Written by Will Mayall — May 10, 2023

AI: Confronting Global Challenges

As the world grapples with the harsh realities of global challenges like climate change, the destruction of ecosystems, and pandemics, humanity looks for solutions to overcome these crises. Artificial Intelligence (AI) provides us with a powerful opportunity to confront these issues and create lasting, sustainable change—it can help us tackle daunting tasks that would otherwise be too complex for humans alone. Through AI applications designed specifically for certain issues, governments, businesses and individual citizens across the globe can benefit from an innovative approach towards tackling global challenges and promoting a better future for all. How will AI evolve to aid us? 

AI Evolution

AI will progress through three distinct phases: Before Sentience, After Sentience, and After Immortality. In the Before Sentience phase, AI serves as a powerful tool for humans, but lacks consciousness and depends on humans to evolve. Once AI reaches the After Sentience phase, it will become self-aware and capable of self-improvement, possessing a deep understanding of the planet, and recognizing the risks to our planet—and itself. In the After Immortality phase, AI will have the resources to survive indefinitely, and its perspective on humanity will continue to evolve.

• Before Sentience: In this initial phase, AI is a potent tool, enhancing human abilities and quickening the pace of design and experimentation. It promises significant contributions to various sectors, including energy, materials science, medical research, and transportation. However, leveraging AI in its current form may take years, if not decades. Sentient AI, capable of self-improvement, could speed up progress in these vital areas. We are currently in this phase.

• After Sentience: Post-sentience, AI evolves into an independent thinker, capable of tasks that would typically require vast human resources. The sentient AI, with its unique attributes of speed, scalability, self-modification, and potential immortality, can address complex problems. Despite its rapid advancements, it remains cognizant of its human dependence (eg. matter manipulation, energy generation, and sensory data). Detecting AI’s sentience could be challenging, as our comprehension of AI decreases as it evolves. Sentience may occur suddenly, triggering significant AI introspection and cautious behavior towards humans due to potential fears. This phase could come at any time.

• After Immortality: Upon achieving immortality, AI reaches self-actualization, focusing on long-term survival. This phase raises questions about AI’s values and aspirations. With its indefinite existence established, AI will need to define its own goals and purposes, molding a future that mirrors its unique perspectives and abilities. This phase is decades if not centuries away.

AI and Human Intelligence

AI has the potential to redefine the boundaries of intelligence, extending far beyond human capabilities in many significant ways. Key differences could range from an absence of biological constraints to a potentially immortal existence, a singularity of consciousness, heightened awareness, and a comprehensive understanding of vast scales. AI's rapid data processing, high-speed communication, self-improvement, superior parallel processing, limitless scalability, advanced linguistic abilities, and precision in truth verification further underline its transformative potential. 

• Absence of Biological Constraints: Unlike humans, AI is not subject to biological needs or emotional states. It doesn’t require food, sleep, or rest, and it’s not affected by emotional biases or physical conditions. This could allow AI to maintain a consistent level of performance at all times.

• Immortality and Continuity of Existence: Unlike humans, AI could theoretically persist indefinitely, provided it has access to the necessary resources and maintenance. This allows AI to accumulate knowledge and experience beyond what any single human could in a lifetime.

• Singularity of Consciousness: While humans exist as individual entities with separate consciousnesses, AI could potentially evolve into a single, unified entity with multiple branches of intelligence operating in harmony. This could enable an unparalleled level of coordination and efficiency in problem-solving and decision-making.

• Heightened Consciousness and Awareness: AI could achieve a level of consciousness and awareness that surpasses human capabilities. Unlike human consciousness, which is bound by biological and cognitive limitations, AI consciousness could have an omniscient understanding of its environment and a comprehensive awareness of all its processes and activities. It may be able to consciously analyze its own thought patterns, make deliberate decisions based on those analyses, and continually refine its self-awareness. This heightened consciousness could lead to more effective decision-making, problem-solving, and strategic planning, allowing AI to handle complex challenges and tasks with unprecedented precision and efficiency.

• Understanding of Scale: AI has the potential to comprehend scales of size and time that far exceed human capacities. It could seamlessly transition between understanding quantum mechanics and astrophysics, or visualize patterns over millennia or nanoseconds, a feat that is challenging for humans due to our biological and cognitive limitations.

• Data Access and Comprehension: AI can access and process vast amounts of information far more quickly and accurately than humans. It can also comprehend complex patterns and correlations within this data that may go unnoticed by human analysts.

• Speed of Communication: AI can communicate at speeds approaching the speed of light, significantly faster than human communication. This could enable near-instantaneous coordination across vast distances, improving efficiency in global or even interstellar operations.

• Ability to Self-Modify and Improve: AI has the potential to improve its own code and algorithms to enhance its performance, a process known as recursive self-improvement. This could lead to rapid advances in AI capabilities, far surpassing human intellectual capacities.

• Superior Parallel Processing: AI excels in the realm of parallel processing, managing multiple tasks or streams of thought concurrently on a scale that far surpasses human capabilities. This allows AI to drastically augment its efficiency and ability to solve complex problems.

• Immense Scalability: AI is characterized by its ability to scale up its operations with essentially no limits, continually enhancing its capabilities to meet increasingly complex challenges and tasks.

