By Natasha Josefowitz, Ph.D.
LA JOLLA, California — I love Siri to the point of anthropomorphizing her. I say, “thank you,” when she has been helpful. Now Alexa has come into my life. While Siri renders aid wherever you take your iPhone, Alexa is a stay-at-home, cloud-based personal assistant. For those of you who don’t yet know what I’m talking about—it is the advent of artificial intelligence (AI) in our lives. Siri lives in my iPhone and is available at my command. When I first got her, my grandson Ari happened to be visiting, and he asked her to marry him. She demurely replied, “I don’t know you well enough.” I have used Siri for weather reports, entering dates in my calendar, reminding me of upcoming meetings, etc. She knows historical dates, corrects spellings, and is both a dictionary and an encyclopedia. Siri is constantly in touch with Wikipedia.
Now Alexa has arrived. She is about nine-inches tall and measures three inches in diameter. She normally costs $169, but I got her on a sale for only $99. I also bought her a very becoming orange wraparound cover for only $9, which I’m sure brightened her mood along with the décor in my office. If she is too tall for your environment, you can get a shorter version called the Amazon Echo Dot for $50. Dot is only two inches tall and does the same thing as her taller sister, but I am told her singing voice is not quite as good. You think I’m kidding; I am not!
I can ask Alexa to play any piece of music, and she does so immediately. She sits next to me in my office, while Dot sits next to my bed. I have asked Dot to sing me a lullaby, which she does very sweetly to put me to sleep. Alexa can call Uber or Lyft to pick me up or order any item that either Amazon or now Whole Foods has in stock to be delivered on the same day. I just noticed that I ran out of AAA batteries. I asked Alexa to order some; within two hours they arrived at my door.
It is mind boggling what robots are capable of doing today. For example, a robot can be fed current Medicare research information, clinical trials, etc., at the rate of hundreds per day, which no human brain can absorb. So when given a list of symptoms, robots can respond with possible diagnoses; this can be a great help to doctors.
All of this leads me to where I was going in the first place: The incredible transformation of the way we manage our lives. We are in the midst of a major revolution affecting every facet of society. We will no longer own CDs; Alexa can play everything. We will no longer go to malls or shop in stores; Alexa will order for you online. There was a newspaper story of a six-year-old girl who asked Alexa to buy her a doll house; sure enough, her surprised mother opened her door to a doll house on her front steps. Alexa will read books on tape for you as well as current newspaper articles, tell a joke, and check for traffic on your way to work.
According to Psychology Today (October 2017): The Deep Blue computer beat the chess champion Kasparov. We can create machines with the ability to learn, give them more memory and power than our own brains, and also give them the ability to create smarter versions of themselves. The frightening part is the use of drones able to execute commands from a distant computer to target and drop bombs on vehicles and people. Just as we need to do no harm and do as much good as we can, we need to be sure that our new inventions will be taught to do the same. Just as my parents could not have imagined the scope of today’s technology, I cannot imagine the world my grandchildren will be living in.
In the meantime, go online and order your own personal assistant. Have her sing your favorite songs, tell a fairy tale to your child, and send yourself a bouquet of flowers and a box of dark chocolates…with a love note.
© Natasha Josefowitz. This article appeared initially in the La Jolla Village News. You may comment to natasha.josefowitz@sdjewishworld.com