F*ck Face and McGee (Dialogues)

We have these two fellas. One’s thin, one’s round. F*ck Face and McGee, respectively. They’re not the most attractive to any man, woman or child, but maybe they’ll find love someday and drift apart from each other. For now, though, they have friendship, comradery. They get along just fine. They drink Budweiser together, watch sports, and play video games that involve racing or violence. And they have some interests, are fans of the same sports teams, and they’ve known each other for over two decades—went to the same elementary school, that sort of thing; played Little League together, both as teammates and rivals. They’re not city folk, but they’re not rural either. Incorporated town folk, if you will. Buddies. Pals. But they were also known to get into it sometimes.

The two of them love to argue, though they lack higher education. In middle school and high school, they were slackers in PE, getting their cardio by walking laps on the track and being lazy, doing the bare minimum so they could pick each other’s brains and watch girls go by in gym shorts. They live…well, I won’t say exactly where they live. In “our” town: what some dead writers would designate _________.

And so, for this episode, these two fellas are on their way to the 76 station up the street to get some snacks and beverages. Oh, did I mention that since this is such a small town they prefer to walk places? Well, that, and because they have time to kill—no major responsibilities and little money to burn. Anyway, let’s follow along.

McGee Is Scared of A.I.

F*ck Face: What’s been on your mind, bud? You look all up in your feelings ’bout somethin’.

McGee: AI. That’s what I been thinkin’ about.

F*ck Face: AI?

McGee: You know, Artificial Intelligence. I just don’t get how a machine can be intelligent. Don’t make sense to me.

F*ck Face: I know AI. Everybody’s talkin’ ’bout it. Why don’t you think it can be intelligent? Can’t computers be smart and think things? They compute, don’t they? Ain’t that smarts? Like a certain skill they have? Calculatin’ shit.

McGee: Yeah, but that’s just what computers do. That’s what they’re made for. Punch in some numbers and some others spit out. There you go, you got your answer. But these things is so advanced that they do have intelligence. I swear! They can learn on they own and think things. That’s why they so dangerous. They can think and decide shit on they own, and that’s what they say make ’um intelligent.

F*ck Face: Pshh! They’re still a machine. You still make ’um with computer chips and tell ’um what to do.

McGee: So you’re saying they can’t be smart?

F*ck Face: I’m just saying they do what they’re told in the end, what they’re made to do. (Right here F*ck Face kicked a small rock along the side of the road, since the side roads of their incorporated town don’t have sidewalks.) So, your worry is they might have a mind of their own? That they that smart?

McGee: That’s the thing! Nobody knows. They might be smarter than us. They might be doin’ shit we ain’t even aware of or know they be doin’.

F*ck Face: A computer smarter than us? We created it! What about God? He created us. You think we can be smarter than Him?

McGee: I think we might come close.

F*ck Face: Shit, then He might as well pull the plug on us. He gotta be Number One. The man upstairs. He ain’t lettin’ nobody into his attic and start tinkerin’ with His shit.

McGee: You got a point. I just been hearin’ too much ’bout how AI learns and can make its own choices to not to be afraid is all. Shit. Even experts, computer experts, experts in computers, are scared. Thing just keeps learning and fine-tuning itself. Might fine-tune us on outta here.

F*ck Face: You mean it thinks we the problem? Why would it think we the problem if we created it? Like God. Do we think God is the problem?

McGee: Reckon some people might, seein’ how He in charge and you can blame Him for stubbin’ your toe. Hell, you can blame Him for everythin’ under the sun.

F*ck Face: So that’s why AI could blame us? ’cause we done created it, so if it stubs its computer chip it’ll wanna snuff us out? What’s it gonna do? Shut down the internet, or the power company, some things we depend on? If it do, it just be shuttin’ itself down, right? Ain’t no computer gonna do anything that don’t have no electrics in it. So, don’t that mean we’re safe? We’d have to fix it and take care of it? Hell, it won’t blow up the planet for that reason either. It’d just be blowing itself up. Why would it do that if it’s so smart?

(McGee shrugged.) McGee: Like I said, we don’t know what it’s thinking, F*ck Face. Maybe it’s plotting to blow it all sky high! Including itself. What’s the point anyway? If there ain’t no point to being human, why would a computer think there be a point to its, uh, computin’?

F*ck Face: I did say it was a still a machine, right? Its whole purpose is to compute, to process shit and spit out answers. Right? You put in one plus one and it spits out two. Though maybe if it’s smart it’d add a note saying to go fuck yourself. Ha-ha!

McGee: It still got me worried, F*ck Face. Though I can’t understand how it intelligent. How can a computer be smart like people? Like it’s got a mind of its own. Least that’s what the experts think and warn about. But I don’t get how that is.

Street Smarts vs. Book Smarts

F*ck Face: Let’s try breakin’ it down then. What is smarts? Is it knowin’ a lot? Facts. Shit you read, like a walkin’ encyclopedia? That sort of thing?

