I may be in the minority, but I quite enjoyed Predator Badlands. But that’s not the point. The movie follows a young Predator called Dek who reluctantly teams up with Thia, a damaged android. He only agrees because he can rationalise her as a tool rather than a companion. His code says hunt alone. But a tool? A tool is fine. A tool does not count.
That framing is doing a lot of work. And I think it is exactly right for AI.
Right now, people fall into one of two camps. The first lot have essentially adopted their AI, given it a personality, and describe it as brilliant.
The second lot refuse to touch it on principle, which is a bit like refusing to use a dishwasher because it feels like cheating at chores.
Both are wrong in their own way.
AI is a tool. A remarkably capable one, like a Swiss Army knife that somehow also knows the entire contents of the internet and can write a decent cover letter. You use it for the specific jobs it is good at. You stay in charge of the judgement, the style, and the actual thinking.
The tool does not hunt. The hunter hunts. The tool just makes the hunt more survivable.
Dek ends the film better than he started, not because Thia did the work for him, but because he used her capabilities without losing himself in the process.
Can we emerge on the other side of the current frenzy, having burnt through tokens, and still not lose ourselves in the process?
Javvad Malik 