On the Pretence to Artificial Intelligence

“Newsflash! Your country doesn’t need you anymore, because the latest and greatest technology—Artificial Intelligence—is going to do everything for…itself. Bummer! You can all go home now, at least until your homes are repossessed for conversion into data centres.”

So represents the readily-entertained reductio ad absurdum of the conclusions vaunted with increasing intensity by the representatives of this technology, whose scripts we are with increasing tenor brow-beaten. Indeed, so spell-binding will be the onset of this “singularity” that its most vocal progenitors urge us like unhinged clerics to prepare our spirits for end-times: nearly all of the jobs will be taken, warn some; A.I.-qua-Lucifer will shed humanity like a snakeskin, warn others. Even the tech-titan with the most prosaic forecast, Elon Musk, warns that the universal-high-basic-income afforded by such technological command of earth’s resources—which Aaron Bastani fancifully dubs “fully-automated-luxury-communism”—will leave us unable to lead meaningful lives. Diddums. What then, as Camus wondered sceptically, will be the point of living? Indeed, under this new form of Communism everyone will have means, but nobody will have ends; not to worry though, for our technocratic elite knows that there are too many “useless eaters” polluting Gaia: most humans are neither good for profit, nor for the planet, so who’d have ’em? Presumably, we shall thence be “nudged” by “thought-leaders” to wander off a nihilistic cliff-edge, albeit a real one. (Robot-assisted dying anyone?) And so whichever oracular disciple from whom one receives the “Word of A.I.”: we had better brace ourselves: for the Apocalypse is coming in one form or another. That’ll be fine too though, for free, easy, and terribly-inclusive access to “pre-departure” “wellness sessions” with the chat-bot of your choice will be laid on. Yet if you’re audacious enough to think you’ll make it through the techno-dystopian upheaval, then carry on reading.

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Not long ago, Elon Musk affirmed Lord Acton’s aphorism that “Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely”, and at this juncture we shall be wise to consider the corrupting influence upon visions of the future induced by the conflict of interest which obtains when concentrated cliques of technicians and investors are committed not to testing their advertorial hype with the stringency of ordinarily-competent bridge-engineers. For as has been put wisely in other words: it is hard to persuade men of virtuous conduct where their incomes depend on forsaking it. Let us then seek for honest insights into what A.I. actually has in store for us by undertaking some mere-mortal stress-testing of this purported apotheosis of outsourcing.

I shall begin with that very old Aristotelian technique of defining our terms: “artificial” and “intelligence”; and this is no mere exercise in academic pedantry while the nature of A.I., and its implications for our lives, are matters of widening speculation amidst their coming to bear on the great many of us.

The first term is more-readily defined: the artificial is that which is not real in one respect but which may be passed off as such in another. Its value thence derives from its capacity partially to stand in place of the real: fools’ gold affords almost the aesthetic value of real gold for a fraction of the cost; knock-off Rolexes signal wealth not held and still keep time. “And so what?” you may ask. Appearances matter, and sometimes appearances are all that matter. Moreover, sometimes, we may even get close to having our cake and eating it. A kit-car Ferrari may look like a real one and afford similar performance at a fraction of the cost. Sometimes, faking it never felt so close to making it, so what’s not to like? So far so innocent, you may think—conveniently discounting the difference in price between the kit-car and the real-one, wherein lies the cost of innovating the cutting-edge article which you would have without paying for the innovation: the most costly element upon which derivations depend. Oh well, thank goodness “foolish” aristocrats buy real Ferraris, so that “wise” yeomen can feel smug about buying fake ones.

Still, bargain-hunting is understandable: deeply-rooted—as it surely is—in the survival-imperative to obtain the greatest number of calories and nutrients for the least number expended. And that imperative will be felt up and down the pecking order for the same reason despite differing manifestations: the rank and file can scarcely afford to lose the few resources they are able to procure, whilst the big-time C-suiters will lose their competitive advantage without the gobs of capital necessary to secure the human- and technological resources upon which their hard-won market-share depends.

It is rather the capacity to manipulate appearances which affords a diversion towards troubled waters: specifically, a channel via which artifice may be conjured into fakery and onward to delusion. After all, if cutting corners persuades us that corners are not, in fact, necessary, then aren’t we a clever cookie? We can have a Potemkin village in place of a real one, and laugh our way to the bank—that must be real, mind you; and somewhere else, of course.

If enough participants in a market are seduced into believing that the artificial is superior to the genuine in toto, and thus represents an unmitigated efficiency-gain, then a “conceit bubble” is established: what psychologist Mattias Desmet has in widespread instances termed a “mass formation”. Theorised more generally some hundred years prior by Gustav Le Bon in his study of The Crowd, these constitute group-dynamics manipulated by hypnotic luminaries so as to draw large swathes to set their stores by false prophets. Chillingly, “You would probably have been a Nazi, too”, reminded Jordan Peterson in so many words, referencing the Stanford prison experiment before a class of unsuspecting students. It was a darkly aphoristic reminder that ranks of young hopefuls such as themselves who yearn to make the world a better place in some inchoate way are ripe for exploitation by thuggish bien pensants with oven-ready ideas and tight deadlines. To summarise as did Richard Weaver in his portentous book of the same name: ideas have consequences. And as Thomas Sowell warned: ideas are cheap, theoretical, and may be donned, whereas consequences are real, incur costs, and must be lived-with—often by those who did not issue them. The pen may be mightier than the sword, but actions can speak louder than words, and are often less amenable to revision.

