Break open the black box
I am reading a very important book, Code Dependant – Living in the Shadow of AI, by Madhumita Murgia.
The black box of AI cannot remain a black box. Light must get in.
One of the surprising things I learned, which screams so loud as the Middle East is hell-bent on annihilation, is a moment called the Rome Call.
In January 2023, leaders of the Catholic, Muslim, and Jewish faiths met in Rome and signed an agreement to commit to AI ethics.
Once upon a time it was the religions that held power. The Taliban flex their might against women’s rights. But so do the evangelical Christians in the USA. It could be argued that the Zionist lobby holds the USA for ransom to this day. They appear to do the same in Australia.
Yet the order of things has changed. Religions have lost their grip on power, and the tech titans now hold the keys. A few men, wrapped in the robes of incredible power, are drunk on the hubris of being able to flick a switch and have billions of people be caught in a carefully designed spell.
The media empires spew out propaganda. But they too, must bend the knee to the tech titans who manipulate the algorithm to suit whatever they feel like on the day.
All the while, in the poorest countries in the world, those at the edge of survival, are paid peanuts to do the hard work of building the intelligence behind AI. Slavery and colonisation are alive and well. Right under our noses, as we rush to use the tool that promises unparalleled gold for humanity.
We have been here before, more than once. Different costumes, different technology. Same craze for power and blood.
The Abrahamic religions – those convening for the Rome Call – have confessed that they know their past has been awash with blood. Why now do they take a stand for ethics?
Their relevance in the future will not be power. They fight a far greater power.
So, they turn to ethics.
The irony is not lost. Yet the deed they convene together to do is good.
Some sanity against a backdrop of off-the-charts insanity.
I am grateful for this. The seed they have generated must become a global citizens movement.
It will take us all to break open the black box and refuse subjugation to exploitation, colonisation and extraction to extinction once again.
Photo Taken September 30th 2024
