From SIRI to self-driving cars, artificial intelligence (AI) is progressing rapidly. While science fiction often portrays AI as robots with human-like characteristics, AI can encompass anything from Google’s search algorithms to IBM’s Watson to autonomous weapons. Artificial intelligence today is properly known as narrow AI, in that it is designed to perform a narrow task, for instance, only facial recognition or only internet searches or only driving a car. However, the long-term goal of many researchers is to create general AI or strong AI. While narrow AI may outperform humans at whatever its specific task is, like playing chess or solving equations, AGI would outperform humans at nearly every cognitive task. The following paragraphs will explain and give a better understanding about the risks and benefits of AI.
Artificial intelligence surely contributes a lot to the development of the modern age. As we can see nowadays, artificial intelligence is used widely in the industry. This is because it can be employed to perform dangerous tasks and thus, reduce the risk of injury to the worker. Other than that, the use of machine also increases work efficiency and thus, increases production rate. For instance, in manufacturing industry, it harnesses artificial intelligence by using machine in the assembling line. Machines are used to assemble products and package them in parcels or boxes for shipment. More advanced machines can be used to assemble more complex and complicated items such as electronics, vehicles and even modern home. However, the production lines which are driven by artificial intelligence still needs supervision and support from human as there might be technical errors and faults from the machines that can damage the product and the production line. It is evident that in the near future, we might not need large amount of workforce in the industry anymore as we are heading towards a robotic manufacturing industry.
Besides, we can also observe the benefits of artificial intelligence in the field of transportation. It is almost impossible to imagine back in the days that we would be able to build a self-driving car. The first full autonomous driving car is built by the company Tesla. The car is equipped with cameras for autopilot and radar sensors which has enhanced processing that would allow it to see through heavy rain, fog, dust and even car in front of it. It is also installed with ultrasonic sensors for detecting hard and soft objects on the road to avoid any damage to the vehicle. The enhanced autopilot also enables the car to match its speed with the traffic, change lanes without driver input and also auto park. In October 2016, Chief Executive Officer of Tesla, Elon Musk said that the autopilot system is basically like a supercomputer in the car. Moreover, the car is hybrid, hence it can reduce the consumption of fuels, thus reduce the release of carbon to the atmosphere. The new technology will surely decrease the rate of road accident and reduce traffic congestion. Hence, the commercial application of self-driving car would surely just be right around the corner.
Lastly, the benefit of artificial intelligence can also be noticed in the customer service. The use of artificial intelligence in customer service surely helps companies to provide better service for its customers. Nowadays, many major companies have 24-hour customer service that is operated by automated customer service to better serve its customers all day long. For instance, DigitalGenius, a company that provides automated customer service, helps other companies by automating basic questions and answering chats with customers. They also further develop their artificial intelligence to be friendly robots that mimic human speech pattern to provide service that is quick and easy to understand for the consumers and less cost for the companies. However, human experts may also be needed for more advanced or difficult problems that the machine could not handle to help in solving basic problems for the consumers.
In the other hand, artificial intelligence had been an interesting issue to be discussed as there are a lot of ups and downsides of it. Among the major issue that comes with the idea of artificial intelligence is that we do not know how to control super-intelligent machines. In the short term which is the present day, these machines depend on the person who controls the machine. In this sense, the machine would still act sensibly as there is still a human person who operates the machine. However, in the long term which is the near future, idea of artificial intelligence will change the concept from machines depend on the person who controls it into whether it can be controlled at all. One obvious example is the autonomous killing machine that are currently developed by almost 50 nations worldwide. The autonomous killing machines are also known as battlefield robots. The most sought after battlefield robots will be the ones that would be able to make the “kill decision”; the decision to target and kill someone without the presence of human inside the loop. These weapons are not prohibited by the international law, but even if they were, it is doubtful that they will conform to the international humanitarian law or even the laws governing armed conflicts as the main issue would be how will they differentiated friends from foes.
The next problem that had been surrounding the artificial intelligence issue is that how long will the machines learn to program itself to be smarter. It is true that the smarter artificial intelligence would help us better in our daily lives such as helping us to navigate and in some cases, drives our car. The IBM’s Watson, the jeopardy beating “thinking machine” is already studying to take the federal medical licensing exam. It is already doing legal discovery works, just as any first year law associates do, but in a faster rate. It had even beaten humans at findings the lung cancer in X-rays and also had outperformed high-level business analyst. It is only about time that these machines with artificial intelligence created by humans would be smart enough to be mastering the art of research and development in artificial intelligence. By the time this happens, these machines would be even smarter than their creators and it would create panics as the machines are in control of the human. These machines are would likely to be self-protective and seek resources to better achieve their goal. The worst that could happen is that they would even fight us as they would not want to be turned off. As survival is the basic drive of anything in the world, this kind of action is no more a laughing matter. Instead it is a serious matter that need to be discussed starting from this moment.
In brief, here are some who question whether super-intelligent AI will ever be achieved, and others who insist that the creation of super-intelligent AI is guaranteed to be beneficial. We have recognized the potential for an artificial intelligence system to intentionally or unintentionally cause great harm. We also have recognized both of these possibilities and we found that, there are actually more benefits posed by artificial intelligence rather than risks. We believe research today will help us better prepare for and prevent such potentially negative consequences in the future, thus enjoying the benefits of AI while avoiding pitfall.