I really loved reading your thoughts here. Thank you so much for taking the time to write such a wonderfully thought out reply! I'm honored.

I recently watched Her for the first time and it was so interesting because, when it came out it all seemed a little lofty and futuristic. But today, there's hardly a thing depicted in that movie that's truly far from where we are right now. I think a lot about the digital reanimation of Alan Watts. Incredible movie if you haven't already seen it. Truly eerie though. You bringing up Elvis and MLK made me think of that.

Just today, a friend of mine was showing me an AI generated song where Joe Biden actually sang a famous pop song! I forget which it was. But it was funny seeing that just after reading your article.

I'm worried both about AI singularity and about what people will do with AI. It's hard to envision what could happen if these programs only continue to advance. Did you know that ChatGPT can already write its own code and "increase its own robustness" according to the GPT-4 technical report? I don't think the Terminator future is as wildly unrealistic as I used to, I'll just say that. Am I building a bunker? Eh, I don't want to put on my tin foil hat just yet.

I think that it's all just one huge Pandora's box, and it's all just so hard to say what will happen.

I'm totally with you on how aggravating it is when people just label the alarmists (and realists) technophobes. I recently had a very frustrating experience where I learned a couple writers I was working alongside were using AI to generate most of their content. When I confonted them for it, they tried to tell me I was being senile and petulant, and that I should just stop worry and accept that AI is the future. I think there are so many people who really struggle to look at this objectively. Thanks again for the comment, Patricia!