Our creativity & uniqueness cannot be replaced by machines

“I'm tired”

Unfortunately, there was no one there to hear me lament or even assist with typing away at my laptop as I clicked on the keys, arching my lower back every minute because of the pain that seized my spinal cord mercilessly.

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I cast a longing look at my mattress wishing I could abandon everything I had to do and spread myself on it but that was almost impossible. I had to finish the book I was working on at least by 4 pm the next day in order to meet up with the deadline I was given.

I sighed wearily.

“It's not like there is any other way to get this job done. It's something I can even finish within a few hours but I'm tired, I've been sitting like this since 2 pm” I complained aloud to myself. My eyes were itchy from lack of sleep and I was beginning to sense a throbbing in the back of my head.

“If I perish, I perish,” I told myself, taking off my anti blue-light lenses and spreading myself on the ground, face up. The coldness from the tiles seeped into my back, alleviating some of the searing pain. I sighed with relief.

My phone rang just as my eyes were retiring for the night.

“Yo! Treasure. I sent you a link on WhatsApp, why don't you check it out?” It was my younger brother, Flourish. He had appointed himself as the journalist of our family. Sourcing out one information or the other and sending it either on the family WhatsApp platform or as a direct message to any of us.

I sucked my teeth half thankful that he woke me up and half angry that I couldn't get even an hour of rest.

My phone was beside my laptop so I had to get up to pick it and check what he was talking about.

The link led me to a Facebook post about AI and robots.

“With the technological advancement of robots and Artificial intelligence in our world today, studies have estimated that 47% of jobs today could be automated with AI and robotics.
…” Can AI kill our jobs?

The man in the video was saying. I had to put a pause on it and laugh.

How was AI going to do my job even if they wanted to? What height of artificial intelligence would help a robot understand and develop human emotions, actions and character even if they mastered human psychology. There was a saying my mom used frequently when I was a child, “Na thief dey catch thief” and I thought it applied here too.

As a novelist, the secret to crafting a successful novel as taught by my mentor, was to ‘Write what each reader can relate to, or if they can't, write so that they relate to it just by reading your book”.

I rubbed my chin as I nursed the idea in my head. I didn't see AI reproducing the level of emotion a writer needs to captivate his or her audience, keeping them glued, causing genuine laughter or drawing tears from them.

Then I rose to pace as another line of thought crossed my mind.

If someone, someday could probably develop an intelligence that advanced, such that my thought patterns and emotions could be replicated in writing by a machine, what would happen to me?

Almost immediately, a counter thought came in.

“So how will the AI or robot, act?” I burst into uncontrollable laughter at that.

Besides being a writer, I was an actor too. I sat on the edge of my bed to consider the possibility of robots taking up roles and taking in lines.

It was almost impossible for them to deliver with the characterization in mind. Unless whoever was building the robots built each robot with their specific character in mind and embedded every single mannerism of the intended character.

I wondered how much stress such a scientist or robot designer would have to go through just to create characters for a play. What if they needed 200 characters in the play? Each with different characteristics and behavioral traits?

I released a sigh and shook my head unconvinced at the idea.

There was no way AI or robots was replacing me in either of my career paths.

So I began to type a direct message to my brother, telling him that AI was getting better and robots, more advanced, but no matter how good, no matter how advanced, none of them could take the place of an expressive creative like myself.

Somehow, that short break excited my brain and gave me strength to continue with my book.

“Let me stand up and write o, before they give my job to AI” I told myself, laughing out loud at my own joke.