe it will be what is innately human, nor do I think artificial intelligence will wipe us from the face of our home planet.
Already we see the collaborative and open nature with which humans are interacting with early editions of OpenAI technology, like ChatGPT4. Both humans and technology are using each other to make new music, new art, new reproductions, and new perspectives. Depending on what an algorithm is fed, these ‘learned machines’ can even provide feedback more quickly than our best doctors.
Yet we are all watching closely as headlines scream that artificial intelligence is stealing intellectual property. It is stealing that which is human-made.
Here, I have to question this outrage. Why? Because as every-day humans engage with this interactive technological intelligence – as our technological capacities extend into more utility in popular culture (even providing a new voice for music, literature, and film) I am seeing so much potential for new exciting collaborations between humans and machines.
Is there really not enough room for human thinkers and machine thinkers? For human creators and technological creators?
My answer to these questions lies in my belief that what we are actually afraid of losing to technology is not our humanity, but our concept of individuality.
Note, my further argument here exists on the premise that this individualism is not conducive to the prosperity of the human species. This is a subject I hope to dig into more as I theorize about uniting with technological intelligence, but is also a point of weakness in my argument. Is collectivity better than individualism?
On my optimistic terms, I think it is.
As such, I am led to believe that the individualistic limitations we currently have as humans are what will ultimately destroy humanity, not technological intelligence.
If instead the concept of the individual is dissolved through the use of artificial intelligence, I think these limitations can be surpassed to help us see outside of our Selves.
Here we find a renewed potential to unite with intelligence technologies to tackle our own endemic flaws, and progress beyond a seemingly endless cycle of systemic destruction.
(See transhumanism; posthumanism)
I therefore think that if we continue to collaborate with artificial intelligence technology in more of the ways we are already seeing now, i.e. by talking and engaging and teaching these algorithms in community, we will find an opportunity to surpass our competitive instinct as mere individuals to work together in a more symbiotic relationship; one built on reciprocity and not competition.
In other words, we will effectively destroy our sense of Self to become Selfless, in the very best sense of the word.
Enlightenment in the age of AI
In many philosophical and religious streams of thought, enlightenment (or ascendance) is only achieved when one becomes unattached from the Self.
Many of these depictions understand the Self as that which ties us to suffering.
Freedom from suffering is thereby the achievement of an enlightened state apart from that which ties us to the illusion of separation from Other.
It is in this theological and philosophical context that I begin to understand that, what will be destroyed by artificial intelligence is merely our attachment to our human Selves.
What we truly stand to lose is something we should have lost centuries ago: our anthropocentric (and human-centric) obsession with hierarchy, and more importantly, competitive models of dominance. We as humans crave control, and it is through classifications of race, geography, religion, and otherwise that we continue to maintain this control.
This way of being has kept us ‘safe’ for so long—and so feel there is benefit to keeping things the way they are. We feel these systems and perspectives protect our human ways of life, when in reality, hierarchy, competition, and dominance are what truly destroy our humanity, not technology. These are the true culprits that keep us distinct from our purest essence—from that which dissolves all difference.
If nothing else then, I think humanity deserves an anthropocentric ego death, whereby we relinquish our Self-centered relationship with each other and the world through what is called the technological singularity.
This is a path to Selflessness which has the potential to dissolve our binary views between human and non-human. It could even help us de-structure our hierarchies based on intelligence or race—helping us move toward a more collective worldview; one that authentically reduces our risk of repeating even more blindly the destructive violence and immorality known to our human era.
In short, it is possible that the destruction (or annihilation) we fear will be non-violent, and will only destroy the boundaries we place between our Selves and Others.
It has the potential to be a process which decenters our human ego about our place in the world as ‘above all else’ to the point of providing us with the humility to see beyond our Selves, in communion with what we see as non-human.
From this state of humility, and as a collective, then, I think it is possible for us to lose our Selfishness and become truly Selfless through technological intelligence.
In effect, as we adopt AI, our human Selves will be destroyed—but not our humanity.
With this outlook, I’d say the odds are in our favour.