3 Ways AI is Going to Take Over Our Lives by 2041
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ChatGPT is the largest development in AI of all time. With the latest chatbot by OpenAI, research is going to accelerate and we are going to start seeing an integration of Artificial Intelligence in our daily lives. Based on my previous readings and conversations with professors in academia I believe:
- Self driving cars will be normalized.
- Brain implants will be much more common across people with disabilities.
- Virtual assistants will be even more useful than they are now.
Driverless Cars
Self-Driving cars have been quite a controversial topic over the past few years. However, I believe that they will lead to a decrease in crashes and an increase in traffic efficiency. First of all, if we look at the statistics, human error causes 90% of crashes today (found here). This could be including but not limited to fatigue, phone distractions, or driving under the influence. Furthermore, the ability for vehicles to network between each other will allow for additional safety features never thought of before. Since the cars AI will predetermine its location and movement, cars will be able to predict and avoid crashes with high precision. I predict that by 2041 driverless cars will bring us a decrease in vehicle accidents through minimization of human error and networking between cars.
By taking control out of a human drivers hands, we could improve traffic efficiency significantly. Firstly, with a decrease in accidents, there will be a decrease in traffic slowdowns. It is unlikely that crashes will be eliminated completely because there are too many unpredictable circumstances that could arise on the road. However, in the event of a slowdown caused by a crash, AI will prevent the traffic snake problem explained here:
If you didn’t watch the video, it basically explains how human reaction times cause the majority of traffic buildup. By removing our slow reaction time from the equation, we should expect a large increase in traffic efficiency. Cars will instead be programmed to network between each other and move simultaneously. This means we should expect to get everywhere a lot faster. In essence, by putting driving in the hands of AI, we are removing the possibility of human error and promoting a safer driving experience.
Brain Interfaces
Brain interfaces are one of the more recent technological advancements we have seen, specifically with Elon Musk’s Neuralink. I predict that devices similar will basically be normalized for people with disabilities (which is undoubtedly amazing).
To understand why I think it is important to understand how these devices work. In a very general sense, the brain uses neurons to communicate with the rest of the body. When a neuron is activated it activates an electric pulse which will then do whatever task it set out to do. For example, when you want to move your arm you first think (probably subconsciously) “hey brain i’m going to move my arm”, then an electric pulse in your brain fires that says you want to move your arm. Your arm then receives this electric pulse and starts moving. Although overly-simplified, thats how it works. When someone has a disability, they are typically not able to activate that electric pulse in their brain to move their arm, or communicate with their arm to move it. This is where super cool robotic brain chips come in!
Now that we know why someone is not able to move certain parts of their body or do certain tasks, think about how we can fix those problems. Neuralink’s solution is to insert a chip into someones brain that manually activates those neurons via electric pulses. Here is a video of a monkey moving a cursor with its brain using the same technology:
It really is amazing how all of this works. This same logic applies to bringing peoples hearing back when they are deaf, a small device transmits sound into electric pulses that one would typically receive. Furthermore, sight can even be partially revived with a small camera that converts an image to those same pulses. The whole concept is quite unbelievable and I think by the year 2041 this technology will be much more common.
Virtual Assistants
We already use virtual assistants pretty commonly with systems like Alexa, Google Home, or Siri. The program will take your voice, do a little AI magic on it and spit out a response. Although they have definitely improved recently, these virtual assistants all kind of suck for the most part. Try having a conversation with ChatGPT then have that same conversation with Siri (it isn’t possible). However, imagine using ChatGPT’s OpenAI model and implementing into these voice activated assistants. The title says improvements by 2041 but I think in the next 5 years we can expect an Oracle voice-activated AI that is pretty competent.
Since ChatGPT has been such an influential piece of technology, I think it is reasonable to predict a faster onslaught of improvements in AI from hereon out. Even my programming professor is getting back into AI research because of OpenAI’s achievements. The above are just a few things I am almost certain we will see by 2041. In fact, whatever is coming up we probably will not even expect it. It is very much likely that whatever technology is released will be beyond our thinking as of 2022.
