Obedience Test Results

Four days ago I posted a simple obedience test. I’m still getting more responses each day, but it looks like the patterns have become clear enough to share what I’ve learned thus far. The basic idea was that I commanded people who read that post to read 5 more articles from my website on that same day and then to send me feedback about their experience. They could choose to obey the command or not. Why the Obedience Test? It was a simple idea that popped into my mind at the time, and I opted to run with it. That’s likely because I’ve been thinking about the theme of obedience lately. Much of the time whatever is churning in my mind provides the inspiration for new blog posts. As some people guessed, obedience is a theme that I’m exploring in the novel I’m writing, particularly with respect to how humans relate to AI. It’s not the only theme I’m exploring, but it’s one of the major ones. That could change as I get further into the writing though. I’m only about 5K words into it so far. Today much of the AI we interact with, such as “smart” assistants like Siri (still dumb as a stump) or Alexa (getting there), behaves rather obediently. It does what we tell it to do, or at least it tries. But what if that Master-servant relationship begins to shift, towards one of equals and perhaps shifting even beyond that? How might humans respond to this shift? Will they obey smarter AI, especially if it&...
Source: Steve Pavlina's Personal Development Blog - Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Tags: Productivity Relationships Values Source Type: blogs