With all the talk about Artificial Intelligence as a savoir or demon, I thought I’d add my .02 cents. Years ago, I worked at a startup called Right Media that was later acquired by Yahoo! During my time there our division was run by a man named Ramsey McGrory. At one of our many meetings we were reviewing the latest Lumascape chart when one of the attendees remarked about how confusing the diagram was. Without missing a beat Ramsey replied, “Embrace the murky”. I would like to extend that thought to the current conversation on A.I. Embrace the algorithm, resistance is futile.
We are still in the early days of the A.I. revolution (and it will be revolutionary). Much of the debate has centered around upheaval and job loss. I think those fears are overblown. Yes, some roles will disappear because it’s faster and cheaper to rely on A.I. to perform those tasks. However, many new opportunities will arise. And that’s where our focus should be.
We're in a period where science hasn't advanced as much as we had hoped. Yes, we have treatments for everything from AIDS to the Zika virus. And weight loss can be achieved with a simple weekly injection. But there are many more conditions for which there is no treatment let alone a cure. With its ability to rapidly process the properties of billions of molecules to produce new compounds and proteins, A.I. will be the tool that unlocks a medical treasure chest.
Use in Schools
Education is the magic key. Understandably, parents and teachers are worried about the impact of A.I. on education. Until recently, schools banned the use of Generative A.I. for assignments. They were even using A.I. detectors to review homework. However, after much study, most schools have abandoned these approaches and are now embracing the use of A.I. They're even figuring out ways to incorporate the technology into their lesson plans.
Think of it as a recursive experience. The student will ultimately have to understand the output from the AI. And in many cases, they'll have to apply that output in the physical world. The results of those real world applications will be fed back into the model to improve future results. This (hopefully) creates the epitome of a virtuous cycle.
Loss of Skills
Some might see the embrace of A.I. as a crutch rather than a tool. While it’s true that some skills will be lost or experience reduced demand (how many assembly programmers do you know?). But that’s only because something better, faster, and easier to learn has come along and the market shifted (C, C++, JavaScript, Python). That was normal and so is this.
Will We All Become Lemmings?
No. I expect the opposite to happen. Most people today are inherently skeptical – even those that built our current A.I. platforms. It’s that very innate skepticism that will keep us from surrendering our free will to the A.I. overlords. No one does a Michael Scott and follows a GPS Navigation system into obvious lake anymore. In fact, I expect people to show off their mastery of A.I. the way people show off their tricked-out cars, PCs, phones, body art, etc. Just picture your favorite nerdy friend and/or relative x 10% of the population. Afterall, people made it and people will control it. And the rest of us will marvel at what they create.
Bad Actors
As with any new technology, there will be people who try to exploit it maliciously. This is nothing new and there are already folks on the case. When these situations arise, I’m always reminded of what the late Chinese Premier, Deng Xiaoping, said about the ills of opening China to the West, “When you open the window to get some fresh air, you have to expect a few flies”.
André Pina
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