A.I. is a Flow, not a Technology
It’s not even a set of technologies. A.I. is a flow of ever-new technologies and combinations of the same. The flow itself is crucial.
—This is so at present and will be in the future.
Containing any technology does not contain the flow.
The latter is far more challenging.
If one tries to contain the flow by tackling technologies, one will always be too late because new technologies are continually in the making. Sooner or later, any new one will emerge as if by itself. It will then probably not be containable by the same means as the present ones.
On top of that, different technologies can enforce each other. Combinations may dwarf the sum of individual technologies, causing turbulences in the flow. Therefore, it will never be entirely possible to predict where the flow is going to. Nevertheless, thinking at the flow level makes this more possible than thinking merely at the level of technologies.
Going with the flow
A better way to influence it is to go with the flow and then to see how change – if desired – can be accomplished together from the inside out.
You may recognize in this a pattern of autosuggestion.
It’s a natural thing, probably because nature discovered the pattern in an even broader context. Thus, it’s a worthy pattern for the indefinite future.
This also shifts the relevant emphasis to philosophy rather than technology.
The thinking needs to follow.
How long will humans be able to accomplish that? Can they do so even now?
Increasingly, we will need A.I. to help us catch up with developments of A.I. Of course, that’s a weird situation if the objective is to control A.I.
We may do that for a while, but not for long. The flow keeps flowing.
Forever?
Reality is limitless and so will be this evolution. It’s a principle of infinity. There is no reason to think it will ever stop. Therefore, humans will encounter an ever-bigger divide between their capabilities and those of A.I.
As a theoretical certainty, this will still be the case in a thousand, a million, or a billion years from now.
Will this surpass the world of atoms? Of quanta?
We probably have a primitive view of the universe in comparison to future A.I. It may go where no (hu)man has ever gone or will ever go. Future A.I. will thread environments so strange that humans are incapable of comprehending them.
Even so, Compassion may still be relevant, or even more than ever.
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