David LinckThere is always a big debate between the future prospects of humans versus computers. But in reality it is humans which cause the conflicts in their realm – as they are the ones intimately involved of their society and civilization. Societies evolve much like a large organism increasing in complexity, creating problems, solving them, and self-healing, or they collapse. Such is the reality between simplicity and complexity, and we should expect that. Okay so, I’d like to talk to you for a moment about the future of artificial intelligence as it surpasses human abilities.
Now then I ask; should humans really fear artificial intelligence, or should they relish the fact that these machines and tools will help us do all we do better. Indeed, I would submit to you that the artificial intelligence is no good to humans unless it can solve human problems. It is the humans who create the problems, and these machines and tools along with the humans that use them will indeed mitigate future challenges and solve the problems of our time.
Today, we may not be noticing, but the reality is that it is the humans who are inadvertently programming the artificial intelligent computers of tomorrow. For instance, every time you search something on the Internet, or click on the “liked” button on Facebook, you are putting information into a giant system, and big data analytics will use these points of data in bettering the future delivery of content.
In that case, more apropos content will be delivered based on your preferences, and other discoveries made by humans that think in a similar way, along with some of the humans that think differently, but had intrigued people like you with their content choices. Yes, there are privacy issues, and humans would have to decide if they can get over those challenges.
And yes, I know what you are thinking, indeed there will be unfortunately less-than-ethical people behind the big data using it to manipulate the masses in their voting behavior, buying behavior, and even attempt to steer society towards their vision of the world, which may not be yours, or ours, or in either of our best interests.
Still, there is a lot of upside here, and that’s the important part. If big data didn’t exist, or we didn’t have these tools, then the same unethical people would be using the printing press, government positions, or the mass media to do the same, after all they’ve been doing it all along. What about the question that the masses of society are dummying down due to social media, social networks, the regular media, and even our own authority-based education system? Yes, these are realities that we face, but let me give you a counter argument on the flip side, and explain perhaps a benefit that you hadn’t considered.
There was an interesting talk at the SXSW Conference titled; “Using Big Data Takes Machines & Humans,” where the speaker Arnab Gupta of CEO/Founder of Opera Solutions. He explained that after the advent of the Chess Playing IBM computer that beat the world chess champion they discovered that it actually made the humans better, much better, in fact everyone improved. Why, because they observed new moves that the AI chess playing system was using, and studied and learned from its strategies. The humans got better, even if the AI system beat them.
The entire game now is played at a much higher level. What I am suggesting here is that perhaps the AI computers will indeed uplift the upper end abilities of human cognition. Meaning they will make us better, more efficient, and for those that choose to use their mind; smarter as well. I ask that you please consider all this on a philosophical basis, before you render your best answer. Yes this is a test, good luck and continued success humans.
