# AI is wonderful and will make your life better! (not) **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Tags:** ai\ **Created:** [July 20, 2025, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117 "2025-07-20T16:40:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2025, 7:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/41 "2025-07-26T07:43:26Z")
I do not understand. They had a system in place that worked well and ditched it because… why? ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2025, 11:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/42 "2025-07-26T11:39:41Z")
I’ve heard of fast food restaurants using remote call centers to staff the order entry part of the drive through. How does that compare with using an AI for this? ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2025, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/43 "2025-07-26T17:12:28Z")
Forget Terminator or War Games, in reality every AI coder should be made to watch Colossus: The Forbin Project. Always have an unbreakable off switch! ---
**Author:** ![ekedolphin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ekedolphin/32/10003_2.png) [@ekedolphin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ekedolphin)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2025, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/44 "2025-07-26T18:15:27Z")
> [@DPRK](#): > > I do not understand. They had a system in place that worked well and ditched it because… why? Ellie thinks it’s because customers complained about it. And the company thought it was actually hurting sales. ---
**Author:** ![Maserschmidt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/maserschmidt/32/18829_2.png) [@Maserschmidt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maserschmidt)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2025, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/45 "2025-07-26T19:07:08Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > Forget Terminator or War Games, in reality every AI coder should be made to watch Colossus: The Forbin Project. > > Always have an unbreakable off switch! Or Paper Man (1971). Behind every evil machine is potentially a fucked-up evil human! ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2025, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/46 "2025-07-26T20:56:45Z")
> [@Maserschmidt](#): > > Paper Man Wow, I’ve never heard of that one. _Of course_ James Olsen is the baddie! I’ll have to see if I can find it. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2025, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/47 "2025-07-26T21:17:50Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > Forget Terminator or War Games, in reality every AI coder should be made to watch Colossus: The Forbin Project. > > Always have an unbreakable off switch! An off switch would have defeated the point. They wanted a perfect ‘Doomsday Machine’ that could not be shut off or interrupted in any way, hence why it was buried in a moat of radioactive salt. I like to think that Charles Forbin went home and caught a late night showing of _Dr. Strangelove, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb_, and realized to his great horror the implications of he just did. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![OttoDaFe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ottodafe/32/356_2.png) [@OttoDaFe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OttoDaFe)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2025, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/48 "2025-07-26T21:48:16Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > Forget Terminator or War Games, in reality every AI coder should be made to watch Colossus: The Forbin Project. > In time you will come to regard me not only with respect and awe, but with love. > > — ~~Colossus~~ Grok ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2025, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/49 "2025-07-26T23:49:13Z")
NEVER!!! FU discourse never is a complete sentence ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2025, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/50 "2025-07-26T23:53:30Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > An off switch would have defeated the point. Well if you’re going to go that route, Forbin should have done full software testing before he actually hooked it up to the defense system AND locked the door. Even HAL was run in the lab for years before it was given a spaceship to run, and look how _that_ turned out. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2025, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/51 "2025-07-26T23:59:53Z")
That is because Heywood Floyd gave HAL-9000 a secret mission objective that he had to conceal from the crew. He went insane because of conflicting directives. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2025, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/52 "2025-07-27T00:13:41Z")
That’s what I said. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2025, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/53 "2025-07-27T06:12:12Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > Forget Terminator or War Games, in reality every AI coder should be made to watch Colossus: The Forbin Project. > > Always have an unbreakable off switch! No such thing. I recall how that issue worked out in the novel _The Two Faces of Tomorrow;_ they discovered that the AI had realized there was a danger of a power outage, and had rewired the power system around the off switches. And upgraded various secondary computer nodes into the equivalent of its main ones, so even the fallback plan of “just blow the computer up” wouldn’t work. ---
**Author:** ![Maserschmidt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/maserschmidt/32/18829_2.png) [@Maserschmidt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maserschmidt)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2025, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/54 "2025-07-29T17:01:39Z")
Oh, hey, here’s another great use of AI - damage assessments on rented vehicles, apparently based on measured changes of some kind. Literally the wheels of progress! > **[It's Not Just Hertz: AI Damage Scanners Are Spreading to More Rental Car...](https://www.thedrive.com/news/its-not-just-hertz-more-rental-car-brands-are-using-ai-scanners-to-nickel-and-dime-you)** > > A growing number of rental car brands, like Sixt, are using AI scanners to assess damage and it's leading to problems, as multiple customers tell The Drive. > **[Hertz' AI System That Scans for "Damage" on Rental Cars Is Turning Into an...](https://futurism.com/hertz-ai-damage-scanner)** > > Hertz' new AI damage scanners are dead on arrival — and unfortunately, it's not the only company deploying the shoddy tech.  ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2025, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/55 "2025-07-29T17:13:59Z")
> Hertz’ new AI damage scanners are dead on arrival — and unfortunately, it’s not the only company deploying the shoddy tech. They need another AI to scan for damage from the original AI. ---
**Author:** ![OttoDaFe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ottodafe/32/356_2.png) [@OttoDaFe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OttoDaFe)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2025, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/56 "2025-07-29T19:43:42Z")
At what point will the AIs be sacked? _Someone_ was gonna say it … ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2025, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/57 "2025-07-29T20:03:29Z")
> [@OttoDaFe](#): > > At what point will the AIs be sacked? Those responsible for sacking the AI that has just been sacked have been sacked. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![SunUp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ea5d25/32.png) [@SunUp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SunUp)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2025, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/58 "2025-07-29T20:07:27Z")
And the damage assessments will be done via an entirely different method at great expense and at the last minute. ---
**Author:** ![Tibby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tibby/32/17030_2.png) [@Tibby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tibby)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2025, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/59 "2025-07-29T20:33:08Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > Of course the biggest, most likely danger is that Skynet achieves consciousness and decides to kill all humans. That’s why I am always extremely polite around robots and AI. I figure it’s going to need a few humans still around so maybe I can survive. I’m not worried. I’ll be strutting into the robot apocalypse with a can of WD-40 strapped to my belt like a cowboy packing a Colt .45, misting it around like robot pheromones. Word on the motherboard is WD-40 is like catnip to killer bots. While everyone else is getting laser-blasted, I’ll be whispering, ‘Who’s a squeaky boy?’ and getting promoted to Chief Oil Boy. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2025, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117/60 "2025-07-29T20:37:31Z")
Until your WD-40 can runs out. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ai-is-wonderful-and-will-make-your-life-better-not/1021117.md?page=4)