Artificial Intelligence Will Drown Us If We Let It

  The future is a riptide, pulling us all deeper out to an unknowable abyss. At times I feel like I’m fighting against this current, splashing and flailing in an attempt to reach a familiar shore that despite my effort continues to shrink on the horizon. The struggle is of course in vain, even if I were to beat the perpetual flow of water I’d find that the land would only crumble, memories don’t provide solid footing and you can never really go back in any way that matters.  Even with this knowledge there are times where I struggle to float out to the future, the water is as cold as the men and women who want to usher it in. 

Artificial Intelligence and the automation that comes with it has always left me with an uneasy feeling. The United States has been a nation of innovation but what sets it apart most distinctly from other countries is its cruelty. The obsession with concepts like rugged individualism leads our society to embrace a sink or swim approach. Not to belabor the nautical metaphors but this line of thinking has caused us to poke holes in each other’s boats if only to make an extra dime. This is all to say that I can’t really in good conscience embrace innovations that will take jobs away from people while the people who profit do everything in their power to leave those people on the lurch.

It’s impossible to pull yourself up by your bootstraps when the richest people are hoarding bootstraps for some reason. We’ve been told that jobs from trucking to being a cashier will disappear in short order. Some fast food restaurants are already working to replace the people taking your order with A.I. It will be interesting to see what happens when the computer messes up an order or the customer feels like making a scene but there’s no human there to complain to, but that’s a scenario for another day. I don’t see the vision these rich people seem to share, it seems they’ve lost the plot and no longer see the value in placating the masses with jobs that pay well. In fact they are hellbent on leaving us with no jobs at all. Then what? Where does a jobless public direct their ire? I feel like I know and I expected that it was common sense but perhaps not to a CEO. 

Now even artistic expression is under attack. As the Writer’s Guild of America strikes for better pay and against A.I. produced scripts it seems that many have already given into the idea that the art we will consume will be produced by robots. I personally struggle with the idea that a program like ChatGPT will ever be able to produce something that can make a human truly feel something. It is difficult enough for a human to make transcendent art, in fact in planning this blog post I’ve struggled to articulate the nuances of exceptional art. You know it when you see it, or more accurately you know it when you feel it. If we can’t explain it, how could we ever teach an A.I. what it is? 

Perhaps I’m wrong, it wouldn’t be the first time and won’t be the last. Maybe my ego as a “writer” is not allowing me to believe that a computer can replace a human even on endeavors that at their core are most human. I think therefore I am but what am I if a computer can easily have the same thoughts? What then would the computer be?

Another Year at Home

I’ll probably delete this at some point because I hate being sincere online. The past couple of years have been quite mentally taxing, I’m sure that’s a sentiment many can relate to. 

Having a chronic medical condition that leaves me feeling sick almost every day, and having to take medication that suppress my immune system during a pandemic has left me living in a constant state of worry. I’m not on edge every moment of every day, that would make living life completely untenable. However the worry has become a part of the background noise of life, a dull hum barely audible, but ever present. I’ve been doing everything I can to ensure that my risk factors are limited. From staying at home as much as possible to getting vaccinated as soon as I was allowed. 

However nothing is guaranteed, no one can ever give me a good answer on how effective the vaccine is for immunocompromised people. Often times when someone who was vaccinated dies it is brushed off as “well they were immunocompromised” which fair enough, but being in the category makes the humming louder, something that can’t be as easily ignored. 

I also feel that everyone is so over the pandemic that returning to normal life seems inevitable, and the stress of not feeling personally comfortable with that, mixed with feeling like you’re letting people down by not being willing to return to normal life is tough to put it mildly. In the beginning I had hoped that we would rally as a collective to get through the worst of it, however that hasn’t been the case. With new variants on the horizon and people still after all this time refusing to get vaccinated and take precautions I just don’t see a light at the end of a tunnel. Instead just a perpetual groundhog day, as my ears fill with the ominous hum of apathy, something in which I can not afford to indulge. 

Ego

The life of an artist consists primarily of selfish pleas, sleepless nights and constant worry. It’s both exhilarating and terrifying at once. To be persuaded by the right side of the brain into releasing personal works for public consumption is an evolutionary trait that perplexes.

I’ve know this lifestyle all to well, true I’ve never been the starving artist stereotype, take one look at any of the videos I’ve produced and that’s clear. In the background however, on my free time from work or school I’ve always pursued my passions with varying levels of urgency. To date I’ve been involved in roughly 304 videos on three YouTube channels, 105 podcast episodes and countless status updates and tweets aimed to amuse.

None of these projects have brought me the success I’ve aimed for yet, there are outliers, a sketch about a business meeting tallied an at the time impressive number of views and just recently a video updating the status of the much beloved show “The Boondocks” blew up in a small way boosting our subscriber base. These brief brushes with internet notoriety gave me the feeling I’ve been longing for. The ego stroke if I’m being brutally honest and putting aside my compulsive need to be liked by everyone for a moment, I felt was long overdue.

