Artificial Intelligence Is Less Than It Seems, and Will Not Save or Destroy Us (But I Could Be Wrong)

With commentary and an afterword by Fred Mueller.

Will artificial general intelligence (AGI) transform the experience of being human, opening up possibilities of knowledge, achievement, and prosperity that we can now barely conceive?

Or is AGI an existential threat to humanity, something to be feared and restrictively confined?

Erik J. Larson, in a fascinating book entitled The Myth of Artificial Intelligence, says “neither.” I agree. AGI, if it is ever achieved, will be an illusion created by very fast computers, very big data, and very clever programmers. The promise or threat of AGI is hype. Lesser kinds of AI are real and need to be reckoned with. I’ll set forth a hierarchy of AI types in a moment.