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AI intriguing, scary

Artificial intelligence is here, and it can do some amazing things.

As evidenced by a recent story in The News about AI chatbot ChatGTP, it can have coherent conversations with real people, drawing on a vast database of knowledge to answer questions and share its knowledge.

But it can do so much more.

AI can write book reports and basic news stories. It can create images out of thin air. It can create “deep fakes,” realistic-looking photos and videos featuring real people, such as the recent fake image showing former President Donald Trump getting arrested. It can mimic voices. It can run machines.

Its capabilities are intriguing.

And scary.

We as a society have to manage AI smartly, or the consequences could be dire.

We have to make sure that, as AI replaces humans in the workforce, we train those replaced workers to handle the more advanced jobs that will remain.

We have to educate the public on the ease with which deep fakes can be created, to make the public more skeptical of the images and videos it sees online. We have to train people how to fact-check. We perhaps need new laws — carefully crafted so as not to run afoul of the First Amendment — providing punishment for people who use deep fakes to harm someone else’s reputation or livelihood.

The science fiction fears of AI, of robots taking over the world, are perhaps overblown.

But AI can already have serious consequences for society, and we have to do what we can as a society now to mitigate those consequences so AI can be the valuable tool that it could be while causing as little harm as possible.

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