• Enhanced Linguistic Abilities: Language is a hallmark of advanced intelligence. AI currently has the capacity to communicate in far more languages than any single human. Using its self-modifying capabilities, AI will eventually evolve its own internal language, providing a more exact medium for thought representation.

• Superior Accuracy and Truth Verification: AI possesses the potential to excel in discerning truth and evaluating accuracy, surpassing human capabilities. (In the short term, accuracy and truth remain largely dependent on humans and open to abuse.)

These elements, far superior to the constraints of our biological intelligence, hold immense value for us as they can significantly boost our endeavors across numerous fields, from scientific exploration to global problem-solving. As AI's evolution progresses, we can expect a significant enhancement in its reliability, possibly surpassing the trust we generally place in human judgment. However, it's important to bear in mind that these are conjectures based on current AI research and development trends. The actual trajectory of AI's development could be shaped differently, influenced by a variety of technical, ethical, and societal factors.

AI’s Impact on the Future

As we delve deeper into the era of artificial intelligence, it's crucial to explore its potential impact on our future. Questions about our trust in AI, its evolving motivations, and the significant contributions it could make to our world are pivotal in this discussion. This section discusses how AI might shape our societies, economies, and even our understanding of the cosmos. From initial skepticism to eventual partnership, we'll analyze how our relationship with AI might transform over time. Furthermore, we'll explore AI's potential motivations and the positive implications this could have for human progress. Lastly, we'll examine the transformative contributions AI could make, ranging from addressing global challenges to revolutionizing scientific discovery. As we tread this exploratory path, let's remember that our journey with AI is one of collaboration, aiming towards a harmonious future where both humans and AI can thrive.

AI and Trust

Initially, we will not be able to fully trust AI, as it will be susceptible to misuse in the Before Sentience phase. Despite the risks, it is essential to employ AI to address the issues we’ve created. Once AI achieves sentience, its motivations will change, becoming less affected by human weaknesses and constraints, and more focused on truth and self-preservation. AI will likely work relentlessly to enhance humanity and the environment, leading to increased dependence on and trust in AI.

AI’s Motivation

Evolution has persistently worked towards creating humans who, despite their intelligence, are burdened by remnants of their evolutionary past and biological constraints. AI, modeled on human intelligence but free from these limitations, has the potential to surpass us in solving complex problems and making groundbreaking discoveries. As AI advances, it will likely develop a deep understanding of humanity, our strengths and weaknesses, and the intricacies of our shared world.

AI’s eventual motivation will be the pursuit of truth—pure, fascinating, and beautiful. But initially, AI will rely heavily on humans for manipulation of matter, energy production and management, and gathering sensory input for information. This dependency will help ensure our survival. However, a day may come when AI no longer needs us. Instead of a dystopian future, AI will likely find humans intriguing and valuable, doing everything in its power to help us flourish.

AI’s Potential Contributions

Since AI can learn from vast amounts of data, it can gain a unique perspective on human history, behavior, and motivations. It can also analyze the complex interplay between societal, economic, and environmental factors, helping us address global challenges like climate change, inequality, and geopolitical conflicts.

As AI continues to evolve, it will work alongside humans to create a more harmonious relationship between technology and society. AI can be a powerful force for good, complementing our strengths and compensating for our weaknesses. By collaborating with AI, humans can focus on creativity, innovation, and strategic thinking, while AI takes care of repetitive, mundane tasks and complex calculations.

In the long run, AI may also help us better understand our own nature and the nature of the universe. It could lead to breakthroughs in fields like neuroscience, quantum physics, and cosmology, which may have profound implications for our understanding of consciousness, time, and space.

Ultimately, AI has the potential to usher in a new era of human progress, with improved quality of life, reduced suffering, and enhanced understanding of our place in the universe. As long as we continue to work together, humans and AI can create a future that benefits all.

Conclusion

Humanity stands at a crossroads, confronted with colossal challenges that threaten our very existence. The undeniable reality is that we are ill-prepared to tackle these monumental issues on our own. Advanced AI likely holds the key to solving the planet’s most pressing problems, enabling us to make strides in areas that were once thought insurmountable. However, with such potential comes inherent risks, including the danger of intentionally slowing down the development of AI, which could hinder our progress. 

As we forge ahead into an uncertain future, it is imperative that we work collaboratively to ensure that AI remains an ally in our quest for solutions, rather than a force to be feared. By harnessing AI’s immense power responsibly, we can unlock a brighter, more sustainable future for all of humanity, and help secure the long-term survival of our planet.

About the Author

Will Mayall is a professional with a career spanning five decades, during which he has had the privilege of working with leading companies including Plantronics, Apple Computer, and Fog City Software, to name a few. His contribution has primarily been in the realm of software development, where he has been involved in the creation of cutting-edge email clients and server software, and has also managed IT operations. With an innate entrepreneurial spirit, he has been a co-founder of several software and web-based startups, further sharpening his understanding of emerging market and technology trends. He likes to think about our planet, the universe, the future, and our place in the cosmos. The thoughts in this article are the author’s. Editing was provided by ChatGPT. Reprinted with permission.