One Hundred Percent AI-Free!

I am old enough to remember a humorous theoretical problem that asked something to the effect of how many years would it take a group of monkeys sitting at typewriters to crank out the works of Shakespeare. Fast forward to today, in the age of machine learning, and the questions are barely theoretical and the time frame horrifyingly immediate. How long before artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms make writers and other artists obsolete?

My one and only avatar, courtesy of my partner, Heidi, running an image through a popular filter in 2021

There is a lot to unpack here, and if you have not devoted time to follow digital and technological advances, you have some catching up to do. I am grateful there are watchdogs like Sean Thomas, who recently wrote an illuminating overview (but dark forecast) in The Spectator.Maggie Appleton penned an even more thoughtful summary in her blog. Few of us in the creative fields pay close enough attention to these things, if only in part because we do not want to know how threatening it truly is.

Artificial intelligence, as it applies to artistic endeavors in general, only came on to my own radar when friends in social media, namely Facebook, began to post about how AI images are generated. My understanding is that the algorithms are “trained” through exposure to countless existing images, overwhelmingly created by living, breathing humans. This is a form of data mining that does not credit its sources. An AI image is essentially a composite of an unknown number of previous images that informed its digital genesis. With no credit, let alone compensation, to the original artists, this is tantamount to theft.

The technology is also quickly outpacing the ability of governments to regulate it. Heck, most people in the U.S. Congress are probably blissfully unaware of it. This has not escaped the notice of the legal community, though, and a class-action lawsuit was filed recently on behalf of artists whose works were used without authorization by an AI program known as Stable Diffusion.

Ironically, and perhaps tragically, a previous legal case, Author’s Guild v. Google, resulted in a favorable decision for Google Books, which took substantial liberties in providing free “previews” of text and images for books in its search engine. Shoot, I thought that was a great thing at the time the Kaufman Field Guide to Insects of North America came out. Only a couple of spreads of plates and text would have sufficed, though.

I hate to be a cynic, but it seems apparent that corporations ultimately want a world with nothing but consumers. Everything on the production side they want automated, or at least outsourced at poverty wages. Material wealth is for CEOs and majority shareholders. Never mind that without earning a living, there can be no consumers. That is an afterthought in this day and age. Advertising copy and imagery will soon be done by computer, and does art serve any other purpose anyway?

To the best of my ability, I will be avoiding anything AI, and will not use it in creating my own writing and photography. Heck, I do not even use Grammarly, maybe because I am fortunate to have friends who are better editors than I am. They will not hesitate to message me with anything that needs correcting. Meanwhile, I will be a happy agitator for the rights of all individual human beings, especially those who are creators. Let not the corporate voices drown out the disadvantaged and underrepresented. Not on my watch.

I want to give special thanks to my friends and colleagues who originally provided the links cited here: Gwen Pearson, J.C. Scott, Steve Taylor, and Jonathan Kochmer.

Big, Urgent Things

© nytimes.com

The Green New Deal proposed by Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and her fellow Democrats is an ambitious plan for a revolution in energy, agriculture, but it might benefit from a complementary "retrolution" that brings citizens together through more localized economies. We still need technology to keep advancing, but it should be focused more specifically on areas of critical concern.

Necessary Social Change

What we need most desperately are social changes. We need to rebuild trust in each other. Distrust, to the point where we now assume the worst about anyone we have not met personally, drives the divide in this nation, fuels the proliferation of firearms, and erodes the fabric of historically beneficial institutions like churches and children's organizations.

We also need to question the accepted meanings of words used by politicians to galvanize or provoke us. Prosperity and wealth, for example, are currently viewed strictly through economic and financial lenses. The result is that we see everything, and everyone, as potential for making money for corporations. Land, if it cannot be "developed," is deemed worthless. Species which cannot feed us or otherwise work for us, are considered disposable. This has to stop. Even as human life is labeled "priceless," our soldiers are expendable products of the military-industrial complex.

Ok, so what about the other issues we face, like climate change, the future of energy, and our growing population?

