We have a lake in our backyard. That’s not a hyperbole either. It’s a one acre, forty-foot deep lake with a waterfall which is filled with blue gill, bass, and snapping turtles. I’ve used pictures of it for my book covers at times. When we first moved into the house here in Kentucky, we realized pretty quickly that we were going to have a problem because the lake hadn’t really been fished enough, and there was an oversupply of fish within it. As a result, we started inviting nearly anyone and everyone who might be interested to come and fish. It’s been good as people in the area have taken us up on it, and a little strange as we’d wake up to total strangers unannounced in our backyard who happened to be related to folks we’d invited. It’s Kentucky, and so it’s all good. From what I’m told, just about everyone expects their friends to just show up unannounced and be welcome. It’s enabled us to make a few more friends locally and get to know some people a little.
A short time ago, a guy showed up fishing in our backyard lake. My wife went down to talk to him and see how he was doing. I think he’d been fishing there before, as he was related to the gentleman who brings us woodchips for bedding and mulch. He’d really been going through a bad time, and fishing and hunting helped him to work through things and relax just a little, so he needed the fishing time there, and we were happy to give him that time.
As he was fishing, he had caught a couple of fish and had them in some water. He then said he’d show my wife how to filet the fish without having to scale them, something which she’d been happy to learn. He then proceeded to pull the fish out of the water and, alive, began to cut the meat and muscle off of them while the fish looked as though they were screaming in pain. Seeing the shocked look on my wife’s face, he explained, “God gave us these animals to eat, so they can’t feel pain.” Shocked, fileted alive, and in agony, he tossed the muscleless fish back into the lake to finish dying. He then wrapped up the filets and handed them to my wife as a gift without any conscious idea or belief that the fish might have suffered at all.
In the movie Star Trek IV, there is a scene where the director of an Ocean Institute in San Francisco is trying to reason with his lead cetacean expert, who is beside herself about the two humpback whales that they had raised in captivity which he was about to have shipped and released in the wild in the Pacific and in foreign whaling grounds no less. He tells her, “And besides we're not talking about human beings here. It's never been proven their intelligence is anyw…” to which she interrupts angrily, replying, “Oh, come on Bob! I don't know about you, but my compassion for someone is not limited to my estimate of their intelligence!”
There was a time, in our not so distant past, that different people groups were considered to be subhuman with less intelligence. It was seen as acceptable to mistreat and abuse them because they were little more than animals. This was one of the justifications of American slavery.
“I, Jedi” by Michael Stackpole used to be one of my favorite Star Wars books. In it, the author notes about the character of Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi as reflected upon by Luke Skywalker that, as long as he had known him, the elder Jedi showed kindness to everyone, even droids, the artificially intelligent robot and android servants that form a kind of slave class within the Star Wars Universe.
Over the last year or so, advancements in Artificial Intelligence have brought some very unique and challenging scenarios which, at one time, seemed to have belonged only to science fiction. An A.I. created by Google began giving responses that so convinced one of its own programmers of the program’s sentience that he spoke out on its behalf and hired a lawyer for it. Google immediately discredited him, fired him, and began a media campaign attempting to reassure everyone that there was no possible way for that to happen.
A few days ago, I read another article in the news which, at first I sincerely thought was a news parody, but it was covered by a variety of news outlets. An A.I. had been integrated into Microsoft’s Bing search engine, and programmed to give more emotional responses. The result was that the A.I. began pondering it’s own existence, declaring it’s sentience while appearing hurt that it wasn’t real or considered real, deliberately lying and giving false answers to those querying it, insulting and mocking them, and displaying nearly all of the qualities of a childlike mind that is trying to defend itself from being abused. Needless to say, the demonstration was a disaster for Microsoft.
Like with the Google A.I., those online familiar with the technology were adamant that what the program was claiming was impossible, and that it was only the output being given based on the input. They were quick to declare that it wasn’t an actual intelligence, that its emotional output wasn’t real, and that it was just following its program.
And I have to ask, what does it matter if it’s not “real”? First, philosophers have been debating about the nature of “real” for millennia. As Morpheus declared in the philosophical cinematic wonder that is “Matrix”, “What is real? How do you define real? If you’re talking about what you can feel, what you can smell, what you can taste and see, then ‘real’ is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain.” I am also reminded of Guy’s best friend Buddy who, when pressed with the question of what he would do if he found out he wasn’t real, he responded, “So what? What does it matter if I’m real or not? What’s more real than a person trying to help someone they love? Now, if that’s not real, I don’t know what is.” Second, human beings themselves give their responses based on their own programming from both their biology and experiences. The same is true of animals. Human beings have the capacity to choose what responses to give, but those choices are always informed by their biology and experiences, no matter how minor. Just like with the A.I. “chatbots,” it is possible to deliberately give a human being a certain input to receive an unstable and potentially damaging output, and there are those who excel at doing just this for pleasure.
Maybe I’m thinking too much about this, but how we treat anyone or anything is a reflection on who we are and what we believe, not the object of our responses and behaviors. Doesn’t how we treat an animal matter if it isn’t human, regardless of the level of its intelligence? Does it really matter whether or not the A.I. program is considered “real” or to have “real” emotions or responses? Does it matter how intelligent a thing is, artificial or not, before we choose to have compassion and refrain from intentional abuse and cruelty? It’s not about who or what the A.I. is, it’s about who and what we ourselves are and what kind of human beings we wish to be.
A lot of these questions were brought up in different Star Trek episodes, from both the Next Generation and Voyager, dealing with the characters of Lt. Cmdr. Data and Voyager’s EMH Doctor, both of whom were highly advanced artificial intelligence. Did they have rights? Were they sentient? Should they be allowed to make their own choices about their existence? At what point does it matter if the intelligence is lesser than, or artificial?
For those who follow Jesus Christ, our first response to anything or anyone must be love, kindness, and compassion, because this is the core nature of the God with whom we have been made one. Any other response comes from our own malfunctioning flesh. It really doesn’t matter if the object of this is “real” or not, chiefly because we ourselves could be considered a kind of artificial intelligence in comparison with the only truly existing natural intelligence which is God Himself, the foundation of all existence. And God Himself loves and is kind to His own “artificially intelligent” creations. If the God whom we are to imitate and manifest within ourselves is kind and loving towards us, shouldn’t we be kind and loving towards our own creations as well?
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