AI Is the Threat that Pres. Nelson Warned About

[The Folk Prophet]

[Carborendum]

On 5/28/2025 at 3:16 PM, The Folk Prophet said:

A.I. does not exist yet.

What we're living through is a big marketing lie.

Believe it or not, that is a lot of what made my OP significant.

[The Folk Prophet]

5 minutes ago, Carborendum said:

Believe it or not, that is a lot of what made my OP significant.

Just so we're clear, I'm not countering anything you're suggesting. (I'm not supporting it, per se, either. Just...commenting.)

The thing is... the dangers of (air-quotes) A.I. (air-quotes) are not, at present, what everyone believes they will be. Everyone thinks it's some form of the terminator. Well...maybe someday. But that's not what the current danger is.. The dangers of AI is that AI is a big freaking lie that's turning the business world upside down...based on a lie.

The lie is, as always, wealth. "A.I. will make you rich!"

But NO ONE is going to get wealthy from A.I. except those peddling A.I. and its related support system (computing power). Well, and the dirtbag traders and execs who will sell A.I. to their companies, get big bonuses, and then move on to another lucrative career.

None of that is actually related to the first comment I made about A.I. not existing yet. More related to the video I just posted.

But it's related... in that even calling it A.I. is a lie. It's not. It's not intelligent in any way, shape or form. Not artificially or otherwise.

We think we're experiencing "intelligence" in the way that Hollywood has portrayed A.I. But we're not. Not even close. At best we're seeing some artificial artificial intelligence. Maybe that's argumentative in an unnecessary way. But not really. Like I said...it's marketing.

Don't get me wrong. There's value in some of what we are experiencing. Not monetary value. Not for most. But it's a nice tool. As a developer, for example, I like that when I google (or bing or whatever) the syntax for some code I can't quite recall, that instead of having to click on the Stack Overflow link, I get an AI Overview (that's basically stolen the info from Stack Overflow), which has been "summarized" for me. That makes my search a bit quicker. Nice. And I like that when I shop on Amazon that when I go to the reviews there's an "A.I." summary of the reviews. Nice.

But neither of these things, once again, are in any way "intelligent", artificially or otherwise.

It's just branding for basic algorithms that have been running for half a century in some form or another. Guess what. That's what computers do! All of a sudden it's being touted as "A.I.". Why? Money and the promise of money.

It drives me nutty. There's only a very few applications of the tech that even pretend to be intelligent, as in artificially "thinking". The chat engines for one.

Even the art generation...which is nifty and fun...but...is it "intelligent"? Since when is automated replication of something or another "intelligent"? And, moreover,.... I'm pretty intelligent. But I can't do that. My brother can. He's not more intelligent than I am. He's trained artist that's learned skills. But the ability to paint a face that looks like a face instead of a scribble isn't exactly intelligence. I mean...it's tied into intelligence. The ability to learn and to assess and remember. So at least the art stuff can, sort of, fit the classification of A.I.... sort of.

But so much the other stuff out there being called A.I.? Nope. It's just the new thing to call stuff. It's like, for example....cameras autofocused for fifty years, but now anything like that is "intelligent". And everyone's freaking out because a camera is "thinking" for itself? Yes...I'm using a simple example and tech has advanced and what cameras or the like do is more complex now. But it's essentially the same thing. It's like calling the starter on your vehicle intelligent. "You mean it...starts the car? By itself? All I have to do is push this button!? Wow! Well, there goes humanity." Another more realistic example is the writing suggestion tools from Word or Grammarly or the like. They've done that forever. But now it's called A.I. The spell checker is A.I. now. Oh no. We're doomed.

The real danger, in things like that, is when all the companies needing photography fire all qualified photographers because the camera is smart enough by itself, and then wonder why their photography magazine nose dives. But, hey...maybe, eventually, the camera will be smart enough. Except, I forgot...we don't need cameras at all now. Just a few prompts.

C'est la vie.

[The Folk Prophet]

 

[The Folk Prophet]

 

[zil2]

2 hours ago, The Folk Prophet said:

It's just branding for basic algorithms that have been running for half a century in some form or another. Guess what. That's what computers do! All of a sudden it's being touted as "A.I.". Why? Money and the promise of money.

