The weekly discussions were great to help my writing evolve. I not only had to formulate my own thoughts but also respond to the ideas and thoughts of my classmates and peers. We would debate ideas, respond to one another and produce questions that would make us think even more on the subjects.
1) The first weekly discussion post we did talked about actions that we as humans perform that have a global impact. I chose to talk about how our high usage and waste of water is going to impacts our future and contemporary world since we waste so much of it.
1a) We as human beings are some of the most wasteful creatures to exist on the face of this planet. From plastics to clothes to food to water we waste tons. On a daily basis the average human being wastes about 30 gallons of fresh water. Of the amount of water in this world 97% is salt water which leaves 3% as fresh water and even then 2% of said fresh water is in the form of polar ice caps which leaves but 1%. And we as humans waste so much water on a daily and the impact can be seen in a variety of fields. Communities such as Flint are without water access, there are countries where water is sold as a commodity and the average person in said country can barely afford it. Since water is so limited companies rush to make it a commodity and make a profit off it. Of the 1% of fresh water have it has to be divided into so many subcategories; agriculture, household usage, cleaning etc. The less fresh water there is to go around the more we endanger our selves since fresh water is what we use to grow our crops which in turn keep livestock alive which in turn keeps us alive. Its like the falling of the dominoes. Along with endangering our selves we also endanger the species that depend on fresh water to survive and some of those species are beneficial to us as well. The more we compromise the integrity of fresh water the closer we come to dooming not only ourselves but also everything around us.
2) another unit of discussion was AI and how it would impact humanity. I argued that AI would be detrimental to humanity since it would only be harmful. AI is like trying to put a human brain inside a metal body, only drawback is an Ai will never understand human affection or know morals, they would a cold calculation ration driven machine.
2a) The human brain is the single most complex ‘computer’ to ever exist and trying to replicate it and have it installed within a body made of steel and wires is the dream of multiple scientists and people in support of Artificial Intelligence. Ai would be the ultimate boon to man; we would have an autonomous body that does all our tasks without us having to repeatedly program it or give it commands. and we don’t have to worry about them being tired or anything they can work for as long as possible. However, we as humans can become intoxicated with power and trying to play God by creating an AI system that can not only think do what it’s programmed to but also develop a sense of self seems very dangerous. We as humans have a gift which is the power to differentiate between wrong and right, an AI will not have such power and you can’t simply program that either. For an AI the options will be whether or no it’s logical or not. An AI will literally be a cold blooded rational thinking machine which lacks any form of feeling. Even in the article most scientists have voiced their opinion saying that if it comes down to humanity fighting an AI system we are more likely to lose.
I’m sure we have all seen movies such as Age of Ultron and the Matrix, in case you haven’t the AI systems in both movies seeks to end the human race albeit in their own methods. As if this point AI seems like a double edged sword in the making; it can either benefit us and help us out or it can turn on us and try to take over the human race it can go either way. Both the article and the video show that we can only jeep an AI under our control for so long. At one point the AI will develop a sense of self and question everything around it and what we as humans do and it will ultimately revolt and try to change things to suit its own needs. AI will always be like a growing fire, we can only tame it for so long until it grows out of control and destroys everything in its path. We are simply humans trying to play God by trying to engender an AI that is as complex as the human brain but also tamebale to an extent. Our role isn’t to play god its to be human.
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