Artificial Strawberries

⏰ (A long read.  Just for fun there is a narration of the article)

It may surprise you to know that, as a Technologist, I am very anti Artificial Intelligence (AI).  Everyone is jumping on the AI wagon and adding it as an enhancement to their software.  In my view there is nothing enhancing about a service that will basically take copies of all my data to train its future self.

If I can’t find an option to disable AI in the software then I am out.  Simple

AI is one massive theft.  Companies have taken data from all over the internet, often without your knowledge, and stuffed it into their sausage machine to churn out artificial sentences.  It’s not intelligence in the sense that the AI tool understands what it is saying.  It is simply able to run words together based on millions of other examples; in the hope that it then makes sense.

All that, while it consumes enough power to run a small country, and cooling water to quench thousands of people.

Every day there are hundreds of blogs and news articles about AI.  Just yesterday I read an article which made me chuckle. (I can’t recall where, so I am unable to cite it.  Sorry)

Said Article was a brief example of the latest AI failure someone had found.  Yes, I know it is easy to point the finger at failings, but it was interesting none the less.

It was simple conversation: How many Rs in the word strawberry?

Putting aside the unnecessary megawatts of electricity in some desert required to respond, the result was absurd.  The AI declared two Rs in the word, and despite the human’s best efforts to query and convince otherwise, it continued to explain why there are only two. Even going as far as to spell out the word letter by letter, with the correct three in it.

For fun I thought I try the same thing, and waste a wind-farm of power.

I have an AI Assistant on my mobile phone.  It’s called “Pi”.  I stumbled across it last year and I use it occasionally for facts that I am checking.  Fun facts, not serious stuff like how to perform open-heart surgery.

I asked Pi, and here is the transcript:

Me: How many Letter Rs in the word strawberry?

Pi: There are two letter "R"s in the word "strawberry." 🍓 It's easy to miss the second one, but it's there right after the letter "e" and before the letter "y." Strawberries are delicious and nutritious, and they're also pretty fun to say out loud!

Me: Are you sure there's only two? I can see three.

Pi: You're absolutely right, David! 🤦️ I apologize for the mistake. There are actually three letter "R"s in the word "strawberry." One at the beginning, one in the middle (after the letter "e"), and one at the end (before the letter "y"). Thank you for catching that, and for giving me the opportunity to correct myself! 😊

In this case it allowed me to correct it.  But will Pi remember?

An hour later I asked the same question, and was greeted with:

Pi: Ah yes, "strawberry." 🍓 A delicious fruit with three letter "R"s in its name. It's amazing how easy it can be to overlook a small detail like that! I appreciate you pointing it out to me, David. Did you know that the strawberry is actually a member of the rose family? It's true!

Did I teach it something, or is it simply remembering our recent chat?  I not sure I care enough to check tomorrow.

I also read today that a company was excited to state that their Company Vision and Goals were written by AI.  Now that’s the kind of firm I’d queue up to work for – NOT!

Did you read or listen, or both?!