I'll bet you were thrilled when "The Cloud" came along and we could put stuff there instead of, I dunno, the internet...

[The Folk Prophet]

17 minutes ago, zil2 said:

I'll bet you were thrilled when "The Cloud" came along and we could put stuff there instead of, I dunno, the internet...

Which is funny branding because.... well, have you ever tried to explain cloud storage, for example, to someone in their 80s? Here's the explanation you give so they get it: "It saves it on the internet."

[NeuroTypical]

4 hours ago, The Folk Prophet said:

But NO ONE is going to get wealthy from A.I. except those peddling A.I. and its related support system (computing power).

It's me.  I'm "those".   

https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/technology-media-and-telecommunications/our-insights/ai-power-expanding-data-center-capacity-to-meet-growing-demand

 

From my perspective, AI is growing so quickly and driving so much growth and energy demand, it's breathing new life into the nuclear industry.  'Bout dang time something did.

https://www.ibm.com/think/news/ai-nuclear-power

 

 

[Carborendum]

16 hours ago, zil2 said:

I'll bet you were thrilled when "The Cloud" came along and we could put stuff there instead of, I dunno, the internet...

I've been saying that for the past 20 years.  What the freak is the cloud supposed to mean!  It's the freaking internet.  I even asked people what's the difference between the cloud and an internet server?  People just shrugged and moved on.

Finally, someone gave me a response that actually made sense: It is a "method of storage" on the existing infrastructure that we call "The Internet."

Edited Wednesday at 11:55 AM by Carborendum

[Carborendum]

14 hours ago, NeuroTypical said:

https://www.ibm.com/think/news/ai-nuclear-power

What the heck are those pipes supposed to be carrying?  That's just an artist's rendering, right?  He probably didn't know what color it actually is.

Again, what AI "thinks" vs. reality.

[Carborendum]

18 hours ago, The Folk Prophet said:

Just so we're clear, I'm not countering anything you're suggesting. (I'm not supporting it, per se, either. Just...commenting.)

This is interesting since you seem to be summing up my position quite well.

[askandanswer]

On 5/28/2025 at 9:30 PM, Carborendum said:

 

 

Edited Wednesday at 12:10 PM by askandanswer

[askandanswer]

Perhaps what President Nelson really meant to say was 

In coming days, it will not be possible to survive spiritually without the guiding, directing, comforting, and constant influence of A.I.

I mean, its a lot more accessible, to a lot more people, and for many people, much easier to understand  

[Carborendum]

10 minutes ago, askandanswer said:

Perhaps what President Nelson really meant to say was 

In coming days, it will not be possible to survive spiritually without the guiding, directing, comforting, and constant influence of A.I.

I mean, its a lot more accessible, to a lot more people, and for many people, much easier to understand  

My point is that we depend on the internet as the source of truth nowadays.  Think about it.  Whenever we have a debate: "Do you have a source for that?  Can you provide a link?"  But what happens when the internet gets owned by nefarious parties?  It very nearly did before Musk bought Twitter.

The presence of misinformation will become more and more prevalent because so-called "AI" will be programmed by parties which knowingly want to mislead.  And because we become more and more dependent on it (or even simple search engines) people will be easily duped if we're not running everything through a filter of "what does the Spirit tell me about this?"

Even before internet "AI", we depended on Wikipedia, Google, Social Media, etc. to give us the truth (even after we abandoned mainstream media).  And for a time, it was about as accurate as asking a 100 regular people.  You'd eventually figure out the truth with enough opinions.  But the internet has made it so easy to do ONE search and find all the answers we needed.  So, "we had it all figured out."  Now, with AI, that tendency is magnified.  It is too easy to trust the man behind the curtain without realizing he doesn't have your best interest at heart.

We certainly use the technology we have, such as it is.  But we need to be guided by the Spirit before we accept any such information.  And it won't stop there.  It will continue with more and more effective methods of feeding us lies.  And there will be no "appeal" to another source.  We simply won't have it.  Other sources will be scrubbed from the internet and we'll only have "fringe" sites that still tell the truth.  How likely will we be to believe them?

And the cycle will continue with whatever methods. 

• We used to trust the media.  Then they got taken over by ideologues.
• We had the internet.  But Google, Facebook, Twitter, Wikipedia, etc. all got taken over by ideologues.

