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- #9 Money is the root of AI evil
You and I can choose to be good.
You and I can choose to be bad.
You and I can also be downright ignorant, moronic, ignore all evidence that points to the contrary, and make stupid decisions.
But what sucks is when one of the largest companies in the world, and a forerunner in the AI race, decides to make those moronic, stupid decisions for us - decisions like firing an AI ethics team.
In today’s newsletter:
This was a bad decision: Profits governing AI development - not responsible decision-making
The rundown: Insurance companies stopping payments, Dr Huberman endorses testosterone-boosting coffee, and AI for predicting career paths
Tips, tricks & tools: 30-second website builders, email drafts, and image background remover
Free resources: Step-by-step idiot-proof guide to building your own chatbot
Screaming AI study buddy: It knows if you’re not concentrating
THIS WAS A BAD DECISION
Microsoft’s decision to dismiss their AI ethics team is of this ilk 👆
“The love of money is a root of many evils. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs”. 1 Timothy 6:10
Interpret this biblical verse as you will. We’ll interpret it thusly:
“The desire for money leads people to make some shit-house decisions - which can lead to all kinds of mayhem.” Given Microsoft just laid off its ethical AI team to focus on challenging Google for market share, it’s a timely thought.
Consider any powerful entity - a technology (let’s go with nuclear energy), a nation-state (say, America), an individual (hmm, Elon Musk) - what do they all have in common?
The potential to do great good or great harm.
AI is no different.
It’s a tool that can and is benefiting lives. Think:
Early detection of breast cancer
Helping domestic abuse survivors
Increasing crop yield
Making fairer hiring decisions, the list goes on.
But there are also negative consequences to even the AI systems we have today (let alone those of tomorrow). Think:
AI-induced unemployment
AI-generated wealth distribution
Possible obliteration of humanity
The only thing dividing these positives and negatives, which stands between good and evil, is the human value system of morality and ethics - the choice to do something right or wrong.
Even when AI companies strive to do good, they inevitably step on toes.
Take, for instance, PimEyes, an AI facial-recognition software that enables users to find images of their faces on the internet and remove those images if desired.
Sounds like a great idea. IT IS a great idea - helping people protect their personal privacy.
The problem is, PimEyes and AI systems like it needs training data.
And to train PimEyes to recognize all types of facial data points, the program scraped photos on Ancestry, a family records database - photos of deceased people who aren’t around to give or revoke consent for such a purpose (and a profit-generating purpose, at that).
Given the growing number of controversial, hurtful and frankly dangerous developments AI has been responsible for over the recent weeks (deepfake porn, presidential hate speech and phone scams), Microsoft’s latest decision to lay off the team responsible for ethical, accountable and sustainable AI product outcomes is startling, to say the least.
As Microsoft and Google battle for AI supremacy and search engine market share, it’s clear why the decision was made - to roll out products faster.
Boards like Microsoft’s ethics team often rein in product launches based on “potential societal consequences or legal ramifications” - something unacceptable to profit chasers when every 1% of search engine market share taken from Google means an extra $2 billion in annual revenue.
Indeed, members of Microsoft’s dismissed team said:
“Microsoft is more focused on getting its AI products shipped before the competition and was less concerned with long-term, socially responsible thinking.”
Microsoft’s Bing AI has already been shown to deliver very strange, creepy user experiences - something experts highlight as a red flag for the mainstream availability of AI services.
It seems, however, that in Microsoft’s pursuit of money, they’re willing to forego ethical best practices, and just get new products out there.
Time and time and time again, humanity has made the same mistake - blindly pushing forward in the name of money and progress. The impact of this decision might become evident sooner rather than later.
THE RUNDOWN 🐂
Medical insurance companies are using AI to inaccurately predict when they cut off payment for an older patient's treatment, costing people their life savings. (link)
Rogan and Huberman endorse testosterone-drinking coffee on The Joe Rogan Experience by drinking it live - only it never happened. (link)
Samsung is saying AI in their latest handphones can automatically enhance photographs. (link)
Eightfold, an AI matching engine for hiring, firing and promoting high-value employees, is seeing heavy government regulation. (link)
Paypal says artificial intelligence and machine learning are crucial to payment fraud detection strategies of large enterprises. (link)
TIPS, TRICKS & TOOLS ⚒️
There’s an AI for That - Database of over 24,000 AI tools for 578 different tasks. Used by over 500,000 people. (link)
Magical AI - ChatGPT-powered Chrome extension, which helps draft emails or messages seamlessly anywhere online. So easy to use - strongly recommended. (link)
Durable AI Website Builder - Build a unique website in 30 seconds using AI. (link)
Remove.bg - Remove any image background for free using AI (a premium Canva feature - nice, it’s free here). (link)
Delve AI - SaaS solutions enabling exceptional customer service and rapid business growth. (link)
FREE RESOURCES 📜
We stumbled upon this absolute gem of a resource - had to share it with you.
In his comprehensive step-by-step guide, Arjun Sha shows us how to:
Set up the tools
Import libraries
Create your personalized AI chatbot
If you’re a teacher, you could use this as an exercise for your students.
If you’re a SaaS or app owner, you can boost your customer service with hyper-relevant responses using this.
Or, if you’re just keen to see how close this technology is for anyone interested - give it a whirl.
FUNNY HOW THAT HAPPENED…
And we thought artistic expression was so uniquely human.
SCREAMING AI STUDY-BUDDY
It’s impressive how many home-grown AI systems there are now.
In AI Plug Issue #5, we shared Priyanjali Gupta’s AI, which translated American sign language.
Recently, an unknown student has used similar processes to recognize when he stops studying and picks up his phone - resulting in the AI system turning on bright lights and blaring a high-pitch whine.
If that obnoxious sensory input isn’t enough to make you put down your phone and keep working, we don’t know what is.
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