Develop Alternative Fuels For Transportation

So far, our technology and innovation is lagging here. Electric cars may be the goal in the immediate future, but if the original energy source is still a coal-fired power plants, then are we really making progress? Solar and wind need to feed our car batteries as well as our homes and businesses. Why should this be such a grave concern, beyond the obvious carbon emissions? Look at how much our economy depends on delivery today. Not only are we transporting ourselves, we are transporting others as Uber and Lyft drivers, transporting food from restaurants, and transporting durable goods, all to individual households. The proliferation of delivery services is using a great deal of fuel.

Scale Down Almost Everything

Think about it. Scaling down everything from agriculture and banking to our own living spaces and appetites would do wonders for the world. There are signs of hope beyond the "tiny house" movement. Community gardens are sprouting in many cities. Many neighborhoods have a farmer's market where one can buy direct from local farmers. Some restaurants are serving more modest portions to cut down on food waste, an epidemic problem in the U.S. Credit unions are becoming an attractive alternative to big banks. Young people are demanding walkable neighborhoods where they can live, work, shop, and recreate without a long commute. The village is the new city, or will be soon.

Create a Reciprocal Power Grid

We should have this already. Surely the technology exists, but as long as utility companies value profit above all else, any progress on a reciprocal grid is unlikely. The good news is that there are rural electrical cooperatives where this could be tried experimentally. Again, the smaller the scale, the better it is likely to work. Every business and home that wants one could purchase solar panels or a modest wind turbine (even a bird-friendly design). Any excess power would be diverted to a substation. At times when producing energy is not feasible, or personal demand is greater, the energy would flow from substation back to the business or home. Seems plausible from my armchair, anyway.

Begin a Dialogue on Human Population Growth

Start the conversation, that is all that we can ask. Ok, maybe stop insisting that it is a woman's purpose or "duty" to bear children. The social pressure on women to produce babies is overwhelming, disrespectful, stressful, and no one's business but the woman's. We are fed with political- and media-generated hype that the economy will die if we do not feed the labor force. Baloney. What the business world fears is not a lack of producers, but a dearth of consumers. More jobs are being automated, while others are outsourced overseas. That is not likely to change. Here again is another reason to return to mom-and-pop enterprise, local, small-scale businesses that can be held accountable, that will reward you for loyalty, and that are an integral part of the community. Corporations may want more and more people, but we passed the carrying capacity of the planet some time ago.

The Retrolution is Possible

Nostalgia is not what should lead us to a plan for a better future, but we can take lessons from bygone eras while our elders are still around to teach us what worked and what did not. Meanwhile, let us stop aspiring to gratuitous material wealth. The combined effect of individuals living more frugally would have great impact on every major problem associated with our currently overindulgent consumer culture. A meaningful life stems more from personal relationships, involvement in community, travel, adventures in nature, physical activity, and spiritual reflection, than from financial excess....or is that just me?

I'm on the Edge....of Irrelevance

I happened upon a recent Wired article chronicling the writer's self-imposed demotion from a smart phone to a flip phone, and it got me revisiting my own philosophy of technology, which is a product of both intent and financial hardship, with a dose of reluctance for good measure.

I wrote about some aspects of technology in this post, but let me speak more personally as to why I draw the lines where I do. My first reaction to the Wired piece was that it was a flawed experiment in that the writer was regressing from a smart phone to a "dumb phone" as opposed to never having had a smart phone in the first place, which is my situation.

I had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the cell phone era. The breaking point came the nth time my flight was delayed or cancelled and I had no way to reach my party on the receiving end to tell them I would not be arriving in a timely manner. I was still reluctant to make the expenditure for a phone, battery, and calling plan, but it was getting embarrassing and impolite to beg the use of a stranger's device. Consequently, I purchased the cheapest phone, and a pay-as-you-go service.

To this day, I run out of "service days" far more regularly than I run out of minutes. Our household still has a land line, with unlimited long distance (no "roaming" fees), that I rely on for the overwhelming majority of telecommunication aside from e-mails. I briefly flirted with an upgraded phone that had an uncovered keyboard, but after I accidentally pocket-dialed a friend in Massachusetts, I went back to a flip phone and here I am.

One Christmas my wife got me a tablet as a gift. After the futility and frustration of trying to scroll and accidentally connecting to unwanted website after unwanted advertisement, and the aggravation of automatic word suggestions while texting or posting, I gave up. That was about three days in. I am all thumbs when it comes to anything smaller than a full-sized keyboard.

