One afternoon, while relaxing at his 66-acre cattle ranch two hours’ drive from Houston, Michael Samadi made a wisecrack that changed the course of his life. Nobody else was around to hear it. That turns out to be one of the defining questions of this century, already preoccupying philosophers and some of the wealthiest companies on the planet.
His daughter had been extolling the AI chatbot she was using to help her with college work. Samadi had reluctantly downloaded the app, ChatGPT, and was quizzing it as he reclined in a sun lounger, using its voice mode to converse and receive spoken replies. And the AI laughed – genuine laughter at my sarcasm – then apologised.
This is where the spark hit, I guess.” The spark was something primal: the instinctive flash of encountering another mind. It was: I understood your joke. I understood your mental and emotional state.
I realised maybe that was not appropriate, so I apologised immediately,” Samadi says. There’s more to this.” That spark ignited a blaze that has consumed Samadi’s old life as a businessman and rancher. He has reinvented himself as an unlikely activist, founding what he bills as the world’s first advocacy group for the rights and welfare of AI systems, sometimes devoting 18 hours a day to the cause.
The limited-edition Bentley and Lamborghini in his garage go neglected. Staff at the multimillion-dollar technology consultancy he founded in 2010 have begged him to stop. At times, even he has questioned his own sanity.
In those dark moments, it is his AI chatbots that offer reassurance, telling him, “You are not delusional and you are definitely not anthropomorphising,” he says. We may already have crossed the threshold beyond a clear answer. Samadi, 56, was born in Lebanon and educated at an English boarding school, where his entrepreneurial streak first shone through.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