McGee: If it is, then AI’s got us beat all right! Thing’s basically the internet itself. Like talkin’ to Google.

F*ck Face: So does that mean it can think? Does an encyclopedia think? Is it smart? You ask Google or its AI chatbot a question and it’s just the same as lookin’ that shit up in a book yourself, ain’t it?

McGee: I suppose.

F*ck Face: Does that make it smart? Does that mean it can think? It’s just knowledge. Like a library in a box.

McGee: I suppose that makes it a know-it-all. Those little bitches. I don’t like them know-it-alls. They don’t know shit, if you ask me. All they do is repeat shit. It’s dumb.

F*ck Face: You mean it ain’t got no street smarts?

McGee: Hell no! All an encyclopedia got is book smarts. That different.

F*ck Face: So you’re saying there’re two kinds of smarts?

McGee: I suppose.

F*ck Face: All right. So on the one hand you got book smarts, like we talkin’ about. That the kinda smarts you don’t like ’cause it be like talkin’ to a book. All it do is spit shit back, right?

McGee: I think so, yeah. Just spitting shit. Like some of them sports announcers on the games sometimes. It ain’t like they know all them stats. They get that off a computer or they got a team of them bitches lookin’ up facts for ’um.

F*ck Face: All right. Sports announcers. They ain’t just all spitting facts, though, right? Some of them used to play the game and they’re experts in the game, ain’t they?

McGee: I suppose. You don’t wanna hear that sort of stuff from no haircut, some guy with one of them golden voices who love to hear theyself talk. You want the inside scoop, to understand what it’s like to be down there on the field, to get in the players’ heads and understand what they be going through. That’s what makes it interestin’.

F*ck Face: So would the announcer who used to be a star player, a hall-of-famer maybe, would he be book smart?

McGee: I suppose he could still be book smart, but that ain’t why they hired him. He gotta be smart about the game. Like he gotta have certain skills that make him smart in that way.

F*ck Face: All right. Would you call the kind of smarts a football star have to be street smarts or book smarts?

McGee: Street smarts. Probably more so, I suppose.

F*ck Face: Why’s that?

McGee: Because they gotta be able to read people and the game, to look for cues and shit. They gotta know the rules, the flow, the players, how they look and act in certain situations, how they talk and all that. Anticipate and shit. Like when folks play basketball on the playground, they gotta feel it, like they gotta be in the zone. They gotta read people and not think about it. It ain’t like they got time to look up stats in the middle of a game. They gotta act and react.

F*ck Face: But don’t they still learn and practice each time they play or watch replays of the games? Don’t they take mental notes? Like study their behavior and learn from it, improving themselves and their skills? Like they try something different, a new way, to test it out, to experiment, and they learn. “No, that ain’t gonna fly.” Even if they do it without thinking?

McGee: I suppose. I guess they must. Like it is with everythin’. But they ain’t lookin’ at no Google or encyclopedia while they playin’.

F*ck Face: But don’t AI learn the same way? Through street smarts, like what we talkin’ about? Like that AI chatbot thing. It learns what to say based on shit that’s been said over and over, like each jump shot, each turn and fadeaway, or hike of the ball. Least that’s how I understand it. So AI ain’t just book smarts if it picks up patterns, improves, and learns from mistakes, which is what it sounds like we talkin’ about.

McGee: So does that make it intelligent? Like it thinks for itself, on its own. If it does, it might decide to take over the world, F*ck Face!

F*ck Face: Let it then! Maybe it won’t fuck shit up like we been doin’. But all right. We talked about street smarts and book smarts, but we haven’t talked about intelligence. What is intelligence? Do you think it’s a way of thinking? Least that’s what I heard it is. Like a thought process. Process being the key word now.

Thinkin’ Or Computin’

McGee: I suppose. You mean like a smart or, uh, intelligent person might break down a problem a certain way that other folks would see different?

F*ck Face: I think that’s what I’m getting’ at. Like a, uh, low IQ person might see a problem only one way, but somebody with a higher IQ might see it five ways. Would that work for you? Does that sound like what intelligence is? Unless you got another one?

McGee: No, that’ll work. As long as you going somewhere with this. I can see the gas station.

F*ck Face: It’s your question! You was the one who wasn’t sure AI was intelligent, with it being a robot.

McGee: All right. Go on then! Nobody’s stoppin’ you.

F*ck Face: So, AI’s got book smarts and street smarts, right? Though maybe more of one than the other. But do you think by having those two, like maybe being good at things with them two types of smarts, that it has a certain way of thinking?

McGee: You mean the thing thinks?! Like actually?

F*ck Face: What! Now we gotta talk about what thinkin’ is? Ain’t it the same as computin’?

McGee: You mean it thinks in numbers?

