On Monday’s episode of “The Daily Show,” Jon Stewart spent a lot of time discussing “artificial intelligence.” He was very doubtful about the optimistic claims made by AI supporters and criticized the deceptive nature of those claims.
Stewart said that the truth is AI is coming for our jobs. He gave examples showing that AI supporters seem to be trying to reduce the number of employees, and how elected officials are often not prepared to handle this situation.
Stewart mentioned that AI is improving and gave examples of misinformation created by AI. He expressed concern about the difficulty of distinguishing fact from fiction and questioned the optimistic outlook presented by those in charge of AI, comparing it to previous experiences with the internet and social media.
Afterward, clips were shown of various AI advocates, all of whom have significant financial incentives, making exaggerated claims, including that AI is already “more profound than fire or electricity.”
Stewart reacted by expressing frustration with these claims and making profane remarks about fire and electricity. He was clearly disbelieving of the comparison.
Stewart expressed doubt about the magnitude of AI's impact and questioned the claims about its ability to address climate change and cure diseases. He expressed skepticism about the current use of AI.
Stewart continued to express skepticism, noting the odd diction of the speaker in the clip. He sarcastically expressed trust and then questioned the current practical use of AI based on the claims made.
A clip was shown of Mark Zuckerberg boasting about an AI app that can make toast. Stewart ridiculed this, pointing out that humans already know how to make toast.
Stewart joked about the trivial nature of the AI development for making toast and expressed the need for focusing on more significant issues like curing diseases and addressing climate change.
Then he highlighted how previous technological breakthroughs have led to widespread job displacement and hardship.
Stewart pointed out the trend of technological advances promising a utopian life without tedious work, but eventually leading to job losses.
Noting the promises made by AI supporters, Stewart mentioned that their true intentions sometimes become apparent.
He showed a clip of someone admitting that the goal is to employ fewer people, using the euphemism “without the tax of more people” to describe it.
Stewart continued by mocking the statements of individuals who see reducing employees as a positive aspect of AI, showing clips of two different people expressing such views.
Stewart then looked doubtfully at the idea of a “prompt engineer,” a commonly used term to describe what AI advocates say will be an important job once AI is established in the way they claim. Stewart dismissed it as simply a “text question guy,” and argued that such a job could easily be replaced by AI.
Next, after showing clips demonstrating how much elected officials lack knowledge about the technology, he linked this to previous tech cycles. Specifically, he showed a compilation of Presidents George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump and Joe Biden from the early 90s until just a few years ago promising that workers displaced by technology could simply retrain to work on that technology
“But that’s the game. Whether it’s globalization or industrialization, or now artificial intelligence, the way of life that you’re accustomed to is no match for the promise of more profits and new markets, which sounds brutal. If you’re a human,” Stewart declared.
Watch the whole thing above now.
