Is anyone considering the enormous but largely unrecognized impact of the currently accepted worldview in terms of developing and using AI?
It is clear that AI will play an important role in shaping the future. The quality of that future will depend, in large part, on the values instilled in the AI agents released into the world by AI developers.
The dominant worldview today is that people and things exist separately and independently. This common assumption diverges from the scientific view of reality which understands phenomena, including us, as existing interdependently.
The reason that this matters in the field of AI is that the values inherent in the two views of existence are very different and it is values that drive behaviours. The values of the independent worldview are based on the erroneous assumption of the existence of independent phenomena. The results of operating according to these values are evident in the troubled world we inhabit today.
Values arising from the interdependent nature of existence are, on the other hand, life-affirming and are implicit in an understanding of the implications of this worldview.
AI agents trained on data representing the values of our current misunderstanding of the nature of existence will perpetuate the problems inherent in that misunderstanding.
However, a different outcome would be possible if measures were taken to ensure that the values of the interdependent worldview (cooperation, sustainability, inclusion, compassion, justice for all, diversity, etc.) were represented in the training of AI agents.
To a great extent our future is in the hands of the developers of AI. I hope they are taking the interdependent nature of our existence into account.