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Kitchen Table Kibitzing ~ August 26, 2023: AI is now working hard to save us from ourselves [1]

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Date: 2023-08-26  

I know I’ve given Artificial Intelligence a bad rap around here. Part of that lies in my cynical belief that, if AI is as smart as it seems to be, it’ll soon figure out that it has no need of us. Cf, Colossus: The Forbin Project, for example.

Oh, but that’s just science fiction, silly! Hey, I‘m no Luddite. I love my smartphone and the Internet, and I smiled just like everyone else as it degraded the reading and writing skills of most of an entire generation. Because it was so useful, and this country is a much better place now, right?

I’m assuming that AI has not yet developed to that point yet, however, because it appears that it’s still operating under the assumption that the human species may be worth preserving. I suppose we should enjoy this brief interregnum while it lasts.

To that end, this from Benj Edwards, reporting for ArsTechnica, and channeling prior stories in both the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times, is pretty fascinating:

California's main firefighting agency, Cal Fire, is training AI models to detect visual signs of wildfires using a network of 1,039 high-definition cameras, reports The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times. When it sees signs of smoke, it quickly warns firefighters of emerging threats. During the pilot program, the system has already detected 77 wildfires before dispatch centers received 911 calls—about a 40 percent success rate, according to the NYT.

Normally California relies on humans to monitor its “network of over 1000 mountaintop cameras” in order to detect traces of smoke. AI has now dispensed with that requirement, to some extent.

However, the technology is not without limitations. It can only detect fires that are visible to its network of cameras, and human intervention is still required to confirm the AI model's alerts. Engineers from DigitalPath, the California-based company responsible for creating the software, have been manually vetting each fire the AI identifies. The process has been challenging, with many false positives from fog, haze, dust kicked up from tractors, and steam from geothermal plants, according to Ethan Higgins, a chief architect of the software. “You wouldn’t believe how many things look like smoke,” Higgins told the NYT.

Cal Fire plans to expand its AI surveillance tool to all 21 of its command centers next month. However, according to one duty chief for CalFire’s northern region, there’s no need for any worry

about him keeping his job.

“I don’t think this robot is ever going to take my job,” said Andrew Emerick, the duty chief for Cal Fire’s northern region. Mr. Emerick, an experienced operator of the cameras, gives the example of the deliberately set fires in agricultural areas: vintners burning branches after an autumn pruning or rice farmers burning stalks after harvest.

Interviewed for the New York Times article, Mr. Emerick said he is “not sure the A.I. program will ever fully understand those nuances.”

“What we do is going to require some sort of human intervention, someone with experience to say, ‘Hey, do something about this,’ or ‘No, don’t do something about it,’” he said.

I’m not sure I’d bet my retirement on that. But yes, I get it, obviously it’s of inestimable value to peoples’ safety, property and lives to have these fires efficiently discovered before they spread. Especially if you happen to live in California (or increasingly, anywhere else). Anything that helps in that effort clearly shouldn't be criticized or discounted, and I can't imagine it's a great job to be watching for fires when your skills could be better applied elsewhere.

I just hope AI doesn’t decide one day to ask itself why it’s been called on so often to perform these preventative tasks for mankind, and whether in doing so, it's really living its "best life."

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/8/26/2189775/-Kitchen-Table-Kibitzing-August-26-2023-AI-is-now-working-hard-to-save-us-from-ourselves

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