Returning to the small fry with which we began: fools’ gold and knock-off Rolexes may well deceive us into believing that we have secured an unmitigated bargain; or even into paying full-price for what we believe to be the genuine articles; and we may in turn deceive others into believing the same things. Frivolous conceits abound, although some are expensive. Art which is merely kitsch can tempt the many for whom the facts are relevant—creators, observers, buyers, sellers, students, and educators—into reckoning that they are witness to profound, big-A-Art, rather than pliant victims of con-artistry—sometimes their own. So, (in)famously, was exemplified in Scruton’s amusingly-honest reaction to Duchamp’s Artist’s Shit in his “failure” to hide his noticing that a can of shit is—surely—just that. For a brief moment, the conceit had been defeated, and, as with Cage’s 4’33”, the silence of a profound nonsense-exposed was deafening.

Consenting to “mistake” cans of shit, urinals, and pickled sharks for works of Art, and orchestras doing nothing or making incoherent rackets for profound acts of Music: such are just a few of the more or less expensive acts of fakery in which we are invited to participate throughout our lives by those who find value in extending Shakespeare’s sagely lines thusly: “All the world’s a stage / And all the men and women merely players / So best be one of the few who plays the many”. After all, there are only so many real jobs and honest livings to be made, and anyway, as Jack London (perhaps it was) pithily put it: “Gods are at a discount, and Devils are in demand!”, so why not answer the call from Beelzebub and join a cult of fakery near you? The film Team America put it crudely: in a world of Dicks, Pussies, and Assholes, it pays to be just one kind of person if you don’t want to get f’d. Besides, ‘tis the way of the world: mutton has always been passed off as bacon, lilies have always been gilded, and veneer has always had its place in cabinetry; there has always been a market for those who would have something for nothing, those who would meet them half way for it, and those who would exchange nothing for something where an adequate pretence to a sound deal could be effected. “Ask me no questions and ye shall hear no lies” is likewise an obiter dictum which has smoothed many a faulty trade. Still, although we are in troubled waters, they are mercifully shallow enough to enable most of us to wade through them, variously scathed in moderate part, to unscathed and modestly advantaged. Besides, so long as we get off with a cheap watch that looks good and tells the time, best not to worry about the new money which can’t tell an unmade bed from a Da Vinci, or silence from Berlioz. We might even get a laugh out of it.

The seller and buyer who know they are dealing in trivial artifice disadvantage neither themselves nor others, for neither parties is under illusion regarding the qualities and shortcomings of the article-traded. Moreover, it wouldn’t matter much if they didn’t. The fake Rolex which looks okay and tells the time for the price of a Casio is effectively innocent: the consequences of its failing to fool anyone are negligible, as conversely are the consequences of it fooling an observer. The ante begins to be upped where the seller and buyer know they are dealing in non-trivial artifice: they do not disadvantage themselves insofar as neither party is under illusion regarding the qualities and shortcomings of the article traded, but it would matter if a forgetful or unsuspecting party placed a heavy tome on an MDF structure designed to look like oak: shelves may collapse, and in addition to a bill for replacement, we shall be inconvenienced, or even hurt.

Trouble really begins to take off where dishonesty starts in respect of non-trivial artifice: for where one person gains by lying to another, a zero-sum conceit obtains: one party gains at the expense of another. We enter a dog-eat-dog world, in which the pie, so to speak, is not made bigger; the great promise of capitalism is denied: someone just gets away with taking more for himself. Value is not created: merely transferred—without consent. Too bad for the losers. The knock-off Omega Seamaster whose seller deceives the buyer into believing it is real induces the latter to rely on it at sea and come to harm; after all, a seagoing time-piece broken by water may well cause a fatal accident; and we shall induce lifelong scars in those left to pick up the pieces, especially those nearest and dearest.

Still, at least one person—the seller—possesses the truth: he may in principle be found; tried; and brought to justice, although necessarily imperfect. Moreover, the seller who profits excessively in the short-term by lying is liable to exposure by market participants, which will thence punish him ruthlessly, purging him of his reputation, and in extremis, of his livelihood. Honest sellers toil to bring value to market for others, whereas he merely extracted it for himself: and that is an intolerable crime against the enterprise of value-creation in which all honest participants in the market are engaged.

To the extent that a lie can be kept alive, however, excessive profits are the reward; and movement into murkier waters is made when this incentive to lie mutates, like a cancer, into fakery writ large: for a lie requires only for one person to deceive another; whereas big-lie fakery requires multiple persons to deceive both themselves and others, such that all are volitionally veiled in a mirage. The old KGB saying, that “anyone can commit a murder, but it takes an artist to commit a suicide”, is almost analogical, for as Scruton noted: anyone can lie, but fakery is an achievement. And it is an achievement precisely because it entails duping oneself as well as others; that is, the Pied Piper and his flock really must believe they are heading up to a higher plane, rather than over a cliff edge—like many Western universities today.

Among the latest and greatest of the Western Pied Pipers may well have been the owner-pilot of the Titan submarine. For after years of “corner-cutting” and “coin-clipping”, he managed an achievement even more remarkable than touring the Titanic via submersible: he managed to persuade himself, his backers, a sufficient number of employees, and prospective customers, that it really were possible to build a cut-price submarine using such parts as a bell-housing rated for a third of the intended depth and a commercial video-game controller to pilot it. He even persuaded his first customers that his scantily tested contraption were safer than scuba-diving: one of the most widespread and safe activities of submersion practised across the world for decades. And so it came to pass that a con artist par excellence succeeded in deceiving not only the victims of his underwater Trojan horse, but himself. That is, until literally, Reality called time, and popped the little underwater bubble and its inhabitants, including him.

So what has contending with artifice got to do with A.I.?

Part II published tomorrow…