The Fall of Phaeton

The Fall of Phaeton - Michelangelo Buonarroti 

(Caprese 1475 - Roma 1564)

The Fall of Phaeton depicts the mythological episode taken from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, and particuarly the end of Phaeton’s life. Zeus, seen frontally and almost touching the cart with his foot, is launching a thunderbolt at proud Phaeton, who had dared ascend towards the heavens. 

One cannot control something when one doesn't know how it works. It matters not what kind of entity it is, the fact remains, if the inner workings of any given entity remains unknown, one cannot control it. 

AI is one such entity.

Throughout history many traditions have believed that some fatal flaw in human nature tempts us to pursue powers we don’t know how to handle. The Greek myth of Phaethon told of a boy who discovers that he is the son of Helios, the sun god. Wishing to prove his divine origin, Phaethon demands the privilege of driving the chariot of the sun. Helios warns Phaethon that no human can control the celestial horses that pull the solar chariot. But Phaethon insists, until the sun god relents. After rising proudly in the sky, Phaethon indeed loses control of the chariot. The sun veers off course, scorching all vegetation, killing numerous beings and threatening to burn the Earth itself. Zeus intervenes and strikes Phaethon with a thunderbolt. The conceited human drops from the sky like a falling star, himself on fire. The gods reassert control of the sky and save the world.

As often state in BRT, AI is an open-ended tech able to evolve, something different from anything man has ever done. The kicker is the fact AI's evolving in real time, millions of time faster than us, a most disconcerting fact without question.

AI is an unprecedented threat to humanity because it is the first technology in history that can make decisions and create new ideas by itself. All previous human inventions have empowered humans, because no matter how powerful the new tool was, the decisions about its usage remained in our hands. Nuclear bombs do not themselves decide whom to kill, nor can they improve themselves or invent even more powerful bombs. In contrast, autonomous drones can decide by themselves who to kill, and AIs can create novel bomb designs, unprecedented military strategies and better AIs. AI isn’t a tool – it’s an agent. The biggest threat of AI is that we are summoning to Earth countless new powerful agents that are potentially more intelligent and imaginative than us, and that we don’t fully understand or control.

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