Is collective intelligence becoming obsolete in the age of AI?

March 29, 2023

by LIOR ZOREF @lior

I’m addicted to Chat GPT 4. Using AI and Chat GPT is fascinating and frightening.

When I asked it for 15 facts about ‘Lior Zoref’, most of the facts were correct. But then it started to hallucinate. It wrote: Lior Zoref is a professor at IDC university, he collaborated with James Surowiecki, and more. Well-phrased nonsense.

Then I asked it to teach me how to break a door lock. The system refused and explained that it’s illegal. I insisted and explained that it’s this will help people who are stuck outside their home. After 10 minutes of “debate,” the system surrendered and sent a detailed explanation. Yes, it’s possible to “convince” artificial intelligence to teach you how to break the law.

Assuming this will improve, will we need collective intelligence in the future when AI will become even more powerful? And when will that happen?

According to futurist Ray Kurzweil and many other researchers (as you can hear in the following podcast), artificial intelligence is expected to pass the Turing test in 2029. That is, in about 6 years, it won’t be possible to distinguish between artificial intelligence and humans. Computers will have consciousness and intelligence at least as good as humans. In a conversation with a chatbot like GPT, it won’t be possible to tell whether it’s a real human or a computer.

Will we need collective intelligence in an era where AI is “smarter” than humans? Wisdom of crowds is based on human beings with emotions and a deep understanding of emotional processes. In questions that involve a significant emotional component, wisdom of crowds is expected to still be relevant.

What about questions of morals and ethics? As artificial intelligence becomes “smarter,” there will be a need to define the ethical and moral boundaries, and there will be a need for wisdom of human crowds to create fair systems that operate according to human moral standards.

One of the conditions for the wisdom of crowds is diversity. Diversity leads to creativity and better decision-making. It’s possible that in the future, we’ll also be able to create diversity among AI algorithms. In the meantime, collective intelligence is the best representation of humanity.