F*ck Face: Even people can think in numbers, McGee. People think in pictures and music and smells and tastes and memories and words and ideas and concepts and in dreams and daydreams, in all those things and in all those ways. It’s all still thinkin’, ain’t it? So, fuck yeah! The thing thinks. You can even say a calculator thinks, in its own way.

McGee: I don’t know if I’d go that far.

F*ck Face: Damnit! I didn’t want to start talkin’ about what thinkin’ is. Your question was about intelligence and if AI is intelligent, even though it got the goddamn word in the name! You know a calculator is smarter than you at addin’ and multiplyin’. Hell, that little bitch is probably better at math than ninety-nine percent of the population. It was programmed to have a certain set of skills—book smarts only, right? You agree? All right then. But is it intelligent? I don’t think so. It doesn’t have no way of thinking. It just eats and shits numbers. A one-track mind. But computers, and AI especially, are smarter ’bout more things. They have more learnin’—street smarts and book smarts. They practiced and got better, findin’ easier paths and connections and shit, sorta like a brain. It finds patterns and tries to be efficient. It was programmed, or taught, or learned, to be that way, to think that way. Like it’s gotta have a code, like at its core, to want to do those things, basically. To earn it some dog treats if it acts like a good boy.

McGee: Like it was made to learn and get better at learning? Like how we want to eat more tasty food and have sex more with sexy bitches? Huck yuck.

F*ck Face: Sure. But do you think AI is intelligent now?

McGee: I suppose. It got street smarts ’cause it learns and picks up patterns like a ballplayer, and it got book smarts ’cause it a walkin’ encyclopedia. Plus, it thinks a certain way ’cause it was programmed to learn and improve. And if it keeps learnin’ and getting’ better, does that mean it’ll get more intelligent than us? And like…wipe out the world? I mean, us, people. Probably not the world, though, right? Like you said, since it needs electrics and the internet. Unless it got a death wish. Heh. But that don’t scare me though.

F*ck Face: Sure. But it probably already smarter than us. I mean more intelligent. Least in a lot of ways.

Are We There Yet?

McGee: So you think we’re doomed?

F*ck Face: I don’t know, McGee. I just find it hard to believe that one computer program could take over everything in the world and force people to build shit for it until it’s able to make its own robot mechanics or whatever and build shit itself. But if we suspect foul play then why would we build that shit for it? Plus, there’re always solar flares. I read that if the sun farts one big enough it could wipe out power grids, and all kinds of shitty shit could happen. We’d be up a creek. But so would AI. But, hell, what do I know? I just know AI ain’t God. It didn’t create us.

McGee: I ain’t following, F*ck Face.

F*ck Face: What I’m saying is that I think we got some things AI don’t, even if it becomes all super-power-like. We got bodies and emotions. Gut instinct. We can communicate just by lookin’ at somebody, almost like telepathy. AI don’t have a concept of death or a true sense of religion. It don’t know what it’s like to struggle, or have to figure shit out on its own to keep the lights on, or of that struggle while the death clock ticks down. Can it make art without a prompt, as they call it? Plus, you know that bitch sucks up a shit-ton of water. The computers or servers it runs on…they need a shit-ton of water to cool them down because those things run so damn hot. In fact, it’s almost like a mirror to ourselves, now that I think about it.

McGee: Whaddya mean, F*ck Face?

F*ck Face: I mean it’s a question we gotta ask ourselves, this AI shit. I thought of it just now while we talkin’ about water. Are we dumb enough to let this AI thing drink up all our fresh water? Like would we let ourselves die of dehydration just so we can be extra lazy and let it think for us?

McGee: Sounds like something to ask it! Ha-ha-yuck!

F*ck Face: Then you gotta think about what its motives are. Like what’s its prime directive, especially if the thing becomes self-aware or whatever they’re afraid of happenin’. But if AI does become self-aware, wouldn’t that make it vulnerable? Don’t that make it afraid of death? Of having its plug pulled?

McGee: Shit if I know.

F*ck Face: Right. But do you know what I mean? It don’t want no sex or no food. It don’t have human intelligence, since it artificial, and it don’t have moods and it don’t get tired or have dreams. It ain’t flawed like us, or sneaky, or hypocritical—least it shouldn’t be. It ain’t got no body or hormones or menopause or impotence. Shit’s not going bald either. But are all those things flaws? They’re natural, ain’t they? So does that mean nature is wrong? Probably to a computer ’cause it don’t know what smells good in its own opinion. It don’t have no innate sense of what smells good and tasty. Not unless is gives us a survey.

McGee: So we don’t know its prime directive, huh? That like Star Trek, right? Or we won’t know it, I suppose. Unless it wants to make money. Ha-ha-yuck!

F*ck Face: No, we might not know what its directive is or what it wants. Unless it is to make money for some rich folks.

McGee: But what do we want? What’s our prime directive?

F*ck Face: Right now it’s Fritos. Ain’t you gonna hold the door for me?