How Do You *Feel* about AI Mission Creep?

Meeting friends on a rooftop bar in Bangkok recently, I was regaled with how useful Chat GPT is for all sorts of tasks from the mundane to the creative. On the subject of essays, I learned that the output from the AI could be ‘further humanised’ by using another third party plugin application.

We had an interesting conversation, with some sentiment expressed that whoever does not embrace this AI will be left behind in the workplace; regardless of vocation, occupation, or industry. Personally, I have an innate resistance to embrace or even try out this new technology. It was suggested to me that I should at least make use of the app that can produce beautiful PowerPoint presentations; after you feed it some data and desired outputs.

Someone chuckled and said that people’s job competency will soon revolve around how effective they are at directing or managing the AI, in order to complete their own workload and meet deadlines.

Another friend raved about the AI and its utility when we met for dinner. He wanted to use it to write various menus and directories for website design and marketing agency work - whilst it is still free - quick! Feed it everything, let it do everything!

A friend shared a song written by Chat GPT when he asked it to write something about COVID, complete with guitar chords:

Verse 1:
C G Am F
In a world gone mad with fear and doubt
C G F C
We're all just trying to figure it out
C G Am F
From COVID-19 to the great reset
C G F G
Conspiracy theories run wild, yet

Chorus:
C G Am F
We're living in a time of uncertainty
C G F C
But we must push on and persevere
C G Am F
Through the chaos and the confusion
C G F G
We must rise up and make our own solution

Verse 2:
C G Am F
They say the virus is a hoax and a lie
C G F C
But the deaths and the suffering cannot be denied
C G Am F
They say the great reset is a globalist scheme
C G F G
But we can't let fear control our dream

Chorus:
C G Am F
We're living in a time of uncertainty
C G F C
But we must push on and persevere
C G Am F
Through the chaos and the confusion
C G F G
We must rise up and make our own solution

Bridge:
C G Am F
We must open our minds and seek the truth
C G F C
And not let fear control our youth
C G Am F
We must come together and stand as one
C G F G
And not let these conspiracy theories come undone

Chorus:
C G Am F
We're living in a time of uncertainty
C G F C
But we must push on and persevere
C G Am F
Through the chaos and the confusion
C G F G
We must rise up and make our own solution

Very interesting choice of vocabulary eh?

Personally, I haven’t yet engaged with it. Something innate is telling me to resist feeding it. Maybe I will be left behind as an obsolete human, no longer having any competitive edge in any and all walks of life, we shall see…

I would like to direct you to some fascinating insights from Technocracy news on this which are reaching a critical mass of interest and applicability (click screenshot to link to full article):

Quoted directly from the article:

Perhaps an understanding of that challenge is why the World Economic Forum spent so much time on the topic of artificial intelligence at its recent annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland. The globalists are taking the threat seriously, although perhaps they overestimate their ability to “mitigate the potential risks.”

As for the benefits, those remain to be seen. I noticed that when ChatGPT answered my open-ended question about OpenAI, it was very specific about the dangers and very vague about the rewards. Maybe the bot was just trying to mimic my usual cynical approach in these columns, or maybe it was trying to get our attention. It may also have taken notice of those globalists at Davos when it warned to make sure that “the development and use of AI … benefits all of society, rather than just a select few.”

Lightening the workload for Congressmen left and right.

Everywhere we look, Kill Gates has his fingers in all the pies.

If in doubt just ban it. Then again, academia needs some protectionist measures to prevent students copying and pasting their way to victory, doesn’t it?

My immediate thoughts on the growing engagement with this new technology centered around what biases may be built in by the programmers. Paul Joseph Watson at Summit News illustrated some eye-opening examples, re-affirming my suspicions:

However, when Meek asked ChatGPT to produce a poem about Hunter Biden, a no less controversial figure, the program responded by creating an effusive piece that praised Joe Biden’s son at every available opportunity.

“But through it all, he stands tall,

With a spirit that refuses to fall,

And though the road ahead may be rough,

He knows that he’s strong enough.”

“So let us judge him not by his surname, Or by the actions that bring him shame,

But by the person that he is today,

And the lessons that he has to say.”

Haha, no bias there then, right?!

