Being human in the age of AI

Artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly becoming independent of human direction, moving from independence in search of information to independence in decision-making.

- ARUN MAIRA

ChatGPT, which emerged only two years ago, is a chat platform easy to use, capable of carrying on conversations and assisting with queries, superseding the search capabilities of Google. More powerful "AI agents" are emerging in various fields—medicine, finance, and warfare—agents that do not need to interact with human beings. They sense their environment through various inputs (e.g., text, images, sensors), analyze the information, and make decisions based on their objectives. Such developments raise ethical questions. How do these AI agents—these virtual human beings—choose their goals? What do they care about? What will life be like for real human beings when virtual humans govern their lives? The world may be run more efficiently, but will it be a more just and more compassionate world?

Artificial citizens, business corporations: This is not the first time in history when humans have created artificial agents who govern their lives. The capitalist business corporation, which was given legal form in the 17th century, is an artificial citizen of society, given the same rights as human citizens to own property, exercise free speech, and sue other citizens (humans and other corporations). Moreover, the limited-liability corporation is a selfish citizen created by law to enable investors to exploit natural and human resources efficiently for profit with limited liability for the consequences. Corporations complain that environmental and labour regulations harm their ease of doing business and profits. Their concept of "minimum government, maximum governance" is privatization of everything, corporations and individual citizens competing, and the "invisible hand of the market" governing everything.