Splitting the artificial atom

There are these moments in the history of man, witnessed by so few, when everything changes, and a new checkpoint is set; from whence, no further back can be travelled.

On the 16th of July, in the harsh Tularosa Basin of New Mexico, the trajectory of man shifted, irretrievably, and a new day dawned. Mankind stood at a fork in the road, with two paths ahead. Without the permission, or even the knowledge of the masses, a path was chosen. This path led towards a tomorrow in which total annihilation was suddenly a very real prospect. With 425 people in attendance, and the American public largely kept in the dark, the first nuclear bomb was detonated.

Of all the witnesses, perhaps none had given more, nor held the process in a greater contempt, than Julius Robert Oppenheimer, architect of the Manhattan Project. And as 25 kilo-tons of plutonium was thrust into the air - with blindling lights and deafening booms, the very same that would befall Hiroshima and Nagasaki less than a month later - Oppenheimer stepped forward, as the realisation of what he had unleashed began to sink in.

"I am become death," were his solemn words. "Destroyer of worlds."

Though, this detonation was the climax of a moment in history, which had begun thirteen years prior, when, at a laboratory in Cambridge, the atom was split for the first time by John Cockroft and Ernest Walton.

There are these moments in the history of man, witnessed by so few, when everything changes, and a new checkpoint is set; from whence, no further back can be travelled. The invention of fire, and the wheel, agriculture and written language, the invention of gunpowder, and the printing press, the discovery of the new world, and the industrial revolution. These developments are set in stone, and can never be erased.

While the tale of Oppeheimer, Cockroft, Walton, nuclear fission and the nuclear bomb is one of lifetime's past, there are checkpoints dotted throughout our own era. Social media for instance, and the irrevocable shift in how we communicate. Though, perhaps none in our time is greater, or bears more resemblance to the advent of nuclear weaponry, than the advent of artificial intelligence.

Firstly, there are some differences. Nuclear weaponry was a closely guarded secret, with virtually all Americans kept in the dark, whereas AI has been pontificated in public for decades; in cinema, and in scientific literature. One had state funding, while the other saw its gestation in private laboratories with private money. However, in what these developments share, they are practically identical. As I stated before, they both created a checkpoint in human history, and changed its path forever.

This is not to say that both are negative, or that they have already drawn time on us as a species. They are not moral developments either, but rather amoral. They are tools. A hammer is a tool, with which one can build a house, or bash his hands to smithereens. Nuclear power has the ability to destroy entire lands, to destroy the earth if left in the wrong hands. It also presents us with the best, and most efficient form of energy there is. It took us into the age of total war, inescapable war.

Likewise, AI can be benign, and has been used mostly to create memes; be that of American presidents playing Minecraft, or a Balenciaga-inspired interpretation of Harry Potter. It has also dragged us, kicking and screaming, into the era of post-truth. The artificially generated 'deep fake' will only refine itself with time, until fact and fiction are indistinguishable; everyone has said everything.

There is no limit to what AI can achieve. This can, in good time, walk arm-in-arm with mankind towards a brave new world, or it can be our undoing. You see, we are not at the stage of the Manhattan Project just yet. We have merely split the artificial atom. The nuclear bomb of our age will be the singularity. The true point of no return.