Truth Decay

Why would anyone ever invite a vampire into their home?

They are no masters of disguise. Their ghastly faces and glistening fangs make it clear to anybody that they are not to be trusted. And yet, in tale after tale, the innocent blindly allow these creatures to enter through their front doors, only for them to inevitably feast upon their hosts.

Despite being biologically hardwired to recognise danger, there are some things humankind should fear, but doesn’t. While vampires may be a myth, these dangers are not. Amongst them, perhaps the most relevant monster we face in the modern time, dubbed “Artificial Intelligence”.

It’s not the first misnomer in human history. In the case of ChatGPT for example, what we’re really talking about is a Large Language Model, or an LLM. It’s only as ‘intelligent’ as the source material from which it sources information, often without permission or inaccurately.

But there’s a reason every multi-billion-dollar company has rushed to spend obscene amounts of money on developing these models. There’s a reason you have direct access to the most popular generative tools at the click of a button, often completely free. After decades of pushback against their attempts to infringe on our privacy and sell off our information to data brokers across the globe, society has, pretty swiftly, jumped onboard the biggest reach of these corporations into our personal lives.

Families have already been torn apart. Socially awkward people have driven themselves deeper and deeper into isolation. Religious zealots have been given enough validation to start dozens of cults across the country. Every job application, not to mention every job listing, is written by an AI, sorted by an AI, and turned down with an AI-written email. It’s in your phone, in your software, on your favourite websites – and for a lot of people, it goes wherever you go.

It is our lack of resistance, our inability to help ourselves from using these tools to expand our imagination, realise our ideas and overcome difficult tasks, that fuels the motivation of these corporate forces to keep this going at full speed. The pale, gaunt man is flashing his fangs at our doorstep, and we’re stepping aside and waving him into our homes.

I believe a considerable amount of people have their doubts and fears about AI. As time goes on, new studies are revealing potential cerebral decline as a result of using generative AI frequently. But as it becomes an essential part of our lives, whether we like it or not, it becomes harder and harder to take a stance against this growing trend without actively using and supporting it in some fashion. Out of fear of being labelled a hypocrite, many remain silent.

If you denounce AI, you have to swear it off forever, and everyone around you seems to benefit more from its use than you could ever through simple dedication and hard work. Nobody wants to be left behind.

How many stories has humankind written about the risks and fears of Artificial Intelligence? How many times across all of science fiction and horror has the story of our inevitable demise been linked to our obsession to develop technology faster than we can learn to use it responsibly?

And yet, here we are.