Artificial intelligence: How healthy is the future?
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Image source Maxpixel CC0 creative commons license. Author unknown
The chat bot just replied your message…you just got a perfect reply to your message without another human being at the other end of the computer; breathtaking!, you’d want/ wish for more of this, for sure you’re already getting tired of the slow customer service agents who previously attend to you via the messaging hotlines. Every second is worth a lot, this orientation has been the main drive of our ‘speed-based’ twenty-first century technology and science, we suddenly moved from the very powerful horses and camels to the ‘two horses driven’ chariots, a double in speed and an increase in comfort and user satisfaction.
Technology have evolved over time and the unthinkable is becoming the reality. With Javascript, python, Java and a vast array of computer programming languages, hardware automation have spelled a new and exciting stage in human history. Automated devices have been developed to solve human problems, this roles they have played satisfactorily, to an extent that they’ve won preference over human abilities. Conditional statements, a common feature of programming languages instructs software as well as hardware components to respond in a specified manner. Features of this sort have enabled the production of robust machines and software which interacts with humans and the environment.
Apart from speed and comfort, technological advancements have also been more ‘accuracy-based’ and these products are geared towards providing more accuracy and efficiency than the pre-existing products and/procedures. The computer –the most important electronic device have livened the hopes of a near perfect result and have been developed to an extent that any error in the results produced by a computer can only be traced back to the operator and not the machine itself.
The GIGO theme is truly a strict one as you’d only receive a result of what you instructed the computer to do. My classmate back in high school defined the computer as an ‘idiot machine’, this was a subject of many jokes ,but on a closer look; I’d say he was correct with this definition as the computer does not detect errors which was made by the instructor, it only carefully carries out every bit of instruction and presents the results in a human language even though the tasks were performed in ones and zeros, the machine language (binary numbers).
This simplifies it’s use as understanding the computer language would even be more tedious and the computer would be difficult to use, at least for the non-technically literate ones. These technological advancements and many more has shaped our present ‘jet age’
Advancements in automation technologies have continuously reduced the need for human abilities as they provide a faster and more accurate result while costing less than human services (as the case may be). We swim so deep in the oceans of automation that we begin to forget/underate the ability of the human mind and muscles.
Natural intelligence versus artificial intelligence, a comparison that continues to favour the machines as we advance in years…and technology. Humans have been at the helm of these amazing breakthroughs, each and everyone of them, human intelligence have shown to be boundless and this have been evidenced in many ways; an astrologer could predict the personality of a new born baby just with the position of the celestial bodies at the time if his/her birth; astrology could be traced back to the ancient Babylon and this proves the might of natural intelligence even before the industrial and computer age, even though the theories of astrology have been proven wrong in many occasions, they still represent a significant attempt by humans to unravel the mysteries of their environment.
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A horoscope. Image credit Wikimedia CC3.0 license. Author Chris Brennan
The fact that even these automated devices are products of natural intelligence simply wins this comparison
…amidst this, present technologies are more concerned about equipping machines with human abilities rather than augmenting the amazing human intelligence with more healthier. Another war between Artificial intelligence (AI) and Intelligence Augmentation(IA)which Artificial intelligence is winning too…unfortunately.Everything we love about civilization is a product of intelligence, so amplifying our human intelligence with artificial intelligence has the potential of helping civilization flourish like never before–as long as we manage to keep the technology beneficial
(Max Remark; president, The future of life institute)
Artificial intelligence has developed over the years in both efficiency and dependability and has gained application in many aspects of our lives, ensuring increased output in these areas where it has been applied, however the use of artificial intelligence oriented gadgets are seriously regulated, this limits their application, but nevertheless, it is in use in many fields. To completely imitate the human ability is not as easy as it seems, as this involves encoding the machine/ bot with several abilities such as perception, learning, language, knowledge and reasoning, movement and manipulation through the means of computer science and mathematics, however, with precise description of some human behavior, the scope of artificial intelligence has been simplified but only to a little extent as even with a precise description, these qualities are hard to interpret into a language which can be understood by the machine, certain human qualities such as emotions are almost impossible to be encoded in a machine language, unlike perception and movement which can be readily programmed using sensors and mechanical technologies respectively
How healthy is the future?
Since the onset of artificial intelligence as an academic discipline in 1956, the study has faced intense struggles and have also made enormous breakthroughs. It’s has found application in almost every areas of the human life as even our as even our messaging applications possess artificial intelligence features which enables users to better interact with the application and also getting faster results, hence a much better user experience.
