BOB AND BERTHA

We have added two new members to our family thanks to our middle daughter. Their names are Bob and Bertha. Actually Bob’s full name, given to him by grandson Carter, who also typed his name in on our computer, is Bob the Vacume 4 (phonetic spelling). They came as Christmas and House-Warming presents and they are, as one might assume by Bob’s full name, a robotic sweeper (Bob) and a robotic mop (Bertha).

As I write this, Bertha is back in her resting place in my office recharging after having mopped all the floors, or at least the floors she can get to which, unfortunately, because we will still have to do those, is not all of them. She won’t go over carpets to get to the floors. Bob, on the other hand, knows no bounds. To be honest, both do very good jobs for which we are thankful.

To be even more honest, I truly feel guilty when we tell them to get to work. I mean, it’s no great of a deal to vacuum or mop the floors. Well, to be truly honest, I vacuum and Arlena mops, but neither of us works up a sweat when vacuuming or mopping. And I certainly don’t want our daughter to feel guilty because she gifted us with something she knew we really would appreciate. And we do, of course.

Bob and Bertha are simply another example of AI taking overt our lives. Our washer and dryer, stove and refrigerator and dishwasher and probably even the microwave are all capable of being connected to our phone or tablet or this computer I am now using. None of them are because I know, I know, I know I will somehow do something to lock one or all of them and not be able to use because I will not know how to unlock them. Better safe than sorry or, given my age, even foolish.

Yes, I truly appreciate everything that AI is capable of doing and has already been doing in my life, like my phone and computer. The phone gives a sense of security and the computer as well as the phone allows for easy access to other people and needed – and unneeded – information. My car basically runs on a computer which, of course, costs a fortune to repair when a chip goes haywire. But that’s another story.

The doomsday sayers are warning us that AI will take over our lives and perhaps it will take over much of it. But no one of us wants to go back to typewriters or surgery suites without the latest in AI. We love what AI can do and does for us for which we should be thankful. So thank you Bob and Bertha.

However, there is one thing Bob and Bertha nor any AI device cannot do and that is love us. Only we, with real intelligence, not artificial, can do that. And while we may wonder or even fear where AI will lead us, we know that love, in all its imperfections, is a wonder to behold and casts out any fear that we may have. I like what AI does but that’s as far as it goes. We love and need to be loved by one another. That’s the bottom line!