Is AI advancing us or dulling our collective intelligence?
Alexa, play ‘we are the world by Michael Jackson’. This was how artificial intelligence entered the lives of us non tech people and slowly but surely everyone was all over it. You no longer had to go to an app or website, type in word by word what you wanted to search for and instead just speak up and it will be done? What a time to live in.
How we love it — putting in the least possible effort and getting stuff done and it is all quite fascinating and time saving and there is just no denying it.
Easy access to A.I.
AI has been integrated so well into our society today that all the leading social media platforms like WhatsApp, Instagram amongst others have introduced their own models of A.I. in their Apps. Now, even the people who aren’t otherwise technology savvy like our grandparents can in a way enjoy the benefits of this technology. They can quickly look up all the information they want on it instead of even going to google for it even if they are not completely trusting of this new technology as no one has fully understood it yet and there is a lot of scope to it still.
What is A.I.?
Artificial intelligence in the most simple terms means technology that is so well fed by information available on the internet and into its systems by its developers that it is now capable enough to process and perform many tasks which otherwise required human assistance.
This does not mean that it can replace human cognition abilities completely. The limit of AI is still in some ways as good as the pre programmed algorithms and systems used by its developers despite its ability to independently learn the data available to it. However, it is important to acknowledge that some advanced A.I. can and does surpass human capabilities.
It is important to recognize that AI systems can evolve beyond their initial programming through machine learning. While AI’s capabilities are rooted in its design, its ability to learn and adapt means that its limits are not fixed. This ability to learn from new data is what differentiates AI from traditional software.
Take for example the present day Chat GPT, Open AI, and various other A.I. models used for generating music, images, art and even voice. There is no bar to the wonders that human mind is capable of thinking and creating once we put our mind to it. It’s important to keep in mind that there are legal risks and implications surrounding these aspects of this somewhat new technology. There are ethics that have to been kept in mind while indulging in these technologies which are too broad to be covered in the scope of this article but generally involve intellectual property rights, bias of developers, misinformation amongst others.
A little bit of history
In 1950, English mathematician and computer science pioneer Alan Turing posed the question, “can machines think?” In his paper, “Computing Machinery and Intelligence,” Turing laid out what has become known as the Turing Test, or imitation game, to determine whether a machine is capable of thinking.
How interesting is this? Someone so long ago posed a question so complex — ‘Can machines think?’ and today we know the answer.
Today, robots are performing critical surgeries and in less time with more precision. This is beautiful and helps decrease the cost of surgeries and takes off the burdens of the otherwise over burdened medical staff.
Sophia, a socially intelligent humanoid robot, was developed by the Hong Kong-based engineering and robotics company Hanson Robotics. Compared to previous robots, Sophia is very advanced and can mimic human gestures as well as hold a simple conversation. Now this is truly spectacular. Some people are fascinated and intrigued by all this advancement but others raise their eyebrows over the need for creating robots and fairly so.
Like with everything, such advanced and complex technology — comes certain risks which cannot be simply ignored. A.I. can and does spiral out of the control of its creators and this is one of the aspects of it that faces the most backlash despite its countless benefits making people untrusting of it and reluctant to use it.
Therefore, we need to be open to hearing the inputs of those in favor of its advantages and those that point towards the concerns with respect to the rise of A.I. and forge the way for its future.
Is A.I. dulling us down?
While A.I. is such a fascinating technology and is practically being used by every other person, the concern lies in whether is it crossing over a line and blurring the divisions between what is to be done by humans and what can be delegated to a machine no matter how capable and efficient it is.
Some tasks involve the presence of a human element which a machine can just not provide no matter how advanced they make it.
Is A.I. making us lazy, think less, loose on our intellectual capabilities or is it saving us time and effort?
Is A.I. taking over the jobs of writers, creators, artists, clerical workers, translators and diminishing the value of humans working in these field?
GitHub Copilot is another A.I. model that helps write code but many allege that it will lead to a negative impact on learning abilities of beginners that are just stepping into the world of coding.
Over reliance on tools like these lead to superficial learning that is harmful to everyone in the longer run.
So the question arises — Are we somehow becoming too dependent on A.I. to make our decisions for us? Do we really need so much input on everything we do or don’t do?
Or is A.I helping us get free from mundane tasks so that we can focus on innovation and other important tasks?
These are the questions that drive the debate on whether A.I. is dulling us down or pushing us toward new heights of human achievement.
Striking the right balance between leveraging A.I.’s strengths and nurturing essential human abilities will determine whether it becomes a tool for growth or a crutch that limits our intellectual and creative potential.
