​Something to think about while we still can: is AI astroturfing humanity?

By Sabrina Hornung

sabrina@hpr1.com

I’m going to go ahead and say it. I have trust issues with a lot of things and artificial intelligence (AI) is one of them.

Yes, it’s a tool that can sit shotgun and make your everyday tasks and life easier as a whole. Sure, I appreciate my transcription apps, Spotify playlists, and I appreciate Alexa’s nonjudgemental input when I ask her random questions throughout the day.

Like anything, it’s a double-edged sword — just look at social media. But what happens when these tools start to replace the things that make us human? As AI infiltrates our art, music and writing, are we in danger of AI astroturfing humanity by altering the way we express ourselves, communicate with others — or even alter our sense of reality?

Forbes posted an article on July 24 titled, “Why we need to be ‘rude’ to AI.” It mentions that, although these polite interactions may make us more bearable as humans (and I do admit, I make it a point to be extra nice to Alexa because I’ve seen Stephen King’s 1986 film “Maximum Overdrive” and think of it often) those extra prompts use up more tokens (data units extracted by AI models) and wreak extra havoc on the environment. That causes these data centers to suck up more power to operate, and they use up more water to cool.

Forbes suggested being short and direct for maximum AI efficiency, which leads to more questions. How will this affect the way we communicate and interact with each other? Since we’re on the topic, is it weird to anyone else that we’re tossing out commands to inanimate objects? Has anyone else actually started to bark commands at other items that are not AI powered and feel really sheepish once they realize what they just did? Asking for a friend…

How are these AI interactions perceived by the next generation and how are they affecting the way we interact as a whole? Are AI voice commands causing society to lose its niceness? Will this be the abolition of please and thank you? Instead of asking nicely, will kids get even more demanding? Will this cause humans to get even more entitled on the instant gratification train and become even more exhausting in the process?

Good grief, the future sure seems…pleasant. Be sure to tip your bartenders and servers extra when this happens.

Let’s get back to social media, shall we?

In a world of brb, lol, and smh, does anyone else feel like social media is turning our communications into a strange form of shorthand interspersed with hieroglyphics (emojis) to set the tone? In a fairly recent interview with Prairie Public, Cecile Wehrman, executive director at North Dakota Newspaper Association & NDNA Education Foundation mentioned the startling percentage of folks who get their news from social media platforms like TikTok instead of the traditional means of print, radio or television. She compared it to regressing to our caveman roots of spinning yarns around a campfire, which I can’t really argue with. The gist of what she was saying is that Americans are reading less.

Well, there goes our vocabulary. It was nice while it lasted.

How will AI affect journalism? Once we rely on AI to communicate, relay our news and take us from point A to point B, how will our facts be altered? And how will our news be regurgitated? As AI characters become normalized and more lifelike, many won’t be able to decipher fact from fiction, creating some cyberpunk/folk horror-worthy glamour, to our newsreels. “Glamour” is a term used in folklore that refers to magically induced illusion that creates deceptive realities. Witches or fairies are usually responsible for this behavior. In this instance we’re blaming artificial intelligence.

How long will it be before humanity reverts back to grunts and groans to communicate? Now that I think about it, that pretty much sums up my reaction to our current newscycle,AI or not.

Hmm…

As technology made our physical workload less cumbersome, folks resorted to going to the gym to stay in shape in the modern era. I’ll be the first to admit that I’ve paid for gym memberships that I rarely used. Now what happens when technology alters our means of intellectual and creative expression? Our libraries and creative outlets will be even more important than ever. Let’s just hope that we remember that in the long run.