You’ve probably been reading a lot lately about Artificial Intelligence and the dangers that some scientists, politicians and others think it poses for the human race and the planet.
My wife ran across something last week that adds some fuel to those concerns. It was on a website called travlers.com (you should be able to click on the link and you’ll find the article). It is a collection of portraits generated by an AI algorithm showing what best represents the average person or persons in each state may look like.
I’m assuming that the system plugs in things like landscape, climate, cultural identities, history and other things that make each state unique, then uses AI to generate a portrait.
Some of the suggested images of the “average” person in each state are pretty reasonable — a “Bubba” looking guy from Alabama, an older Hawaiian native warrior in what we’d think of as traditional clothing for that state and a cool looking blond dude with aviator sunglasses and a beach shirt for California.
So here’s what AI thinks we New Mexicans look like:
Here’s what the website says the portrait represents:
“Under the canopy of the vast Southwestern sky, the AI representation of New Mexico stands as a weathered elder, his deep-set eyes filled with countless untold stories. There’s an air of gentle, enduring strength about him, as resilient as the desert landscape he originates from. Framed but the backdrop of a clear sky and endless sand, his spirit and both expansive and quiet- just like the endless stretched of sand dunes throughout the state.”
Whew!!! Allow me to catch my breath. I’m sure that bit of prose was penned by an AI robot somewhere in the bowels of a computer lab in California.
Actually, I kind of feel like that guy — a weathered elder with “countless “countless untold stories” waiting to be posted on my blog. I do take offense that New Mexico is nothing but an “endless tretch of sand dunes.”
But if you think AI was a little too harsh on New Mexico, take a look at what it posted for Florida:
As the website describes the Sunshine State’s representative:
“We’re presented with a character who’s part man, part lizard, and entirely Floridian. From his reptilian eyes to his yellow hat and Summer shirt, he’s got the sun-soaked vibe down to a tee. After all, when you’re in a state that’s almost entirely a beach, why not go full-on sand lizard when you can?”
Hope you have fun finding your home state’s “average” person or couple. And I’m glad (for many reasons) that I don’t live in Florida.
aero-cordero.com 
As a former Floridian and Gator, I take umbrage with that description. I remember curvaceous young women and bronzed and strong men. Above them would be a pastel blue with sail-boat clouds drifting as with the tide. These examples of youthful beauty would be standing beneath swaying palm trees with a calm serenity born by the rolling waves caressing soft sand. Each dawn would bring them new joys and wonders to be savored as a right of life. (Courtesy AI Lon)
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