Hello - this is a thread where everyone can submit their ideas and thoughts on this dilemma
Human beings today are becoming more like cyborgs with each passing decade. Our meaty predecessors, homo erectus, some 1.2 million years go, consisted of about 20 thousand members who would go on to sire the ancestors of all existing humans. That’s a tiny fraction of people compared to the 8 billion we have today, but this fraction was the dominant race that all of us trace our origins back to.
Recently, with developments in AI as a tool, such as GPT-3, Stable Diffusion and some incredible advancements in Reinforcement learning, it’s being revealed that some people have a particular talent for using these tools (for example, so called ‘prompt engineering’). Assuming that this talent remains relevant for the next iterations of these models (and that might be quite a sweeping assumption), it is conceivable that this tiny fraction of tiny people with a “talent for AI” will become the dominant group in the 21st century. This is a fairly basic evolutionary observation but it makes the image of the grandson helping his grandmother restart her computer takes a sinister overtone.
Whether that means the displacement of everyone else, or simply just having significant societal and economic advantages over them, or co-existing with them until they naturally fade out, it is fair to say that the gap between generations and subgroups will extend even further than ever. Or, perhaps, it will bring us closer together.
Thinking in a “computery way” is an interesting take on cyborgs I hadn’t thought of before! In a similar way to your chess AI article, I can totally see AI-minded people who most efficiently use tech as a tool becoming extremely valuable. Having a human “handler” could do lots to add credibility to controversial AI applications and improve public opinion. I do get the ick though from reading articles that idolise a future where workers can get cyborg-esque enhancements to perform their job better...
Thinking in a “computery way” is an interesting take on cyborgs I hadn’t thought of before! In a similar way to your chess AI article, I can totally see AI-minded people who most efficiently use tech as a tool becoming extremely valuable. Having a human “handler” could do lots to add credibility to controversial AI applications and improve public opinion. I do get the ick though from reading articles that idolise a future where workers can get cyborg-esque enhancements to perform their job better...
It definitely feels like the start of some new form of colonialism (technocracy). Like, a kind of mental & physiological capitalism, perhaps?