Distinguishing between AI and BS not always easy

By: Eli Amdur
Vantage Point
NorthJersey.com
06/18/2023

..... First, let's make suer we're talking about the same thing. Yes AI is artificial intelligence and yes, BS is well, y'know... (Can't print it here.)
..... Problem is, they're often the same thing. Last Wednesday, [06/14/2023] I singed on an IA site - and it took me all of four minutes to catch the first error, or untruth, or ... BS (which is mu like it).
..... I asked the bot, "When did Albert Einstein meet Sigmund Freud?"
..... Back came this answer, instantly: "Albert Einstein and Sigmund Freud met on several occasions to discuss various topics, including science psychology, and philosophy. Their most notable meeting took place in February 27, 1927, in Vienna, Austria.
..... Two sentences, two mistakes. According to Richard Panek, science writer, journalist, and author of the fascinating book The Invisible Century: Einstein, Freud and the search for Hidden Universes (2004) - the two met only once and, yes, it was in February 1927; however, they met in Vienna but in Berlin, at the home of one of Freud's sons.
..... Subsequently, Einstein was asked if he'd consider being psychoanalyzed; he quickly replied, ",,,I should like very much to reanimate in the darkness of not having been analyzed." Freud reflected "He understands about much about psychology as I do about physics, so we had a very pleasant talk."
..... And that was that.
..... But given that these two giant made significant discoveries of things forever invisible but forever verifiable - relativity and the ego - it's reasonable to suspect that there were more meetings.
..... So which story is correct? I'll go with the scholar on this one. Of histrionic note here, however, the two did carry on a correspondence through 1932, but that one visit in 1927 was the only time they were in the same room at the same time.
..... What's the point here? Simply that AI, which has - in no time flat - gotten in your face, is also sneaking up behind you. That it came up with the answer so quickly and continued with a well-written tale, complete with folksy asides and embellishments, made it appear authoritative, unassailable. had I not read Panek's book, the bot would have out this one over on me. and on you.
..... In the world AI, in which content is generated - actually created - this is called Hallucinating. AI simply made up parts of the answer and, like a good BS-er, kept going. Which brings us to the obvious need to have a good working definition of BS. For this I turn to another scholar, Harry G. Frankfurt, Professor of Philosophy emeritus at Princeton, whose books - On BS [He spells it out] and On Truth (2005, 2006) - should be on everyone's bookshelf.
..... Professor Frankfort begins the first of these two books like this: "One of the most salient features of our culture is that there is so much BS. [Again he spells it out,) Soon there after he offers his definition of BS, also referred to as humbug: "deceptive misrepresentation short of lying, especially by pretentious word or deed, of somebody's own thoughts, feelings, or attitudes."
..... He's right. There really is so much BS - an without much help from AI yet. Heaven help us! We've hardly started!
..... Why can AI get away with this - and with so much else? Never mind the sinister humans who are purposely trying to overturn the current world order: bad actors, we call them. Let's just stay with the more innocent stuff for now.
..... Take your pick of any of these or a combination of some or maybe a brew of them all (10 Lack of critical thinking, which seems to have evaporated from school curricula at all levels. (2) Laziness or inertia. A body at rest tends to stay at rest unless... You know that one. (3) Indifference. If we don't care, it just doesn't matter. any result is OK. (4) Intellectual malaise, self-inflicted, mostly. (5) Comfort, the need for an answer, no matter its veracity. (6) Obsession with technology. just gotta have it, no matter what we do with it. Let the Joneses keep up with us for a change. (7) Atrophied attention spans. Jack Russell puppies pay attention longer than most of us, and we've got instant gratification suppliers like browsers and apps to thank for that. (8) Thinking it;s all one big game. It's not.
..... And that's not BS.

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