That’s the balance of being an artist it seems, when does art for art’s sake give way to ego. Are you truly not an artist if you aren’t content with toiling in obscurity? That question follows me, poking at the very essence of my being. Am I an artist or just a guy starving for attention?

“Look at me, I’m making a joke, I’m reviewing a new movie, I’m talking about a tv show the majority of the people on Earth only have a vague recollection of, leave a thumbs up or subscribe so I can have this entire venture validated in some small way,”

In many ways I feel selfish as an artist, greedy even. True as of yet I’ve never asked for a dime, but I do ask for people’s time and social currency.

“Don’t forget to share this with your friends, it helps the channel out,”

The artist in me is content to create forever for a small circle of people who are interested. But as always my ego just wants more. The life of an artist is about balancing these two opposing forces. The life of an artist is my life.

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Sincerity

One of the first things a potential writer is taught is to lend sincerity to their work. This rule goes double for those hoping to peruse personal essays. Without a sincere touch the essays become less personal and at that point you should just write fiction.

As someone who is attempting to entice and entertain readers with candid blogs, snap shots of my true thoughts I’m apprehensive to admit I struggle with my own sincerity. This thought has been creeping in the back of my mind now for sometime. It came to the forefront while making our newest video series “Are Ghosts Real?”. The premise is I’m looking to assemble a team to answer the title’s question. The rub being I don’t believe in ghosts, I want to but most of the time I feel silly asking a spirit to speak cryptid responses into a microphone. I’m worried my disbelieve in wayward souls cursed to walk the Earth forever will taint the series. I’m equally desperate to not come off as the type of person who believes wholesale in the premise. Rock meet hard place, meet small internet ghost hunting show I’m probably overthinking.

This is all compounded by the discovery of the music artist Hobo Johnson. His songs combine rap and spoken word poetry to great effect. His honesty seems to lace every line to the point I’ve heard him called “soft”’for expressing himself in such a way. To me his truths about unrequited love and unrealistic expectations of live and success resonate. I wonder if I’ll ever be capable of being so candid in my writings or videos? Is his success correlated to his sincerity? Will mine be? Perhaps this crisis of confidence will be cured by an apparition  whispering calming platitudes into a microphone. Assuring me I’ll be okay and proving their existence simultaneously. For now I’ll continue to write these blogs and hope people connect enough to continue reading.

Also it has been pointed out to me that even if a ghost decided to calm my nerves with a corporeal pep talk most people wouldn’t think it was sincere. Instead I’d be relegated to the pile of hacks trying to make a quick buck off of true believers. An imposter with the reputation to match my insecurities.

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Mirror

Labeling a blog post “Politics” is a risky endeavor regardless of affiliation or moral principles. Which is why at the last minute I changed it to Mirror. I like to think my opinions are more unbiased observations than politically motivated diatribes. I’m sure the comments will disagree but that’s fine, they are more than welcome to create their own blogspot blog and shout into the void alongside side me. There was a time that feels at this point like the far flung past that politics was treated like an embarrassing fetish, something whispered about between like minded peers but never publicly announced. The old adage being “there are two things you don’t talk about, religion and politics”. It seems lately that political belief has become religious and any affront against a person’s favorite politician might as well be blasphemy against their chosen deity.

For me this transition was noticeable first on websites like tumblr and radio stations that insist Don Imus is still a hit. Hidden away on the equivalent of fetish message boards. With the 2016 election we witness this thinking spill out to the real world. Instead of two normal candidates pitching different platforms that would in practice act similar. We had possibly the most hated woman in the United States running against a man who has been described so fully and widely that I struggle to come up with a new arrangement of words. Here’s my best attempt, Donald Trump who in his old age had moved away from looking human and now resembled an orange left out in the sun, adorning a wig of fair pubic hair.

Clinton was a political mainstay, from her days as First Lady to her time as Secretary of State, she was never far from the political fray. Trump on the other hand was viewed as a self made man (in reality it was his father and Mark Burnett), an illusion that wouldn’t be exposed until years later and at this point no one really cares. For some reason these two brought the venom out of the country. It wasn’t only their fault of course, social media and misinformation rallied moderates to worshipers. Perhaps his supporters find it unfair but I think it’s undeniable that Trump allowed extreme racists to feel more comfortable culminating in the unite the right rally and the death of Heather Heyer in Charlottesville.

I know many people want to point at Trump as some mastermind who set the events of the current political landscape in motion. My personal opinion from what I’ve observed from afar is, that kind of Machiavelli planning is beyond him. The man often appears as if each sentence out of his mouth surprises even him. He’s nothing more than a useful idiot who at times can’t be stopped from saying or doing something stupid, cruel or otherwise below the standard we once held the presidency to.

