Recently, the global media has been flooded with talk of the threat of artificial intelligence. A Google search for “AI threats” turned up more than 270 million related contents in 34 seconds.
American economist Robert Solow once said, “People always overestimate the short-term benefits brought by a technology but underestimate its long-term impact.” Here I use a story “No Touch Love” to discuss about the long-term impact of AI empowerment on humanity.
Story: No Touch Love
The story takes place in 2042, in the post-coronavirus era, people have to learn coexist with viruses. Chinese “fist-holding salute “has become an internationally popular etiquette because it does not require physical contact.
Chinese “fist-holding salute”
In that era, many people barely left their homes, and all their daily living could be met by unmanned express delivery and household robots. Some people no longer pursue full-time jobs but live a satisfying life by accepting part-time jobs such as designing skins and props for VR games. For example, the heroine in the story — Chen Nan.
Chen Nan, who is based in Singapore, witnessed the death of her grandfather, grandmother and both parents during the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic, which caused mental trauma and suffered from a phobia that isolated herself from the world.
Despite this, Chen Nan still longs to be loved. She fell in love with a young man from Brazil, Garcia, online, a kind of contactless spiritual love. Whenever Garcia asked to meet offline, Chen Nan refused again and again because she was extremely afraid of being intimate with her lover.
To help his loved one to overcome her fears and prove that even huge culture differences cannot stop the love between them, Garcia even registered a virtual avatar that replicates 100% of his own image, down to his poles and scars. He put his AI-powered avatar into a Singaporean city simulator and lives his life like an ordinary Singaporean. He was proficient in using various local applications and complying with local regulations and guidelines. However, when he again requested to meet Chen Nan offline, he was still rejected.
AI 2041
The story ends here. If you are interested in how Garcia uses various AI applications to win Chen Nan, you can read the book “AI 2041”co-authored by Kai-Fu Lee and Chen Qiufan.
Kai-Fu Lee is the founder of Innovation Factory, which Time magazine listed him as one of the 100 most influential people in artificial intelligence in 2023. Chen Qiufan is a sci-fi author, screenwriter, translator, and curator who was nominated for the second Sanlian Humanities City Award in 2023.
AI Technology that Makes People’s Lives Easier
Bio-Sensitive Film
In the future, we no longer need to always carry a variety of physiological data monitoring instruments. We only need a thin bio-sensing film. This kind of film, which is attached to the inside of the wrist, can display various physiological data in real time (including whether the vaccine in the body is effective), and it is a Digital Health Profile (DHP) certified by the national medical institution.
Digital Medical Records
Birth, old age, sickness and death are inevitable experiences in life. Digital medical records will greatly improve the efficiency of communication between doctors and patients, as well as the effectiveness of disease diagnosis and treatment. In the future, our biochemical data will be collected through various sensors.
For example, bio-sensor film can obtain body temperature, heart rate, bioelectricity, and other parameters. Micro-sensors enter the body in the form of capsules, and can perform blood testing, cell sampling, and monitoring tumor markers, without the need of invasive operations. Even human excrement can be analyzed for its composition through the smart toilets.
In addition, all data will be transmitted to the cloud and reports will be automatically generated by the medical AI, and the transmission process will be encrypted to prevent theft by criminals.
Will Artificial Intelligence Threaten Human Existence
As artificial intelligence becomes more and more powerful, we can’t help but wonder: Will AI pose a threat to human existence?
There are ongoing debates about this in the philosophical community, but it is broadly believed that if AI has self-awareness, then the end of mankind will not be far away. The definition of self-awareness varies. However, it has the following characteristics that are unanimously agreed:
（1）Able to describe the surrounding environment and things through language, and make corresponding evaluations.
（2）The ability to reflect on oneself.
Once artificial intelligence has self-awareness, it means that it can think independently, understand the meta-theorems and meta-rules of things, and is no longer bound by the rules and definitions of the human world.
On the one hand, we are looking forward to the various conveniences brought by the continuous enhancement of AI functions, such as smart homes, smart robots, smart transportation and so on, but on the other hand, we are worried that the singularity of AI with self-awareness is approaching.
When discussing the future of artificial intelligence, although it is full of uncertainties and challenges, we can remain optimistic, face it with an open mind, look at the situation with a smile. There is no need to overthink, and what should come will come naturally.