“Nothing vast enters the life of mortals without a curse.” ― Sophocles
Let's start our discussion by diving into the concept of intelligence itself before we move on to artificial intelligence. We'll explore the definition, relevance, historical and contemporary significance, as well as potential future developments of this term.
Intelligence
What is intelligence? Oxford defines it as "the ability to acquire and apply knowledge and skills," but is that enough? Probably not, especially if you are trying to make extraordinary claims. If we go even further, the word "intelligence" comes from the Latin word "intelligere," which means to understand. It somehow changed its form and got limited to "to learn or develop," which still gives the same meaning on the surface. But if you still go further, things start to get crazy. For example, you can acquire the knowledge of body language and apply it in your life, which makes you intelligent based on the first definition. However, if you go to its origin, do you really understand body language? Can you make that claim without knowing why and how, why a person can't make eye contact with another person when he is lying? You can catch his lie, of course, which is great for you, but this doesn't make you intelligent in that field. You are just a person to whom someone (intelligent or just like you) has said the condition a person may be lying is this. You just accepted it with some evidence (which may be provided that it is true), but that doesn't make you intelligent. You are still dumb with new information, which may make you even more ignorant and dumb. After all, it's not about how much information you have; it's about how much you understand. If you have pieces of information only, then are you dumber than the person who has limited information but understands everything. The world may take you as an intellectual than the other person, but it does not matter. The ability to grasp of a person on another person's intellectual ability is limited by what he can show the world. The education system also has a hand in misinterpreting the word intelligence. If you can recite facts, then you are thought to be intelligent. But what about the child behind you who has a better understanding of the topic than you but can't recite facts as fast as you because he is calculating how the conclusion came, which sort of makes him slow? If you are slow, the education system gives you different names, which just decreases your self-confidence. You may have acquired the knowledge, but have you understood it? No one questions it, and it's a problem. It reminds me of the Chinese Room Argument.
Artificial Intelligence
Now returning to our main topic. If you go to the history of AI it was first coined by John Mccarthy in 1956. By artificial intelligence, he meant Artificial Intelligence is a method of making a computer, a computer-controlled robot, or a software think intelligently like the human mind. In today's context can AI think intelligently like the human mind? Let's put the question aside and ask simply can so-called AI think? Of course, right? It can distinguish between what's wrong and what's right. If you just search what's the meaning of the word think or thinking you again go back to our favorite oxford which defines it as"having a particular opinion, belief, or idea about someone or something. ".Today we are not here to question the oxford interpretation of the word "think". May be next day but the (so-called) AI we have today has opinions, beliefs, or ideas about someone or something? Yes, these tools can be useful for factual things like You can ask about the Civil Rights Movement or WWII. You can ask it as many factual questions as you can and it may give you information better than any human can because it has data from many people on how they want the answer to be presented. After all, it's what it's made and trained for as of now.
Why you should be worried then?
If the (so-called) AI hasn't developed intelligence then why should you be worried? You should not be worried about AI taking over the world like in some Si-Fi movies. You should be worried about a different problem. You should be worried about the people who lose their jobs and income sources because AI can provide factual information better than any human is capable. You should be worried about the junior employee at a programming company, You should be worried about the literature teacher whose job can be done way better by an AI. You should be worried about the students who just skim a chapter with the help of an AI and pass the tests. What if your doctor does it? Some of the readers have just skimmed the article with the help of an AI tool you should worry about them. And more importantly, you should be worried about the crisis humanity may face if it started asking questions that need thinking to AI. What happens if due to this action, people lose the ability that makes them human. What happens to democracy if leaders get elected because an AI said so.
Final Thoughts
Many of us have lost the ability to spell words correctly just because of autocorrect systems and soon after we may lose the ability to think if we don't limit our use of (so-called) AI systems