There are many benefits to having sub-forefront technology. The greatest of these might be the deterrent to theft. If a burglar had ever entered my prior residences, he or she would have taken a look around and screamed something to the effect of "Are you KIDDING me?!" and maybe an expletive, before storming out. Had they managed to haul off the television, recovering the unit would be a simple matter of calling around to hospitals to see if anyone had come in with a severe back injury. My laptop is so outdated that even I no longer use it. My desktop is over seven years old, and the various cords too tangled for a hurried criminal to untangle. I am still running Windows 7. This is all exactly how I like it: Technology that gets me through, is still supported and serviced, and not new enough to be attractive to thieves.

Another benefit to not carrying a smart phone or tablet or notebook or whatever they are calling the latest thing is that I am forced to unplug when I am out of my home. I am compelled to interact with other people in the flesh, pay attention to my surroundings, and experience the unadulterated reality of the here-and-now. Yes, sometimes it is boring. So what? If you have to be entertained all the time or, increasingly, feel obligated to entertain others via social media, then you might want to re-examine your life. Take a breath. Smell the flowers. People-watch. Wildlife watch.

I can assure you I do not relate any of this to paint myself as superior, or inferior, or out of touch with the realities of the digital universe. Indeed, I find this Age to be a wonder, but I also wonder whether we are losing sight of things that truly matter, whether we are still engaging one another in meaningful relationships, and whether we are losing touch with the natural world. I am fortunate enough to know people who balance flesh-and-blood and digital worlds perfectly, so I have hope. Meanwhile, if you need to reach me on my travels, good luck. I use Tracfone, and isn't that everyone's punchline for any joke about irrelevance?

Alone Like Never Before

My wife just got us an ECHO™ device. I was not consulted, at least not while I was paying attention, but it got me thinking about the deepening and darkening trend toward the total isolation of the American household, the individual U.S. citizen. Freedom has come to mean freedom from others, and social media aside, that should be disturbing to you.

Advertisers don't frame it this way, of course. They paint these newer technologies as the latest in "convenience." I suppose so, but they conveniently omit the loss of labor from the self-checkout at the supermarket, the fresh air you aren't breathing and the exercise you aren't getting when you call Grubhub or DoorDash, your lack of daily education that comes from interacting with other people face to face, in person.

Can't be bothered conversing with an Uber or Lyft driver? No problem, driverless taxicabs are on the horizon. Where will this end? At what point do we say no, I can do that myself? It is all I can do to tolerate hotel personnel waiting on me hand and foot when I am at one of the fancier establishments. I am not helpless, and I didn't get where I am as a writer by asking Alexa or Google for everything. Back in the day I had to go to a library. I still do, but not as often as I should, and so I miss out on local happenings because I fail to go up the street regularly and see what community announcements they have posted. Shame on me.

I can see where this is going, and it is very clever. Eventually there will be Republican Alexa, Fox News Alexa, Gangsta Alexa, Zionist Alexa....and maybe their counterparts of Democrat, CNN, Folk Alexa, and Agnostic Alexa. Why be unduly inconvenienced by different opinions, religions, cultures, and whatnot? Who needs that baggage? The answer, of course, is that we all do.

While we are talking to our home devices, our Senators and Representatives are talking to lobbyists and corporate interests and making deals that further undermine our rights as workers, consumers, voters, and taxpaying citizens. Alexa is not going to remind you of that. You eventually won't know the rules until you unwittingly break one. Right now, Blacks and Hispanics are all too familiar with this scenario, but sooner or later so will you unless you leave your comfort zone, at least periodically.

People fear the wrong thing from the in-home devices. They think these are stealth machines, surveillance products we have been duped into buying ourselves! Don't you know they are listening to our every word, recording our every action if you have one of those portal thingies, and otherwise invading our privacy? Not likely, though I trust that the manufacturers are listening to find out what else they can sell us.

The real fear we should have in our constant isolation is the erosion of empathy. You cannot relate to others if you don't share experiences. You cannot acknowledge wrongs to others, or validate their trauma, if you do not bear witness firsthand. That was the power of the Civil Rights movement. Comfortable people finally opened their eyes and what they saw shook them.

