You may recall a time, as recently as the later months of 2022, when you almost never heard about artificial intelligence (or, as it is more commonly known, AI). Now, you hear about AI constantly — whether you want to or not. That is partly because tech companies decided they wanted to sell some products.
But how well do these products work? A recent post on the r/facepalm subreddit looks at how good Google's "AI-powered" search engine is at delivering accurate information.
The post consists of a screenshot in which someone attempted to Google the seemingly pretty answerable question: "Which U.S. president went to UW Madison?"
Google AI's answer was: "13 U.S. presidents have attended UW-Madison, earning 59 degrees in total."
The AI went on to list some of those presidents, including "John Kennedy: Graduated in 1930, 1948, 1962, 1971, 1992, and 1993."
In reality, zero U.S. presidents have attended the University of Wisconsin-Madison (let alone one named John Kennedy graduating six times), although former Vice President Dick Cheney did pursue a doctoral degree there before dropping out. Go Badgers.
While these highly inaccurate, AI-generated search results are funny, the actual impact that AI-related products are having on our planet is no laughing matter because of their huge energy use and associated carbon footprint.
Although tech giants have been making gestures toward wanting to reduce the amount of pollution they create for a while now, the need to suddenly deliver products that tell you President James Buchanan graduated from college in 1943, 2004, and 2013 appears to be counterproductive.
Instead, Google reportedly increased its planet-overheating air pollution by 50% over the past five years, per the Guardian, as it has created the vaporware. Vaporware usually refers to tech products that are promised but never delivered, but the term has also recently been used to describe AI software.
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But don't worry, because Google has a plan to solve the very problem it is causing: more vaporware. At a recent AI conference, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt told an audience, "We're not going to hit the climate goals anyway … Yes, the needs in this area will be a problem, but I'd rather bet on AI solving the problem than constraining it."
Is it possible that AI could do something beyond generating inaccurate search results? Absolutely. It could, for example, create synthetic viruses that spark a new pandemic (also according to a former Google executive) or make cyber attacks more effective.
However, while critics fear AI, the tech is already being used for good, too: monitoring vulnerable wildlife, predicting the trajectory of hurricanes, supporting regenerative agricultural practices, and more.
Researchers at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities also believe more energy-efficient AI is on the horizon (bonus points if the data centers run on clean energy).
One can hope that if AI proves more troublesome than beneficial, governments and companies will pivot. In the meantime, this Reddit post highlights the importance of guarding against misinformation and educating yourself about important issues.
"Well, that's one way to get people to stop trusting your search engine," one commenter wrote on the Reddit thread.
"[Google AI] is so horribly bad. Their 'summaries' will send you tf off if you take it at face value. It's made me look stupid a few times for that reason," another wrote.
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