Artificial Intelligence (AI) is certainly making more inroads into everyday life, to the point where we don’t necessarily have to push a button any more, because all we have to do is speak to the compact little unit that makes it all happen and it all happens! Interesting.
So we no longer have to get off the couch if we don’t want to, just speak a command and the TV will come on (could this be the end of losing the remote?), music will play, the phone will call whoever we wish to speak to and the home AI system will even lock doors, turn on lights and send footage from our home security cameras to our phones so we can check what goes on when we’re not there.
It almost rules out having to think too much, doesn’t it? Let alone having to physically do something, and while this may make those who use it (and more people are now) the envy of those who want to but can’t afford the setup yet, I sometimes wonder just how good an idea it really is. Do I really want a little gadget running my life for me? Sure, they look cute and everything, but…is this what I really want?
Okay, so it’s fun and it’s really convenient. Via an AI home system you can send the little vacuuming robot on a whiz around the house while you check the recipe the system has brought up on your kitchen device, or set the kettle to boil while you spend some downtime with a downloaded novel. It can’t bring your coffee to you yet, but give it a couple of years and there will be something that will. It will probably make it for you first!
Hang on, aren’t there coffee machines that already make it for you, from go to whoa, now? Whatever, they still can’t bring it to you at this point. Anyway…
So then, your house is now the coolest one on your block because it does everything for you and all you have to do after a hard day’s slog is come home, walk in and drop into the massage chair. Well sure, that sounds all very nice, but what will you do in regards to general physical activity? You know, as in when you used to move about from A to B to C around the house doing actual things for yourself? Oh that’s right, your AI gadget probably talks to your exercise machines (it definitely will if you have a Google Nest Audio) and all you need to do is verbally direct it and it will set them in motion for you. Heaven forbid you should have to flick a switch or press a button.
Okay, fine! That’s why you went all AI in the first place so that you don’t have to do any flicking or pressing! Whatever!
But the big question for me is this…what happens should your system develop a glitch? Or gets hacked? Like, it cuts off your phone, sets the exercise bike to manic and tells your car not the start? Then it prevents you from initiating the manual override, locks you all inside or worse, locks you all out of your house altogether? You are probably thinking that is just ridiculous but if it’s smart enough to run everything in your house, run your phone and your car, it just might be smart enough to play silly buggers with you, or worse, your AI system decides it doesn’t like you anymore and goes all Twilight Zone on you.
Or the hacker does. Either way, it’s not good.
Personally, I like perusing the old recipe books, the physical ones, when I’m in the mood to create magic in the kitchen. I don’t have issues with pressing buttons or flicking switches, with walking over to the bookshelves and physically selecting a real book to read. I am not put out by having to turn a key in a lock or trot around with the vacuum cleaner and feel comfortable with not wanting or needing to speak to a gadget to make things happen.
Perhaps I’m just too smart for AI.