Seductive AI

AI has always been thought of in one of two ways: violent overlord, or benevolent savior in a world moving faster than humans can keep up with. However, while we’ve been concerned with ferocious domination, we’ve already started along a path of soft oppression. It’s not about domination, but seduction. There is no doubt that AI is useful, but “being highly useful is the subtlest form of seduction there is.” In this Broadside, Glenn Harlan Reynolds explores how AI need only take advantage of innate human characteristics – exactly as we programmed it to do – to wreak havoc on society as the most subtle of overlords: anticipating our needs, pleasuring us with tailored “sex bots,” isolating us through convenience, and ultimately thinking for us. Eventually, we may not be able to do – nor even imagine doing – anything without AI. To avoid this trap, we must understand what AI is doing to us, even as it does things for us.