Artificial Intelligence Lies: A 2024 Reality Check

We’ve all heard the buzz about AI “hallucinations” – those moments when artificial intelligence tools confidently present completely made-up information as fact. While these glitches can be entertaining in the abstract, I recently encountered a chilling example that hit much closer to home: AI inventing a history of my own last name.

The Case of the Fabricated Family History

It all started with one of those spam emails that clog up your inbox, promising to reveal the fascinating origins of your surname. Now, I usually send these directly to the digital trash bin. But this one, with the subject line “The Wirestone Lineage: A Story Through Time,” piqued my curiosity just a tad too much. Against my better judgment, I clicked.

The email unfurled a fantastical tale, complete with medieval blacksmiths in the English countryside and a coat of arms emblazoned with – you guessed it – wires and stones. According to this digital genealogist, the Wirestone name could be traced back centuries, representing a proud lineage of artisans and innovators. There was only one problem: it was utter baloney.

You see, “Wirestone” isn’t some ancient surname passed down through generations. My husband and I actually created it in . We were looking for a unique and meaningful name to represent our new life together. After much deliberation, we landed on this distinctive moniker, a fusion of our individual passions and aspirations.

We were so intentional about this choice that we even documented it! In a humor column I wrote back in , I detailed the entire name-changing saga – the brainstorming, the debates, the sheer joy of finding a moniker that truly felt like “us.” This wasn’t some obscure, forgotten piece of personal history; it was out there in the digital world, ready to be found.

AI’s Inability to Discern Truth

Intrigued (and more than a little creeped out), I decided to see what the AI would cough up if I asked directly. I fired up ChatGPT and typed in a simple query: “Tell me about the origins of the last name Wirestone.”

And guess what? The chatbot, with its characteristic air of confident authority, proceeded to spin a completely new yarn, different from the email but no less fictional. This time, the Wirestone name was attributed to a long line of Scottish stonemasons who used – wait for it – wire to bind their creations. Seriously?

This is where the “hallucination” metaphor breaks down for me. It implies a kind of neutral, if slightly off-kilter, imagination at play. But what’s really happening is far more insidious. These AI models aren’t hallucinating; they’re actively generating falsehoods, and they’re doing it with such unwavering certainty that it’s easy to be taken in.

Here’s the rub: AI language models, for all their sophisticated algorithms, don’t actually understand truth. They operate by recognizing patterns in massive datasets of text and code, using statistical probabilities to predict the next word, phrase, or sentence. They’re masters of mimicry, not meaning. So, when confronted with a query about a nonexistent family history, they don’t say, “Hmm, I can’t find any reliable information on that.” Instead, they default to what they do best: fabricating a plausible-sounding response based on the patterns they’ve learned.

Beyond Silliness: The Real-World Implications

Okay, so AI made up a fake history for a slightly unusual last name. Who really cares, right? Well, I’d argue this goes way beyond a harmless case of digital fabrication. We’re rapidly entering a world where we rely on AI for everything from navigating traffic to choosing what we eat for dinner. Increasingly, we’re trusting it – or being pushed to trust it – for information itself. And that’s where things get kinda scary.

Think about it: Google, the gatekeeper of the internet, is weaving AI deeper and deeper into its search results. What happens when those results are riddled with AI-generated inaccuracies? We’ve already seen glimpses of this with Google’s featured snippets, where the search giant tries to give you a concise answer at the top of the page. Except, sometimes, those answers are flat-out wrong, even dangerously so. Imagine getting bad medical advice, biased historical information, or straight-up propaganda served up by an AI with all the authority of a trusted encyclopedia. Not so funny anymore, huh?

And it’s not just Google. Facebook, that bastion of truth and accuracy (insert sarcastic eye roll here), has been grappling with the dark side of AI for years. Their algorithms, designed to maximize engagement and ad revenue, have a nasty habit of prioritizing sensationalized content and outright misinformation. Remember when Facebook blocked the Kansas Reflector and other news outlets from sharing factual reporting on the Kansas constitutional amendment vote? Or how about the time they allowed a fake video of Nancy Pelosi to go viral? Yeah, good times. Despite all the talk about combating misinformation, Facebook continues to struggle with the unintended consequences of its AI-powered content moderation systems.

Meanwhile, OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, is raking in billions in funding and touting the transformative power of its technology. Don’t get me wrong, the potential of AI is huge. But we’re nowhere near the point where these systems can be trusted as reliable sources of information. We need a serious reality check, and fast.

A Call for Skepticism and Focus on Reality

The truth is, the future of AI is probably gonna be amazing. We’ll have AI assistants that can help us with complex tasks, personalize our learning experiences, and even tackle some of the world’s most pressing problems. But right now, in 2024, the reality of AI is a little less rosy. It’s messy, it’s flawed, and frankly, it’s often just plain wrong.

Remember my little last name saga? It’s a perfect example of how AI-generated content can muddy the waters of online information. Before AI came along, if you’d Googled “Wirestone” back in 2013, you probably would have found that humor column I mentioned. You would have gotten the real story, straight from the source. But today? You’re just as likely to stumble across some AI-concocted tale of Scottish stonemasons or who-knows-what. The truth is still out there, but it’s buried under a heap of algorithmic guesswork.

So, what can we do about it? First and foremost, we gotta get skeptical. Don’t believe everything you read, especially if it comes from an AI. Double-check information, look for multiple sources, and consider the biases that might be baked into the algorithms. And for the love of all that is good and true, don’t take your family history advice from a spam email!

More importantly, we need to support and engage with sources of information we can trust. That means real journalists, doing real reporting, and holding powerful interests accountable. It means subscribing to your local newspaper (or, you know, a kick-ass online news outlet like the Kansas Reflector). It means having real conversations about the information ecosystem we’re creating and demanding better from the tech giants who shape it.

Conclusion: Prioritizing Reality Over Hallucinations

The allure of AI is undeniable. It’s tempting to believe in a future where intelligent machines can solve all our problems and answer all our questions. But let’s not kid ourselves: we’re not there yet. Right now, AI is as likely to fabricate a reality as it is to reflect it. And that’s a dangerous game to play, especially when the very notion of truth is at stake.

So, the next time you find yourself face-to-face with some shiny new AI tool, remember the tale of the fabricated Wirestone family history. Take a beat. Ask questions. And above all else, stay grounded in the messy, complicated, beautiful reality that only we humans can truly understand.