I know what you are probably thinking...
ChatGPT and I'm going to talk about AI and it's going to either save us or enslave us all.
Actually I think we have a bigger problem/opportunity that's in front of us already and I literally never hear anyone talk about this, because we are all focused on being destroyed by the Terminator or being unemployed and homeless.
You see, ever since the beginning of the "Information Revolution", there has been a strong focus on developing technology just for the sake of developing technology. While many things of course would benefit humans, it wasn't necessarily important that it would actually do so. If it was shiny enough and new enough and dazzled enough people, then that alone would be enough for that technology to gain acceptance and be pushed out to many people.
I believe we have a tremendous opportunity in front of us though. There is a whole category of science that is focused on what it means to be human. Many times this science gets downgraded in society because it's only "soft science". Many times psychology, sociology, politics or anthropology get discounted because there is a lot of question about how do these disciplines actually move us forward. Many times it's hard to measure progress with these sciences because there isn't hard numbers that we can look at and see concrete progress. However, these fields should not be ignored because they directly affect the human condition.
Imagine the things that we could accomplish if we were able to integrate technology more with psychology. We could help improve people's psychological condition, whether they start from a good point or not, in a very noninvasive way. Many times we hear about how maybe technology is affecting people's psychology in a negative way, through too much screen time or social networking's impact on the brain. Instead, maybe we can use technology to help people to examine the things that bother them, make them worry, scare them, or cause problems in their relationships. We can do this in a way that is engaging and not intimidating.
We also have access to big data. What if we were to start to analyze the types of videos that get posted online, try to map those to certain locations on a map and then try to ask some questions about those relationships? What could we learn from the world around us if we did those things and then had a discussion about these questions?
The thought here is not to make people feel like they are only being examined or psychoanalyzed, but actually looking to see if we can solve some of the bigger issues in our world. While it's always nice to have a nice shiny new gadget, imagine if that gadget could help us with the real problems in our lives.
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