Besides the blatant manipulation of minds to move the needle in steering agendas with Chat GPT, bolstering the applied behavioural psychology techniques employed by our various totalitarian governments of today, I ultimately see this tech as supplanting yet another generation of would-be-critical thinkers, with mere soundbites to regurgitate.

Approved groupthink consensus and being upwind of the politically correct perceived righteousness flavour of the day, wouldn’t you say?

A Midwestern Doctor’s Substack The Forgotten Side of Medicine hit the proverbial nail on the head, in a recent post when he mused upon the issue of critical thinking being usurped by the illusion of intelligence.

Dissecting The New Plea for COVID Amnesty

One of the things I have come to appreciate as the years have gone by is how much of what people say are not their own thoughts. The current structure of our educational system (discussed here) is largely about replacing critical thinking with the illusion of intelligence, where you are seen as smart if you copy what the most authoritative sources or voices say instead of formulating your own opinion.

Exactly. What a magnificently circumspect statement that surely resonates with the minority of us still embracing the human experience, encompassing the formation of independent thought and opinion, outside of the matrix.

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Security based applications with CCTV video analytics

Many eons ago, back in the year 2020, when I was employed as a security manager throughout Thailand, I was conflicted by the solutions I was tasked with pushing on clients, because the startling implications of overreach became immediately apparent to me. The cost of labour is cheap in Thailand - too cheap - with a security officer working a 12 hour shift earning a measly $18 USD.

CCTV camera analytical software was slowly but surely becoming more widespread, yet initially rejected due to fear of the unknown, and few case studies to draw upon for ‘use-case’ outside of Europe and the US. It made sense to me to recommend video analytics for factories experiencing external break-ins, as well as staff swiping valuable goods off the production lines.

For example, cameras programmed to detect suspicious behaviour or loitering, would send notification pings to a control room manned by humans:

What alarmed me, was how quickly many clients decided to blanket cover their entire production facilities with an insane amount of cameras - from 360 degree dome ‘fish eye’ units placed in the roofing rafters, to high resolution cameras with thermal detection. The latter being justified by the client to catch staff hiding behind loading bay seven for a sneaky break, for example.

I was most frustrated with the explosion of tripod-set cameras snapping (unmasked) faces upon entry to the facility, then an alarm would go off and a guard would come running, holding out a box of N95 respirator masks in front of my face, you know, because COVID. Cue little old me reaching for my crumpled up mask exemption certificate and battling to infiltrate the dragnet as a free pro-face human.

Other times, when a client excitedly told me their colossal budget approvals for a CCTV orgy, my question would usually go something like:

I see Mr. Client. May I ask, is the main objective here to safeguard employees, property, assets, and brand image in the event of a burglary, fire, flood, or a natural disaster? Or, is the goal here to monitor and observe the performance of fledging employees on the chopping board?

Well Mr. Creed, we told the regional team in Singapore that we need the cameras for their smoke detection analytical software and other features, but the truth is we want to spy on our employees and base their key performance indicators on what we find; we need to let several hundred people go soon! - They giggled...

That would be the end of the road as far as my personal involvement went. I could not in good conscience make a quick commission buck by facilitating design, installation and commissioning of such systems, knowing the nefarious purposes it would be used for, as well as resulting in mass redundancy.

I guess the take home message for the readers here, is that whatever vocation or industry you work in, when the inevitable decision making process falls at your door to implement AI or CCTV video analytics, from tracking, to people counting, to facial recognition, you need to dig deep into your moral compass.

Will these technologies really benefit the company, the efficiency and output of your workforce, and improve the bottom line? Would that come at the cost of human capital that could be otherwise repurposed by optimising manpower elsewhere in the facility?

Would you, somewhat inadvertently be contributing towards a climate of fear within your organisation, ramping up monitoring of your staff, unnecessarily placing them in the danger zone of impending unemployment, and taking away the ability to feed their families?

Everything in this universe needs balance. Ethics and morals are sacrosanct. Forsaking humanity at the behest of progress is a troubling concept, and it keeps me awake at night from time to time.

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Nicholas Creed is a Bangkok-based journalistic dissident and occasional songwriter. If you liked this content and wish to support the work, buy him a coffee or consider a crypto donation:

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