Sermon Illustrations
Fresh Perspective on ‘Increase in Knowledge’
The often-referenced passage in Daniel 12:4 about an "increase in knowledge" during the last days has taken on new meaning in our high-tech age. Thanks to the internet humanity has never before had access to so much knowledge. A scary next step is what we are producing with this overwhelming increase in knowledge.
Go is arguably the most complex board game in existence. And is thought to be the oldest board game still being played today. However, it's not only humans that are playing this game now. In 2016, Google DeepMind's AlphaGo beat 18-time world champion Lee Sedol in four out of five games. Now, normally a computer beating a human at a game like chess or checkers wouldn't be that impressive. But Go is different. There are over 170 moves possible in Go. To put that into perspective, there are only just over 100 different atoms in the observable universe.
However, what many people don't know is that only a year after AlphaGo's victory over Lee Sedol, a brand-new AI called AlphaGo Zero beat the original AlphaGo 100 games in a row. The most impressive part? It learned how to play with zero human interaction. This technique is more powerful than any previous version. Why? It isn't restricted to human knowledge. No data was given. With just the bare-bones rules, AlphaGo Zero surpassed the previous version in only 40 days of learning. In only 40 days, it surpassed over 2,500 years of strategy and knowledge. It is now regarded as the best Go player in the world.
And if we continue to develop Artificial Intelligence, then, that means there's going to be more and more non-human intelligence. Eventually, there's going to be a point where we represent the minority of intelligence. Maybe even a very minuscule amount.
Billionaire tech mogul Elon Musk comments on the rapid development of artificial intelligence: "It could be terrible and it could be great. It's not clear. But one thing is for sure, we will not control it."
You can watch the video here (Time: Start – 2 min 32 sec).