What will our ghosts say to the future?

Image credit: Master AD, French artist c. 1600. Artwork downloaded from the NGA. Books and artworks are not mere consumables; they are a means for one human being to reach across space and time, far beyond one’s lifespan, to communicate with another human being. While books and artworks do this intentionally, other forms of human-made artifacts do the same by their very existence. Discovering a spearhead, an earthen pot, or a sunken ship tells us a trove of information about the people who lived in the distant past. AI appears to subvert this pattern. Despite initial appearances, their output contains no communication beyond the superficial—they are nothing more than consumables, shallow and disposable. There is no human to communicate with. Over time they provide no insight into the people living in our era, aside from our overarching vanity. I sometimes wonder what future archaeologists will think of the artifacts we leave behind. Will our debris help our ghosts speak to our future…