Don’t forget the AI we see today is the worst it will ever be?

I’ve again seen a few messages today repeating “Don’t forget the AI we see today is the worst it will ever be.”

It’s up there with “AI won’t take your jobs but someone who can use it will” in my list of top AI quotes that I dislike a lot!

It’s also why we need contributions and engagement from all sorts of people and disciplines, including arts and social sciences, not just AI people (yes, I’m essentially one of the latter…).

History is full of examples where, at least on a human lifetime scale, this simply wasn’t true when we said this about technology. Did Romans say this about roads and central heating? The Anglo-Saxons might disagree.

(As an aside – I jump straight there as I live in Caerleon, home of Wales’ National Roman Legion Museum and full of amazing Roman remains. Come and visit us!).

I know this isn’t a perfect analogy, but what about space travel and moon landings? Concorde? Airships got better and better until they caught fire.

So let’s remember, linear technical progression is far from guaranteed.