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Other areas such as sports, and the medical sector have adopted artificial intelligence technology and techniques which produces a more accurate and faster results.
In corporation with Adidas, Cairos Technology in Germany produced a goal line technology system which makes use of sensors and magnetic grids to detect when the ball crosses the goal line, the grid is made up of thin cables with the electric current running through them, and the sensor measures the magnetic grid and relays the data to a computer which determines whether the ball had crossed the line or not.
A telemedical system. Image source Wikimedia. Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license. Author Intel free press.
Artificial intelligence based products has gained application in several medical procedures such as radiology, patient monitoring and assistance and other medical diagnostic procedures.
Using artificial intelligence, medical radiologist can interpret imaging results with more accuracy, however the artificial intelligence means that interpretation of this results do not need much expertise from the radiologist, the Telemedicine can convey information to the physician as regard the occurrence of any disease activity. This would decrease the need for the much human-based processes in the healthcare and may provide more efficiency and speed to medical sectors.
Apart from these, artificial intelligence has vast applications which cannot be covered in the scope of this writing, with advancements in robotics and the moves to produce robots, and bots which perfects the human features, artificial intelligence is used in many places where we don’t even realize they are products of artificial intelligence. Self-driving cars might appear to be the most significant product of artificial intelligence in the transportation sector, this is wrong however as this discipline have been more impactful on the transportation industry than the Self-driving cars itself.
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On a more conscious examination, we are faced with a dilemma. A world machines and ‘less-intelligent' and near-useless humans or a world with machines which aids humans in performing certain task by performing tasks which are not healthy for humans, not humanly possible or simply allows the man to perform the main tasks faster, while the simple calculators augments the human ability, artificial intelligence aided calculators go many miles ahead to perform other human roles in calculations and can perform the complete calculation tasks without the man or with the man just present to inspect the work behind done by the machine.
Even though the artificial intelligence provides us with more accuracy, speed, safety and comfortability, delegating some activities to machines would still expose humans to a new set of dangers which may be even more severe than that encountered in a human-based control system. Continued researche and discoveries in the artificial intelligence discipline will eventually reduce the role which humans has to play in the concerned field as these machines are always built to out- smart humans, this would remove the role played by emotions and decreased use of the human brain reduces it’s capabilities, this is in congruence with Jean Larmack’s law of use and disuse, hence while we make machines more efficient, we render humans less-efficient and decrease their role in the ecosystem, artificial intelligence is awesome I must say, but in essence, it should be geared towards the performance of humanly impossible tasks and reducing the unnecessary stress for workers, precisely, artificial intelligence should be geared more towards ergonomics and creating a stress-free working environment for humans.
Intelligence augmentation (IA) as proposed in the 1950s by cybernetics and early computer pioneers is the effective use of information technology to amplify human intelligence while he performs his tasks. This concepts is particularly healthier as the machine in use doesn’t replace the human, rather, it only enhances their efficiency and leads to the production of a better result in a shorter time.
In our contemporary society, the unhealthy effects of artificial intelligence is already evidence, despite being small enough to be overlooked in some cases, the fact that this discipline is evolving and making more breakthroughs towards producing human-like machines only means that these effects will escalate and become more tangible. Whether humans will evolve to survive the era of super machines by expanding their abilities to exceed that of the machines or whether they will fall prey to the sophisticated machines and become less influential in the environment is still unknown and only time will tell. This uncertainty could be averted by channeling more efforts towards intelligence augmentation and producing healthier machines which makes humans more productive than ones which reduced the need for their services…and existing.
The future is human-machine hybrid. The goods associated with AI are too numerous and humans are now partly dependent on AI for survival.
Most of these devices are intelligence amplification tools. AI goes to the extreme in this case, I read an article about a robot which can handle all gardening procedures, this is AI in full action. The Gardner just lost his job...AI
I guess everyone will need programming knowledge in order to stay employed in the nearest future
So that the gardener will be able to focus on a new kind of job. This is similar to what happened with industrialisation. Some jobs will become obsolete and new jobs will arise.
PS: this is my own opinion on this eternal debate :)
A well diversified job system have always been an economy saver, if AI narrows down this diversity and everyone is propelled towards jobs which are yet to be taken up by the computers, then this diversity will suffer, and the economy too.
This is where I am unsure. Yes, some jobs will disappear. But new one will appear. At the end, we will still have a diversity of jobs, but a different one. There will be of course a transition period of uncertainty in the middle (since one needs to identify the new jobs and educate people accordingly).
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