I don’t often write about politics, in fact the only other time I can recall doing so was at the introduction of “alternative facts”.(see We Need to Talk About Donald) A phrase that amused me then, when I thought we were all on the same wavelength, but chills me today as I think the cult of Donald would believe and defend him if he suggested the sky was green. There was a particular event that inspired me, while ordering dinner from Moe’s, ( a burrito place for those who haven’t had the pleasure of sampling their homewrecker) I looked at the giant television screen next to the cash register. Normally it was playing whatever popular sporting event was on. That day however with a lack of games to choose from it instead played the news. The casters silently reciting their prompted lines. A graphic read “NY man charged with building bomb he wanted to detonate at National Mall on Election Day, FBI says”.

The man in question wanted to draw attention to the political climate by committing a heinous act. While I worried about which topping to get there was a plot seemingly straight out of the beginning of a post apocalyptic novel being thwarted. It shook me, this is the world we live in. Fearing attacks from lunatics with an axe to grind. I wonder if America is great again just yet? Furthermore is the pit in my stomach caused by the headline, or was the home wrecker a bad decision?

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Chaos

At times life can feel like a constant struggle to make sense of chaos. The world is inhabited by biological organisms both diverse and awe inspiring. However I sometimes feel as if there are unseen entities, spirits if you will, forces of nature serving only randomness. Of course that’s just my conscious and rational mind providing a thoroughly irrational explanation for something I can’t explain. A mortal trying to put uneven blocks into a tidy pile.

The past week while being thoroughly planned out, still managed to keep me on my toes with the unbridled randomness that only our universe can provide. First and foremost the planned part of my life has gone smoother than I anticipated.

The stream on Wednesday of Spider-Man actually managed to draw a small crowd which is probably more than I deserve. When it comes to streaming I’m at the crossroads of anxious to the point of ineptitude (see a now private walking dead stream where I sat in silence as my microphone was muted) and untalented. Sure I can turn on what little charm I have for stretches but streaming it seems to me requires a marathon approach, don’t tell all your funny stories right away and keep your energy up but not so high you burn out.

The second planned event involved a hunt of the paranormal variety, featuring night vision cameras, electronic voice recordings and of course a crystal through which a psychic friend translated the spirit’s communications. Normal Saturday night stuff. The trailer for this outing is now live on YouTube and it would mean a lot to me if you watched.

As for the unplanned my weekend was equally exciting. My brother turned 21 which of course required a bar hopping adventure culminating in an unplanned stop at a hookah bar hosting queer dance night to meet up with a friend I care for quite a bit but suck at keeping in touch with. Then a sudden surge in YouTube subscribers brought about by Kayne West doing his best Uncle Ruckus impression on SNL (or online after the show was over but regardless) highlighted a borderline surreal couple of days.

If you know anything about me it’s that I constantly hawk my YouTube channel, Wicked Good Everything a collaborative project that is artistically fulfilling but also can feel like slamming your head against the wall. We covered a story on The Boondocks sometime ago and it did well. With Kayne bringing the show back into the zeitgeist it more than doubled it’s views. The rub of course is can we keep these new fans entertained and engaged? Head meet wall once more.

Content

The room is bathed in a dull blue, while I focus acutely on the text cursor. Doing it’s best impression of a virtual particulate blinking in and out of existence. At least that’s what I’ve been told, perhaps the more science minded reader sees that’s sentence as nothing more than a guy with an English degree doing what English majors do best, completely misunderstanding the sciences. Regardless while a comprehensive understand of psychics escapes me, I think metaphorically the sentence is solid and while exploring the vast world of subatomic particles is interesting I must move on. The blog isn’t going to write itself and the text cursor needs to get moving.

In times like this, when ideas mock me by appearing half formed their full state just out of reach I feel a kinship to mayflies. Mayflies if you don’t know are nature’s cruelest joke, cursed to live on average a mere 24 hours. Which to humans seems terrifying especially when you consider how many days we’ve wasted doing nothing. To certain animals such as Greenland sharks which can live 400-500 years that time must be inconceivably short, granted I’m not confident they can put into perspective their own life spans compared to mayflies. I hardly can. Leaving near immortal sharks aside I bring up the tragically short life span of the mayfly in relation to my own life because I’ve put myself in a position to create in a similar manner. I work hard, be it on a blog or a video then post it, receive feedback and consider the stats but tomorrow I must be on to the next piece. Nothing lives long on the internet, everyone wants something new and I want to be the person to provide that for them.

This isn’t to complain of my position in life, quite the opposite in fact. I’m extraordinarily lucky to be alive at a time and in a position to pursue my dreams if only in a small way. The pressure to deliver for myself and my talented friends who I have somehow conned into believing in me can be at times worrisome and at other times paralyzing. However the internet isn’t going to wait for me to be cured of my creative paralysis and I must move forward. The mayfly may only live for 24 hours but their species lives on. Resiliency incarnate. To build this brand I will be as well.

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