We have had years of weekly technological disruptions that questioned what we were doing. Artificial intelligence goes much further, it questions what we are. It is not an evolution that changes the answers, it is a revolution that changes the questions, a mirror of who we are. One that does not reflect the reflection of our body but that of our mind. A mirror not of the I but of the we, an image of the collective, a reflection of our species.
Sometimes deforming, with distorting hallucinations; other times, magical, generating images from our collective subconscious, most of the time, a simple reflection of what we are. What terrifies us about racist, classist and patriarchal artificial intelligence is that we are that racist, classist and patriarchal society. That is why seeing ourselves reflected in the algorithm produces the panic that the Frankenstein Mary Shelley discovering her face, or even worse, the absorbed fascination that Narcissus felt when he saw his own face in the pond.
Once again, apocalyptic versus integrated playing with the mirror distraction that confused Orson Welles in his pursuit of the Shanghai Lady with the body of Rita Hayworth. The reflection as a distraction maneuver that turns the Bachelor Salvador Carrasco into the Knight of the Mirrors himself to deceive the ingenious nobleman. A maneuver repeated today ad nauseum when the richest people on the planet meet in Davos to discuss the impact that AI will have on work when it is they and not the algorithm that decide on the employment of hundreds of thousands of workers.
We must be alert to the devastating effect that AI’s magnifying mirror can have on the great ghosts of our time: inequality and polarization
Let us not blame the algorithm. Let us not be distracted by the reflection, however algorithmic it may be. AI is not going to take your job away; it will be some powerful man who tries to do so in order to continue increasing his profits. AI does not kill in Gaza either; it is other powerful men who massacre with the sophisticated excuse of the algorithm. AI, which can do so much good, is in the service of evil, even if in that banal way that Hannah Arendt explained, of individuals who are not brave enough to oppose a perverse system that commands them. The more artificial intelligence advances, the more we should be concerned about natural stupidity. It is not machines that endanger our future today, it is the people who use them. It is important to remember this, Terminator It is not a documentary.
That is why we must be alert to the devastating effect that the magnifying mirror of AI can have on the great ghosts of our time: inequality and polarization. AI represents a barrier between those who use it and those who do not, it creates winners (few) and losers (many) in countries, companies and people. If we do nothing to remedy it, it will produce an unprecedented concentration of wealth. On the other hand, generative AI and its sophisticated lies are about to blow up already moribund trust. Soon only an AI will be able to differentiate if a video has been created with another AI. Artificial intelligence creates the lie and decides what is true. Inequality and mistrust are fuel for the fire in which we live and pave the way for those new fascisms that devastate the planet, scared and angry white men much more dangerous than any algorithm.
The reflection in the mirror is not the face; just as Borges’ 1:1 scale map is still not the territory. AI, however similar it may be to us, will always be a simulation, but let us trust in the possibility, however small, that it will make us more human. It is a question of natural intelligence.
