The Coming "Symbolic Analyst" Meltdown (When AI eats your job, and you're a professional complainer.)

James Pethokoukis asks, “Does ChatGPT mean the Technological Singularity is near? How would we know?” To answer the second question first, we probably wouldn’t. One of the characteristics of a singularity is that you can’t tell when you’re entering it. (And by the time you figure things out, it’s too late.) But looking at Chat GPT and the various AI Art programs that are appearing, I can’t help but see an irony: The jobs that are coming under attack first are the jobs that up to now have resisted technological replacement. For decades, traditional manufacturing jobs were gobbled up by automation and offshoring. This led Robert Reich to postulate a hierarchy of work in which the “symbolic analysts” – essentially, people who worked with information as opposed to actual stuff – were at the top, while people who worked with actual things were at the bottom. With a remarkable lack of sympathy, journalists and politicians told coal miners and auto workers that they should “learn to code” as their jobs vanished.

Oh there is a lot of chatter about the “new tech” and the cultish advance of it’s use.

And even in social media spheres where ‘authenticity’ has always reigned ...until now, influencers are starting to pause and consider businesses could just create deep fakes.

I believe we will see this technology advance on us in ways we never dreamed about.

But, I also forecast we will see a very real human desire to reconnect with what is real in about 5 years time. People are going to walk through this tech doorway to embrace it and find none of it is where they really want to be.

Just the other day I was playing around in a marketing app trying to create a social media post. Tried their text AI and a few keywords later had something so remarkable, even I couldn’t have imagined it. Surprise! I am not an expert in the niche, just a small biz person trying to avoid huge marketing costs. And I had something so incredible, I do not think a marketing house/brand could have created it for me. All for pennies.

The consumer will need to get real savvy about who they follow, who they listen to, etc.

And yes, there are a lot of people who will be unemployed.

But, I wonder besides the economic damage, what really happens to the human mind, human learning, human imagination in this brave new AI world?

You don’t have to wonder. We have 120 years of logic triumphing over reason and morality to know where AI is going. Just consider Leftists, AGW, etc.

People are inefficient. They are selfish, wasteful and often illogical.

AI dominance will ensure people are enslaved and ultimately destroyed. It’s how to maximize efficiency. And it’s only logical.

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