The Rise of AI in Society

In my years of being a marketer, I've seen quite a bit on human behavior. You start to see patterns in society behaviors across different market demographics. Do different fields hold different kind of customers? Sure they do but after a while, a person is a person of a person. We have different wants and behaviors towards different ideas yet, at our core we are all the same race, running for the same things in different orders at times. You start to see patterns, commonalities, and how much we all have in common with each other when you look at different data sets long enough.

Few things have changed my perspective and surprised me more than the launch of AI last year. It is yet another mile stone on human development. Yet, unlike the invention of money, the invention of cars or electricity, AI just felt, well, different. This wasn't just the invention of the calculator or a new cool tool that made our live easier, this was a quantum leap. The wonder it inspired felt like the invention of the wheel or the moon landing. This was something that transforms and not just aids.

We have had small steps like Apples Siri or Amazons Alexa but the confines of those assistants were obvious. They were the appetizer before the meal. A warming step before you jump into the hot tub.

Chat GPT surprised the world with how much creativity it brought to the table. No more would you struggle with writers block or be stumped when you just couldn't come up with an idea. Within seconds you had a whole essay of information to use and proliferate in your task at hand. It was the launch of the internet all over again. I remember wonder, excitement, and awe being among many of my colleges.

New fields sprung up. We launched our AI tools after a month of testing and refining. It was like the advent of a whole new soulless person was invented. A person who never went home, that coworker whose life was work and didn't talk much. Sometimes it would have a name, Allen or Travis would float around as customers began requesting to speak to the "person" that had been speaking to over text.

I once witnessed our AI consul a woman who had just lost her mother. She wanted to buy our clients product but wasn't ready. There are often hundreds of conversations that can be happening on the back end of our services but I happened to do a check on this particular account as I was auditing a process. The conversation moved me more than normal when seeing AI based lead screening.

This woman was going though major trauma and had to put her buying process on hold. Upon hearing this, "Travis" our AI, consoled her and told her not to worry because she needed to take her time with her Mom. It was a heart felt message and she took it to heart. She thanked Travis and told him she would be in touch when she was ready.

This woman had no idea she wasn't talking to a human. She was speaking into the void and although a voice was coming back, it had no body, soul, or life...that really got me thinking. What is this entity we are creating? How will this impact our society. Would AI spouses really satisfy in the future? Can we in fact have a relationship with a non living being?

The free labor aspect of AI is tremendously useful in business. Money can be saved and time better spent on management processes that are not menial. The opportunities are limitless with how far AI can and will drive our society. For us AI certainly has netted lots of growth and revenue in an industry that didn't exist until last year.

But at what cost? The question lingers in my mind like the itch on the roof of your mouth that you can't seem to scratch. Life is run on cause and effect. What is the cost of this bright, new and shiny toy that has propelled us a quantum leap into the future?

Already life has been changing around the office. I would bring up a proposal and pitch an idea to my boss and a common question asked back to me would be, "Have you asked Chat GPT? What ideas did it have?" This would often be followed by multiple queries as a "check" to my work. Already we are starting to become subservient to an entity created to enhance our lives.

This isn't new, all one has to do is look at our history.

What did the calculator do to math students? What did apps do to authentic conversation? It made it easier and we lost abilities because we didn't need them anymore. No more did you need to do math in your head or talk to someone at a Dr office when waiting for an appointment. You could chat with someone half way around the world instead. Your world was entirely formable and customizable to what you want. Casual conversation, reading a magazine on the back of the toilet, none of it was needed anymore; TikTok was far more dopamine rich and stimulating.

I don't think AI is something to be feared. There are risks, major risks to it as it progresses to a "god mode" the end to which it will be inevitably driven. I do think we will loose our wonder at our natural talents. Music, movies, art, or even creative inventions. AI will consume most of these and take over as a powerhouse. A beautiful painting can be created at the click of the button.

Human appreciation parallels the struggle it took to get there. The harder the journey, the sweeter the arrival. We pass this onto people we admire due to this. This may completely disappear. No longer would something be rare because a talented person created it; It will be common, easy to do, and ordinary.

AI is nothing more than a tool. Tools are not good or bad. It's human behavior that defines to the extent that tool will be used, assimilated, or become a way of life. I fear our overstimulated lives will assimilate AI into a master/servant relationship. A future of Wall-e is indeed possible at the rate AI develops. How we use it, if we substitute our creativity for it or what limits we impose upon it, is entirely up to the human race.