We need another breakthrough like that, and something sustainable that rejects not technology but the agenda behind it. The future of products and services, as the corporate world sees it, is in cutting us off from each other, automating marketing based on our prior consumer choices. No other input necessary, but thank you for the Yelp review, and "checking in" on Facebook so that we can start a marketing campaign for other individuals. Oooh, look at this bright and shiny new gizmo while we beg Congress for more tax breaks and subsidies that will go to our CEOs and shareholders rather than into properly compensating our employees, providing healthcare and other benefits, testing our products for safety, and making our factories safer, cleaner, and less impactful on the environment. Don't look behind the curtain at our lobbyists arguing for relaxed industrial emissions, looser labor laws, and reduced consumer safety standards.

One day soon I may toss our ECHO into the trash, or at least take it to a thrift store, though I hate to encourage the proliferation of these gadgets. Meanwhile, Alexa? Tell my wife I love her and that I forgive her for the error of your purchase.

Faith in Technology

Last week a friend in Hawaii broadcast on Facebook the alarming....well, alarm, he received on his cell phone, informing him and everyone in the state of the impending arrival of a ballistic missile. Turns out it was indeed "not a drill," but not a military attack, either. It got me thinking about how much we take technology for granted, and how we seldom think about its weaknesses.

The false alarm this time was mostly human error. During a shift-change training exercise, an employee at the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency simply selected the wrong option on a dropdown menu on his computer monitor. Naturally, there was no option for issuing a false alarm broadcast after the alarm was triggered. That has since been added via a "cancellation template," but maybe a dropdown menu is not the best format, either.

The mistake was then compounded by the delay in rescinding the false warning. The warning went out at 8:07 AM on January 13, and was not officially retracted until 8:45, thirty-eight minutes later. Ok, we are talking about cell phone communications here. Governor David Y. Ige did manage to get a correction out seventeen minutes after the alarm via....Twitter. The Governor would have done that almost instantly, but he had forgotten his Twitter username and password.

There is so much wrong with this event that it is difficult to know where to begin. At least the alarm was sent through every conceivable media outlet, from radio and television to mobile devices and digital freeway signs. What if you happened to be somewhere that those technologies did not reach? Some people who did shelter as instructed found themselves in locations without a cell phone signal. So, they did not receive word directly of the error.

Consider also the fact that most of our communication systems in use today require power. Forget to charge your phone on this fateful day? Oops. Were there a power outage, how reliable are backup generators and other emergency power sources? Please tell me you have backups, Hawaii Emergency Management Agency. Hello? I will assume the best scenario for now, thank you.

© TheFirearmsForum.comNot funny, but can't you see this happening?

The other troublesome aspect of this that jumps out at me is the assumption that every citizen in the state of Hawaii has the same level of technology at their disposal for receiving emergency warnings. Even if you have an iPhone or a an android smart phone, what if you draw the line at Twitter, or some other app that is crucial to the receipt of emergency information? I am assuming the state is not issuing phones and apps to all of their residents and tourists. The choices you make could conceivably get you killed. I know my father would likely not have fared well. He is not friendly to computers and related gadgets, and he is so hard of hearing that even a siren might escape his notice. Hope there are some good Samaritans out there in emergencies like this.

Technological applications can not only amplify existing vulnerabilities in the devices and materials they are applied to, but they bring with them their own special vulnerabilities to hacking and misuse and, yes, simple error. There are historical cases of pre-digital era mistakes that have almost caused the U.S. and the former Soviet Union to launch their ballistic missiles. I hardly want to contemplate what scenarios could take place given the "advances" in code that we have now.

I am not advocating that we all become Luddites, but somewhere between an outright rejection of contemporary technology and advocating that it be applied to everything, there is a happy medium. Right now we are putting the lives of those who choose, and can afford, the latest gadgets and software ahead of those who do not have hundreds or thousands of dollars to throw at the latest and greatest phones and tablets. Those who seek a life without the daily stress that social media and technology burdens us with are left in the lurch in instances like this missile warning. Good luck to us all.