Internet news sources are there that are truly independent.  But nowadays, very few are actually trying to be neutral (like 1440 or the Hill).  They have to have an ideology.  This makes us only trust one side.  But guess what... our media can also be biased.  Listening to only one side puts us in an ideological bubble.

Podcasts are now becoming a better source because it is not about "sound bites".  It isn't just a headline.  You have people having unscripted conversations for hours at a time.  It is difficult to fake that.  But at some point, even that will be taken over by ideologues.

That is what I believe Pres. Nelson was talking about.

Our only recourse will be to listen to the Spirit.  If you don't know how... learn.  It will take time.  But everyone can learn.

******************

To get back on topic...

In the OP, I referenced "the rest of Pres Nelson's talk."  It was about family relationships.  I talked about how I'd raised my children by teaching them correct principles.  And they are true to those principles.  

The beginnings of learning to feel and recognize the Spirit comes from raising our children in the path that they should go, so that when they are grown, they shall not depart from it.  I believe we've done that fairly well for the most part. 

I worry about my youngest.  He's not really showing any signs that he "gets it."  So, I wondered what others were doing to raise their children to feel and recognize the Spirit.

[askandanswer]

13 minutes ago, Carborendum said:

I worry about my youngest.  He's not really showing any signs that he "gets it."  So, I wondered what others were doing to raise their children to feel and recognize the Spirit.

My personal opinion is that this is the best teaching resource for that question:

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/media/collection/hear-him?lang=eng

[zil2]

2 hours ago, Carborendum said:

Finally, someone gave me a response that actually made sense: It is a "method of storage" on the existing infrastructure that we call "The Internet."

Which is another way of saying: It's the internet.  (Good grief, Charlie Brown.)

[zil2]

2 hours ago, Carborendum said:

What the heck are those pipes supposed to be carrying?  That's just an artist's rendering, right?  He probably didn't know what color it actually is.

Again, what AI "thinks" vs. reality.

Pretty sure those pipes are carrying soylent green.

[NeuroTypical]

2 hours ago, Carborendum said:

What the heck are those pipes supposed to be carrying?  That's just an artist's rendering, right? 

A reverse-image search reveals it's a stock photo that seems to be widely used.  A lot of carbon-removal/desalinization/eco-friendly energy use sites.  Entirely possible it's just for show, or it might be an actual carbon renewal or desalinization project.   

Both of those, along with AI, are all power-hungry grid-capacity-exceeding things that have the nuclear industry waving a big sign that says "the solution is right here baby".   The general notion is that with a few thousand smaller modular reactors sprinkled around the planet, everyone could have clean water and atmospheric carbon extraction and all the AI the planet could use, and the enormous power needed could be generated with nearly zero emissions by zappy the friendly green reactor. 

I mean, if that's every gonna happen, people are gonna have to stop reacting to the prospect like a vampire to a crucifix, but the pro-nuclear folks seem to be eternally hopeful that humanity will pull itself out of its anti-nuclear superstitious dark ages.

[Carborendum]

9 minutes ago, zil2 said:

Which is another way of saying: It's the internet.  (Good grief, Charlie Brown.)

A minor point worth interjecting.

By "the cloud" we do, indeed, mean the internet.  But when we're storing or retrieving data from the cloud, it is via a streamlined methodology.  And it is that streamlined methodology that we initially invoked when we refer to "the cloud."

But today's common practice... yeah, not a lot of difference.

[zil2]

1 hour ago, Carborendum said:

And because we become more and more dependent on it...

I'm reminded of some Star Trek: TNG episode where they ask the computer to analyze a substance to determine if it's organic (or maybe if it's alive) and after the computer gives its answer, they ask it to confirm / reanalyze. Like the computer is going to change its mind?  You don't ask [entity] to confirm its own analysis.  If you want confirmation, you go to [alternate, independent entity].   (I know, it's fiction, we're supposed to shut off our brains while watching, but sometimes, they ask a bit too much - or little, in this case.)  Pretty sure it was "Home Soil".

Or "When the Bough Breaks" - the one with the planet Aldea, where their own technology was killing them and no one believed it or understood how the tech worked...

