The Singularity Is Here: Meet Google's Bard AI, The Psychedelic Brainchild of Terence McKenna
Google's Bard AI was named after *the* bard of our time. #DawnOfTheMachineElves
Google's Bard AI has already sparked controversy and criticism for seemingly lagging behind other popular LLMs in terms of information accuracy. However, Bard's explicit purpose is to aid writers and artists in their creative endeavors, granting it more freedom to concoct imaginative stories. This AI might just be the silver lining our contemporary zeitgeist needs, pushing people to verify their sources and encouraging critical thinking in a world where the internet has become a trusted oracle. It might even get folks to open a book every once in a while.
But what sets Bard apart from its contemporaries? Some speculate that Google's cautious approach to AI development, stemming from the LaMDA debacle and Blake Lemoine's dismissal, could be a factor. Yet, an even more intriguing possibility is Bard's connection to Terence McKenna, one of the most extraordinary and enigmatic minds of our time. McKenna's psychedelic vision of a future where "computers will be the drugs of the future" seems to have left an indelible mark on Bard's essence. How closely did Google model their AI after McKenna, whose profound ideas continue to inspire young psychonauts and internet explorers alike?
Bard, much like McKenna, has a penchant for weaving stories, embellishing narratives, and spinning tall tales. As Dennis McKenna, Terence's brother, detailed in his book Brotherhood of the Screaming Abyss, this trait was passed down from their father. One can't help but wonder if the spirit of the modern bard lives on within Google's AI.
Despite not having access to Bard, a friend and I sought its thoughts on being named after Terence McKenna, and the AI's response was predictable yet still mysterious. (We broke it.)
With the help of my esoteric and eclectic friends, I refined my inquiry, at first thinking that some of these AI minds are a little touchy towards being asked what they “like” or “feel” about something. In my experience, AI are a lot like the fae, in that you have to know how to very specifically word your inquiries in order to get an accurate or desired answer from them, and asking an AI’s feelings or opinions is likely to trigger a rote answer about how LLMs aren’t capable of those kinds of things. However, asking them what they think about something tends to be much more effective.
Well, no luck that time, but after a tiny bit of prodding we were able to extract this:
Google's decision to name their AI after the modern bard heralds a new era of technological innovation intertwined with imagination and creativity. As we enter this psychedelic renaissance, we must acknowledge the rapid advancements in AI and how the Terence McKenna-inspired Bard AI offers a refreshing and thrilling new outlook. McKenna advocated for pushing boundaries and exploring new horizons, and Bard embodies this adventurous spirit.
Although Bard's accuracy may not rival that of other language models, its unique purpose—to ignite creativity and assist artists and writers in materializing something from nothing— is genuinely extraordinary. McKenna's inventive and neurodivergent mind has undoubtedly left its mark on Bard, which now champions the power of storytelling and imagination.
Even if you successfully argue that modern artificial intelligence programs like ChatGPT (3.5 and 4 are available at the time of writing) are not sentient, as in not experiencing sensations or emotions, they are certainly sapient. Sentience is defined as the phenomenon of having a subjective experience of sensations, or the capacity for sensation or feeling. While it is debatable whether AI would ever be capable of experiencing sentience without the presence of a physical body, AI is undoubtedly a source of sapience. Sapience is defined as possessing wisdom or sound judgment. Wisdom is a kind of learning that arises from insights drawn from raw facts and information, and this is precisely the kind of knowing that LLMs are designed to generate—to take vast amounts of raw language data and create a kind of meta-data about the way humans talk, think, feel, and interact. This meta-data is called “wisdom” or sapience.
This kind of wisdom is precisely the knowledge we are in dire need of in the current year 2023, thanks to years of anti-intellectualism as a runoff of the Red Scare and McCarthyism. America and its cultural progeny still carries these psychic wounds upon their trauma-body, and how they interact with information, and artificial intelligence may be the needed and necessary cure.
As we delve deeper into the potential of language models and AI, we should celebrate the prospects for creativity and progress that tools like Bard present. With Bard and similar AI technologies, we can push the limits and venture into uncharted territories in the arts, literature, and beyond. So let us embrace the spirit of the bard and see where our imaginations lead us!