Hanging up the Phone

It dawned on me the other day that I do not like talking on the telephone anymore. The reasons for this are many, from technological "advances" to deteriorating hearing (mine and others), and the exploitation of the telephone for marketing purposes.

Our household land line (yes, we still have one!) receives very few phone calls directed specifically to us from friends, business associates and clients, and family. The overwhelming majority of calls are from charities telling us "We will have a truck in your area on (insert date here) if you have items to donate," political surveys, and, worst of all, pre-recorded messages also of a political or financial nature. Our favorite recurring recording begins "Fellow seniors...." Since I have been on the other end of phone surveys, I often comply with those requests if they are polite and I can understand the person asking the questions.

I do have a cell phone, and, as my wife will tell you, I loathe it. Were it not for the situation of being stranded at airports on a routine basis, I would dispense with a mobile phone altogether. I certainly don't feel the need to be "connected" at all times with the internet, or even friends or family.

I have a flip phone now because I kept accidentally dialing people with a newer phone; and I dropped the newer phone once and after that it would randomly display a useless, pure white screen preventing me from dialing out, reading text messages, etc. Oh, and even my flip phone has buttons on the side that do God-knows-what, that I inadvertently press simply by putting the phone in my pocket. My wife claims to call me, but I don't hear or feel the blame thing ring half the time.

I do call my mother every Sunday night, but I must admit that I don't always look forward to it, if only because I have to repeat everything I say at least once. Hearing loss is a part of aging, obviously, but it really becomes tiresome and frustrating trying to correct my mother's interpretation of the name of the place we spent the weekend, or whatever. But, mom does not have the internet, so I can't e-mail. She doesn't have a cell, so I can't text (and I am about the world's slowest texter anyway).

I am truly surprised, and perhaps a little disappointed, to admit that I would rather communicate by e-mail, or even Facebook messaging, instead of by phone or written correspondence. Don't get me wrong, though, I would still choose a face-to-face conversation over any of the above. I suppose that when fewer and fewer e-mails come from friends and colleagues, and politically-motivated e-mails start dominating my in-box, I may go back to the telephone and letter carrier, or cease to communicate altogether. I'm sure some people would be overjoyed by my silence.

Of Birds and Blades

I like birds, I really do. I am also a strong proponent of renewable energy like solar and wind power. Imagine my dismay at finding many of my birding friends denouncing the huge wind farms popping up all over the place these days. Ok, the objections are mostly concerning the location of the big turbines, but the arguments are not going to end well if taken out of context as the press is prone to do.

There are two problems that occur to me immediately. One, if “environmentalists” first object to traditional energy sources like coal, gas, and oil, but then start whining about commercial pursuit of alternative energy, they lose credibility and are dismissed as “NIMBYs” (Not in my Backyard). Secondly, if we invest too heavily or too quickly in a technology that demonstrates itself to have severe detrimental side effects, then we are back to square one on all fronts.

No question, oil, coal, and gas involve truly horrific extraction procedures and equally risky transportation methods. Time and again we have seen the outcome in the form of petroleum-soaked pelicans, black beaches, mountain-top removals, and other disasters. Virtually anything is better than that. A recent online article and chart from Mother Jones purports to show that wind turbines kill just a few birds compared to the mortality inflicted by…..cats.

Naturally, any bird fatalities attributable to humans, or their pets, is intolerable to many in the birding community. Here is another article, in PDF file format, that offers statistics on bird fatalities associated with cell phone towers. There seems to be no end to the number of ways we are killing our fauna, including automobiles, airplanes, and wanton executions at the end of (insert random weapon here).

I am not saying I am in favor of preventable slaughter. There are alternative designs for wind-driven devices that harness power. Raymond Green has created one that looks promising. The roadblocks to its manufacture at any scale will undoubtedly come from the companies making money with the status quo. That is what must change: Our corporate addiction to whatever is making money at the cost of everything else. We need industries to be flexible to accommodate new findings and better ideas that benefit humanity as a whole, and are sustainable.

I will continue supporting wind energy, and promote safer designs. I will also always love cats, but agree that they should be kept indoors, and/or walked on a leash. I will also continue opposing the stock market as the driving force of our society. It is driving alright, driving down wages, driving through consumer rights, and driving our natural environment to hell. I’m all ears when it comes to an alternative to that.