#tools #weapons #AI #logic #damage #evil #CommonGood #IndividualEvil
The T-shirt reads: “If guns kill people, I guess pencils misspell words, cars drive drunk and spoons make people fat.”
There’s a lot of illogic to unpack there, but let’s try to imagine.
Do people actually blame the tools for the damage THEY do? One could carry this idea into the future. If something good happens, the person did it. If something bad happens, the tool (read: AI, for example) did it.
There currently are people in very high places who use that illogic. Sometimes, if a tool isn’t available to blame, another person usually is.
Here’s how the real logic goes: if you have a tool that you can use for good, by all means use it for that. But, if that same tool can be used for evil, it’s on you to make sure that doesn’t happen.
Tools are tools. Most do good, but also inflict damage. Which way it goes depends in whose hands the tool resides.
How do we keep damage from occurring? It’s not always possible, but we can attempt to mitigate, if not eliminate, damage.
We can try to keep “tools” out of the wrong hands.
It’s not always possible, but we can try.
Then, we can teach our children the proper use of tools. Just because we can make a tool do something, doesn’t mean we should – or even consider it.
Tools were designed to accomplish things that we cannot do with our bare hands. Most animals have the equipment to do damage or good with their bodies alone. We humans, who also invent tools, need tools to accomplish necessary things.
AI is, or will become, a great tool. But, in the wrong hands, can also do damage.
In fact, it will be like the gun mentioned above. Do we want to use AI as a weapon or as a constructive tool?
We, as a people, will have to decide that.
By the way, guns can be used constructively in sports, hunting etc. They can even be a good self-defense weapon.
But, they can also kill unnecessarily.
When they kill unnecessarily, they have ended up with the wrong people. We have to do everything possible to make sure guns and the wrong people are parted.
We used to ask whether a gadget was a tool or a toy. In today’s world, we have to ask whether a gadget is a useful tool or a weapon.
Let’s use every tool in our box in its designed constructive way. Let’s not use them to deliberately injure people or property.
Writing implements don’t misspell, but AI can. Cars don’t drive drunk, but AI can make self-driving cars move erratically if not functioning properly. Eating utensils do not make one fat, unless they are used (by people) too often.
So, let’s tool up for the common good, not the individual evil.
Peter