Courtesy of wikipedia.org
I came across an article the other day noting that Silicon Valley oligarchs are investing in research to improve babies’ IQs. (“Baby Maker,” by Emily Mullin, Wired, March/April 2026, pg. 23) Having seen little evidence of goodwill toward humanity among these entrepreneurs, I thought of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. In that novel, he created a society in which IQ was assigned according to a caste system (Alphas, Betas, Gammas, Deltas, Epsilons). The purpose was to create a social order in which the majority was designed to serve the elites.
Am I right or wrong to suspect that oligarchs would be willing to contemplate a similar system? After all, most of them seem unwilling to take responsibility for the ills they have thrust upon us. Social media is a prime example. How many young people have killed themselves through the promptings of that unregulated enterprise? Or, how about their concern for the number of jobs likely to be lost to AI?
Fundamentally, where does integrity lie in an AI world designed for profit rather than altruism? Here, the operative word is “artificial”? A system that draws no line between truth and falsehood makes distinguishing between the two difficult.
An article in Skeptical Inquirer suggests that a better way to serve the truth might be to expand our parameters, adding what’s probable to our understanding of fact and fiction. (“New Research Shows Cognitive Inoculation Improves Discernment of Information,” by Sander Vander Linder et al., Skeptical Enquirer, March/April 2026, pgs. 55-56.) Fake news, for example, may not be the opposite of accurate news (Ibid., pg. 55). It could be incomplete news. Commentators will sometimes say a report is “unconfirmed.”
Considering what’s possible allows us to examine an idea without rejecting it out of hand. Physicist Luis W. Alvares used the notion to explore one type of coincidence. Most of us have experienced it. We think about a person we haven’t heard from in a while, then shortly afterwards that person calls.
To determine whether these occurrences were more than happenstance, he conducted a series of mathematical calculations. When he was done, he concluded these incidents were more than mere chance, and that the phenomenon should be studied further, something he never pursued. (“Luis W. Alvarez and the Case of the Curious Coincidences,” by Alec Nevala-Lee, Skeptical Enquirer, March/April 2026, pg. 54)
When we view AI through the lens of “possibility,” we can weigh it without judgment. We may even come to realize that we have been asking the wrong questions about its merit.
Shakespeare wrote, “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” For example, truth is true until we say it isn’t. Would anyone today argue that Earth stands at the center of the universe?
At every phase of human advancement, we’d be wise to open our minds to consider more than whether a thing is profitable or “true or false.” We should consider its potential for expanding our compassion. After all, that is the value our species most depends upon.
BOYCOTT: Tesla, Apple, Amazon
