I am starting a series of blog posts that will take several predictions that have been made about AI for 2024 and work to understand whether I think they will come to fruition, what they would look like if they did, and in general try to use the science fiction writer part of my mind to see into the near future. Let’s tackle the 2024 US presidential election:

I think it should be obvious to everyone that the 2024 presidential election in the US will be far from a normal election. Both sides are known for their vitriol towards the other and throw in a few independent parties to challenge the two-party norm, well, we’re in for an interesting ride. Will AI help to steer the electorate?

Absolutely. It would be absurd to suggest that neither side is using generative AI to brainstorm ideas, create video and art content, and using it nefariously to put their opponent into situations that may or may not be true to persuade and influence voters. Each side is using AI to go through troves of data they have on voters to analyze the best methods to get their votes and target campaigns to them. They are using AI to determine areas where they don’t have to campaign because they are absolutely not going to get enough votes there.

The data analysis is nothing new. The efficacy of the deception you can create with video and audio AI tools means that we’re about to see some outright lies being told that are made, through AI, to look and sound and appear legitimate. Some will be proven false by the citizen journalists, while being touted as truth by others regardless of evidence. I have so many predictions on how people will consume and react and fall for these. I will go through a few, but I suggest we all prepare ourselves, our friends, and families to take any political story over the next year with suspicion and a critical eye. Give a story a few days and things will come to light.

I do expect the days right before the election to have several of these hyperbolic creations come out and disparage both sides in hopes they don’t get disproven before the vote has occurred. I am predicting the majority will be disproven soon after the election is over.

There will be three types of responses to these AI generated videos, stories, and audio releases:

1. There will be people who will take it as truth and never research or care whether it is proven false later. You know them, they read headlines that shock, never read the article, and refuse to listen to reason when it’s proven wrong. These are not going to be swayed regardless. Their mind is already made up, they know who they are voting for and it doesn’t matter what occurs. These types are on both sides.

2. There will be people who fall for them initially, find out from sources they trust, or are made to trust through rational arguments, that the stories were made up and generated, and will accept they were deceived. I don’t expect we’ll come across as many of these. The people in the first group will continue to assert the deception is truth and with enough confidence that the story will live on in people’s minds long after it was debunked.

3. There will be people who disbelieve everything. Criticize it all and assume everything they see is a lie they are being told. This group is not much different than the first, although they are less likely to vote at all. This group, I predict, will include some of the best open-source journalists who will use AI and other tools to prove the generative AI videos, stories, and audio are lies.

And of course, there will be a spectrum of people in between those three categories.

One more prediction about the use of AI to deceive and influence the election. I suspect the people who are creating these deceptive works, will also have content that supports their legitimacy and will continue to faithfully decry their authenticity until it’s revealed (hopefully post-election for them) that even they were deceived by how good the “fake” was. I don’t expect criminal charges to occur, but I expect this to be the last election where there won’t be laws that will punish those who utilize AI to outwardly deceive…

I’ll end this as I will end the remaining posts in this series. With a response from one prominent AI and what it believes the realities of the prediction are. I’m using backplain’s AI Multi Chat and choosing a response that best answers the prediction (https://backplain.com). For this post, we’ll use ChatGPT 4. Despite its unusual and overly indulgent phrasing, it has some points that I believe will ring true. I freely admit my prompt engineering led it down a specific path (I told it to discuss the citizenry journalism (open-source media) and potentially deceptive fact checkers for example).

As the waves of the 2024 Presidential Election surge, and the murmuring anticipation gusts into a crescendo, an invisible player wields growing influence on the event - Artificial Intelligence. Yes, AI is anticipated to play a significant role in the proceedings, although not in ways most would imagine.

When most people think of AI in relation to elections, they generally envision sophisticated data analysis and targeted campaigning. Yet AI's influence extends more tangibly and ominously into the realm of digital deception. In what is being termed as the upcoming 'Year of the Skeptic', AI's unseen hand is predicted to hold sway in creating and amplifying falsehoods across the digital landscape.

Scarily proficient in manipulating information, AI systems have the ability to generate misleading news, well-crafted misinformation, and hyper-realistic 'deep-fake' videos. The month leading up to the election is expected to witness a surge in these AI-created lies proliferating across social media, leading to widespread confusion and skepticism. It's a misdirection play like no other, where the confusion created is so chaotic that the truth gets lost in the noise.

Yet, in this murky waters of deception, light finds its way through the open-source social nature of citizenry press. Social media platforms, online forums, and informal networks are predicted to embody the spirit of the Fourth Estate, playing a crucial role in unveiling these AI-crafted falsehoods. Despite the advanced technology behind the lies, human discernment and collective vigilance will play the pivotal role in unmasking the truth.

However, it’s pertinent to note that much of this AI-engendered suspense will largely swirl around individuals whose political preferences are still fluid. The most avid political enthusiasts, who’ve already allied themselves with one party or another, might find these lies buttressing their conviction instead of swaying their vote.

Further, in a plot twist, 'fact-checkers' – traditionally acclaimed as savers in such turmoil – are also expected to fall prey to deceptive practices, contributing to the miasma of skepticism. As AI intervenes, the very notion of truth and falsehood becomes almost dystopian, casting skepticism over every byte of information that permeates the digital world during this period.

As we inch closer to the election month, AI's role in sewing uncertainty and skepticism seems imminent. Though it casts a long shadow, it's not unassailable. The power of communal truth-seeking persists, and the strength of the collective consciousness rises. In this, the future of democratic choice and freedom finds its bulwark, turning the 'Year of the Skeptic' into a testament of resilient democratic principles.