Blog Post #9: The Age of A.I. 

After watching Frontline's documentary, "In the Age of AI," I learned many new things. The first thing that stood out to me was the dotcom crash of 2000. Before watching this documentary, I had never heard of that or had even thought that a dotcom could crash financially. Time Magazine said the dotcom market grew slowly until it suddenly crashed. This was surprising to discover. Something else that surprised me was the origin story of Google and how its founders were against ad revenue. I cannot imagine Google today or any other internet browser without ads. There would be no other way for them to make an income. The most frightening thing I learned during this documentary was the surveillance state that the nation of China is described as. I had known of their overbearing political leader as well as their treatment of Uyghur Muslims. Still, I had no idea the country was slowly inserting its technology into other countries.

The Positive's and Negative's of AI

There are some positives to the increased use of AI in our world. It can help keep us safe by scanning faces to ensure that very dangerous people are not walking around with us, but at the same time, those scanners scan every person and store data they do not need to have. This plays into China's usage of a surveillance state and how they separate Uyghur Muslims from the rest of the country's population and watch everyone in the country. As the documentary states, it has created a situation where everyone trails data. 

 

Another negative of AI is that it perpetuates inequalities. It takes away jobs that used to be run by people, such as cashiers and causes more prominent technology companies to buy up smaller ones, thus creating a monopoly. AI is slowly changing how our economy works, not for the better. It makes the rich more prosperous and the poor poorer, and this will inevitably cause a devastating crash in our economic system. 

 

The documentary also discusses that our nation's democracy is threatened by AI unless social norms are changed. AI is widely accepted nowadays, but people need to realize that, as with most technological innovations, there are upsides but also downsides. 

 

One example of this is how AI is changing the system of education. So many people use ChatGPT to complete assignments nowadays, and it is altering how teachers deliver lessons and how assignments are evaluated for plagiarism. ChatGPT can greatly help educators if appropriately used, but most students view this as an easy way to finish homework. It is discussed that long-term usage of ChatGPT puts students at a disadvantage as they may be making good grades, but they are no longer thinking for themselves and are putting themselves at risk for academic punishment. 

 

AI can be a handy tool, but like most new technological advancements, it can also be perilous. We can see this in countries like China and our own through forced economic disparity and threats to how our government operates democratically. AI may keep us safe at times, but at the same time, it could be contributing to our downfall. 

 

Works Cited

Geier, Ben. “Tech Stocks and the 2000 Dotcom Bust: 15 Years of Wall Street Lessons.” Time, Time, 12 Mar. 2015, time.com/3741681/2000-dotcom-stock-bust/.

“In the Age of AI.” YouTube, Frontline, 2 Dec. 2019, www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dZ_lvDgevk.

Kirk, Tom. “CHATGPT, We Need to Talk.” University of Cambridge, 5 Apr. 2023, www.cam.ac.uk/stories/ChatGPT-and-education.