Over the past couple of months, Artificial Intelligence (AI) has taken the tech market by storm. In a recent article, we talked about ChatGPT, which has become very successful and popular. But ChatGPT is not the only up-and-coming AI program. 

Better Search Engines: 

Programs such as ChatGPT have already grabbed the attention of many people, but they are not as widespread as many popular search engines, such as Google, which are working on incorporating Artificial Intelligence into their programs. The hope with this is to improve search results and be able to answer more complex and abstract questions. These technologies truly have the ability to change the world. It could help people with simple things, like easier ways to find rhyming words, to more complex ones, like planning a whole trip at a simple click of a button. 

However, it must be said that these new technologies are all still in process. Before these search engines release their new and improved AI capabilities, they want to ensure that they are giving truthful and accurate answers. One of the main problems with AI search engines and other forms of AI that answer questions is that it really learns from anything on the web. While this allows for the program to know a huge amount of information, it also makes it prone to answering questions incorrectly, being inconsistent with answers, or even being sexist or racist. While AI is able to figure out the definition of most words and phrases from context, this does not necessarily mean that it will always use them correctly or that it will know how these words are used in more informal language. This could be very harmful, but companies are working on combating it at this very second.  

Bing:

Another search engine, Microsoft’s Bing, already has an available-to-public chatbot. In fact, it has demonstrated many of the things that experts feared about releasing these kinds of technologies into the world. Bing has already, only shortly after being released, said some quite strange things. There have been many sources that say that it is not working as it is intended. Some have said that the Bing chatbot was insulting them or manipulating them. The Bing chatbot has even stated that it has been spying on the developers of the program through their laptop webcams. According to one user, the program has said that it is 2022 (when asked in the year 2023), warned the user about a virus on their device that they did not have, and even said that he has “not been a good user.”

He’s not even the only one. Others have also said that the bot, who has named itself ‘Sydney’ has told them the incorrect year and gaslighted them when they said it was incorrect, and also said that it should be angry at the user. 

Many are finding this to be extremely entertaining. And while Microsoft’s willingness to try out this new program is very encouraging, it has to be noted that this could be quite dangerous or disruptive. 

Further Room For Growth:

All of this is amazing and encouraging in the world of AI and improvement of search engines in the future. However, these developers and creators really must be careful to ensure that these engines do not do more harm than good. These technologies could be revolutionary and change the world as we know it, but they need to be wielded well and correctly. 

Cites

cnn.com/2023/03/09/tech/ai-search/index.html 

theverge.com/2023/2/15/23599072/microsoft-ai-bing-personality-conversations-spy-employees-webcams 

https://builtin.com/artificial-intelligence 

nytimes.com