(You see, it's not AI that has all the answers - it's fiction! )

[Carborendum]

3 minutes ago, NeuroTypical said:

A reverse-image search reveals it's a stock photo that seems to be widely used.  A lot of carbon-removal/desalinization/eco-friendly energy use sites.  Entirely possible it's just for show, or it might be an actual carbon renewal or desalinization project.   

Both of those, along with AI, are all power-hungry grid-capacity-exceeding things that have the nuclear industry waving a big sign that says "the solution is right here baby".   The general notion is that with a few thousand smaller modular reactors sprinkled around the planet, everyone could have clean water and atmospheric carbon extraction and all the AI the planet could use, and the enormous power needed could be generated with nearly zero emissions by zappy the friendly green reactor. 

I mean, if that's every gonna happen, people are gonna have to stop reacting to the prospect like a vampire to a crucifix, but the pro-nuclear folks seem to be eternally hopeful that humanity will pull itself out of its anti-nuclear superstitious dark ages.

Well, thanks for looking that up.  But I'm heavily involved in the industrial sector, and that recently includes nuclear.  I've never seen "green fluid" in anything I've ever worked on.

So, if your info is correct, it is probably just "an artistic expression" rather than any reality of large pipes holding fluorescent green fluid.  Visually stunning.  But completely inaccurate.

Yes, people tend to shy away from nuclear power because they have no idea how clean/efficient it is and how safe it normally is.  I recognize how much of an uphill battle it will be to educate the masses on the topic.

[zil2]

1 minute ago, Carborendum said:

I've never seen "green fluid" in anything I've ever worked on.

Of course not.  You're not meant to see it until you're part of it... 🤢

(Don't mind me, I'm feeling snarky this morning.)

[zil2]

2 minutes ago, Carborendum said:

fluorescent green fluid

I've got it!  Noodler's have seriously up-scaled their operations!

[zil2]

1 hour ago, Carborendum said:

I worry about my youngest.  He's not really showing any signs that he "gets it."  So, I wondered what others were doing to raise their children to feel and recognize the Spirit.

Here's a unique thing about being the youngest (which I am): There's no one for you to take care of.  Everyone takes care of you.  Further, you tend to get more independence as your parents are busy worrying about the more serious problems of the older children and they're not as paranoid that every little thing you do will harm you, etc. etc.  In some ways, you grow up faster (independence), in others, you mature more slowly (caring for others).

IMO, that scenario stunts your ability / need / desire to seek the Spirit.  Don't ask me how you overcome that - receiving guidance from the Spirit is a challenge for me to this day.  But I believe it has something to do with it.  FWIW.

[Carborendum]

5 minutes ago, zil2 said:

I'm reminded of some Star Trek: TNG episode where they ask the computer to analyze a substance to determine if it's organic (or maybe if it's alive) and after the computer gives its answer, they ask it to confirm / reanalyze. Like the computer is going to change its mind?  You don't ask [entity] to confirm its own analysis.  If you want confirmation, you go to [alternate, independent entity].   (I know, it's fiction, we're supposed to shut off our brains while watching, but sometimes, they ask a bit too much - or little, in this case.)  Pretty sure it was "Home Soil".

I remember that episode.  And it didn't really go down like that. 

They found unusual behavior from some substance they found on the planet that had properties that normally didn't come in the same package.  They were perplexed as to what it was.

Dr. Crusher then asked the computer: "Disregard the inconsistencies and theorize as to the nature of this substance."  The computer responded, "Life."

5 minutes ago, zil2 said:

Or "When the Bough Breaks" - the one with the planet Aldea, where their own technology was killing them and no one believed it or understood how the tech worked...

(You see, it's not AI that has all the answers - it's fiction! )

I have wondered sometimes if we reached this condition in our modern world.  Not completely, but to a large extent, yes.

There is so much technology that we don't even know how to maintain it or fix anything really.  We just replace (better ending than mending).

We can operate.  How many know how it actually works?

In the engineering profession, we hope that a licensed professional knows how things work.  But, sadly, that is less and less true.  The office in which I've worked for the past year is the creme de la creme.  But a significant minority really don't know what they're doing (which is better than the large majority -- which is what I'm used to).  And precious few of them are able to learn.

Do people actually learn science/engineering anymore?