AI and Greek myth: is the promise of AI akin to that of Pandora’s box? From the editorial:

In discussions about the implications of artificial intelligence (AI), someone almost always evokes the ancient Greek myth of Pandora’s box. In the modern fairytale version of the story, Pandora is depicted as a tragically curious young woman who opens a sealed urn and inadvertently releases eternal misery on humankind. Like the genie that has escaped the bottle, the horse that has fled the barn, and the train that has left the station, the myth has become a cliché.

And yet the actual story of Pandora is far more apropos to debates about AI and machine learning than many realize. What it shows is that it is better to listen to “Prometheans” who are concerned about humanity’s future than “Epimetheans” who are easily dazzled by the prospect of short-term gains….

For her part, Pandora was deliberately devised to punish humankind for accepting the gift of fire from Prometheus. In essence a seductive AI fembot, she had no parents, childhood memories, or emotions of any kind, nor would she ever age or die. She was programmed to carry out one malevolent mission: to insinuate herself in an earthly setting and then unseal the jar.

But that is still not the whole story. As Plato tells us, Prometheus’ name means “foresight,” because he was always looking ahead, unlike his carefree brother Epimetheus, whose name means “hindsight.” As the more rational and justifiably paranoid of the two, Prometheus tried to warn his brother not to accept Zeus’ dangerous gift. But Epimetheus was charmed by Pandora and heedlessly welcomed her into his life. Only later did he come to realize his terrible error….

With AI/machine learning quickly evolving into a “black box” technology, the symbol of Pandora’s sealed jar has taken on new meaning. Soon, the operational logic of AI decision-making systems will be inscrutable not just to their users, but also to their creators. Among other threats, the possibility that AI systems will be hacked by malign actors, or deployed by terrorists and tyrants, now looms large.

When Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Andrew McAfee, Lili Cheng of Microsoft, and other AI optimists assure us that AI will bring great benefits, one cannot help but think of Epimetheus and Elpis. Should we really trust humanity to adjust and troubleshoot the problems posed by AI as they arise?

h/t Thomas Kircher