Balancing The Benefits and Risks of Artificial Intelligence

Intelligence itself has been defined as the ability to identify and understand reason, self-awareness, the skill to learn, think critically, and engage successfully in problem-solving.

Somebody can also describe it as the capacity to perceive or infer information and to retain it as knowledge which can be applied towards adaptive behaviour within an environment or context.

Therefore, when machines portray intelligence, it is called artificial intelligence, as natural intelligence is only perceived to be shown by human beings, animals, and plants.

What Problems Can Artificial Intelligence Solve?

When we talk about artificial intelligence, people begin to imagine ninja robots, spectacles with the ability to see through objects and computerized flying cars that drive themselves.

Hence, it is immensely vital to employ our intelligence to understand the logic and identify the accurate applications that artificial intelligence has in real life. We’re not saying we don’t believe that a computerized Ferrari could someday double as a flying machine. All we’re saying is, maybe someday, just not today.

In today’s world, artificial intelligence is the key that makes our lives easier. Now, one could do that by tactfully employing the wonders of artificial intelligence to specific processes which can make insight gathering, task automation and data processing that much faster and greater in terms of speed and scale.

We, humans, create an excess of data that one cannot control without AI systems that perform intelligent searches, interpreting both text and images to discover patterns in complex data, and then act on those learnings.

Here are some typical real-life applications of Artificial Intelligence: 

Machine Learning is an application of AI that instils the ability to automatically learn and improve from experience into computer systems by analyzing data and creating appropriate algorithms. Apart from being used to predict what Netflix movies you might like, or the best route for your Uber, machine learning is being applied to healthcare and pharma as well.

Cognitive Computing is used to recreate the human thought process in a computer model by understanding human language and the meaning of images.

Deep Learning is a part of machine learning that uses an artificial neural network (similar to the biological neural network in the human brain) that learn by processing data. Thus, enabling computer systems to remember actions on their own after processing them.

These certainly are not all of the applications of AI in real life; there are so many more such as NLP or computer vision. After all, Artificial Intelligence is present in all of our lives in various contexts.

So what do humans get for letting machines be almost as smart as themselves? 

Let’s find out what the benefits of artificial intelligence are for human beings, so we can understand why anyone would want to replicate the human brain in the first place.

Jokes aside, artificial intelligence has proven to produce uncountable benefits for the human race, such as reduced human-intensive labour which has been achieved by leveraging smart automation. Now, in many factories, human effort is replaced with machinery to conduct tasks that are either too tricky such as heavy lifting or too mundane to be repeated several times a day. As per the Oxford Economics Report in June 2019, more than 2.25 million Robots are deployed worldwide (Threefold increase from last decade) which has allowed humankind to utilize their efforts in places where machines cannot be of service. Furthermore, when Covid’19 infected millions of people worldwide, AI was utilized to shorten work days and replace workers who weren’t well with machines for the time being.

Artificial intelligence has also enabled the medical industry and pharma to develop drugs more carefully through machine learning algorithms that were also briefly mentioned above. These algorithms have assisted several scientists in discovering and attaining the perfect composition of salts in sensitive drugs with the help of a thorough analysis of chemical reactions, genes etc. As of this moment, AI is being used in the medical industry to invent and produce a vaccine for the corona virus.

Moreover, the use of artificial intelligence in the financial sector has been a great success. As several financial processes rely on analyzing previously attained data to predict future financial decisions, it then comes as no great surprise that artificial intelligence compliments it. The primary function of AI is to analyze past data, which is why it feels like a perfect fit for the finance sector, especially for services such as fraud detection or risk assessment. In the world today, entire nations are suffering from substantial financial loss. This is happening due to the damage that has been inflicted upon the economy after the outbreak of Covid’19 led to the closure or halt of many significant businesses. At a time like this, AI is enabling millions of people worldwide to put their savings to good use.

If that didn’t seem like enough, even customer service has been made easier and faster with the help of AI chatbots. These chatbots work with the use of Natural Language Processing that enables the chatbot not only to interpret and understand human language but also learn it on its own hence saving time, energy and money.

As per World Health Organization Report, more than a million individuals suffer death as a result of road accidents. To reduce such accidents, many companies have begun to utilize AI to recognize driving patterns such as distance maintenance between vehicles, lane traffic and traffic rule abidance. Therefore, AI is enabling companies to reduce a significant number of fatalities per year.

Furthermore, artificial intelligence has proven to be a miracle in disguise in the face of disaster. One can apply this technology to predict natural disasters such as tsunami’s or hurricanes, and then also assist survivors in several ways after a calamity takes place app, i.e. disaster relief work.

On the other hand, where there are pro’s, there are always con’s.

What are the risks that accompany Artificial Intelligence?

Artificial intelligence may be a leap in technology which has proven to be successful in multiple fields across the globe; unfortunately, it has also acquired some significant risks that cannot be ignored. These risks pose an imminent threat or warning to humankind.

The immediate risk of artificial intelligence is job automation. There is no doubt about whether artificial intelligence will replace actual human labour in many jobs because it already has. Although we do appreciate the fact that artificial intelligence saves our time and money, we tend to forget who it’s protecting our money from, our fellow human beings with actual families, responsibilities and problems that only finance can solve. Unlike machines, human beings have their own lives to tend to. Thus, the increase of job automation has causes unemployment and financial crisis in many communities worldwide.

Even if individuals are greeted with new and better jobs after the loss of an old one, how sure can we be that they will have the necessary skills, education and mindset required to do that job well?

That isn’t it; there’s more.

In a 2018 paper for February labelled “The Malicious Use of Artificial Intelligence: Forecasting, Prevention, and Mitigation,” 26 researchers from 14 institutions (academic, civil and industry) enumerated a host of other dangers that could cause serious harm — or, at least, cause minor chaos within the next five years.

“Malicious use of AI,” they claimed in their 100-page report, “could threaten digital security (e.g. through criminals training machines to hack or socially engineer victims at human or superhuman levels of performance), physical security software(e.g. non-state actors weaponizing consumer drones), and political security (e.g. through privacy-eliminating surveillance, profiling, and repression, or through automated and targeted disinformation campaigns).”

This enables us to establish that AI could lead to a loss of privacy and security in the future.

What happens when we lose control of the machines we created?

We don’t know the answer to that, which is why it is crucial to maintain maximum control over the use of artificial intelligence while ensuring that we continue to reap its benefits and safeguard ourselves from its predicted risk.

Here’s how to create a balance between the benefits and risks of AI:

The next time you take your phone out so you can take a selfie with your favourite Snapchat filter, think about how many snaps you’ve been sending every day. If you understand the difference between a good number and one that symbolizes excessiveness, and you apply that knowledge to your daily life to make sure you’re not wasting your time, then you are in the clear.

It’s that simple!

Balance is stability. Once individuals, groups and organizations begin to stabilize themselves by sticking to methods that enable them to employ artificial intelligence without causing any harm to their kind, a certain equilibrium will be achieved between the benefits and risks of artificial intelligence. However, to achieve that strong of a footing, in this case, one must thoroughly educate themselves about the benefits and risks of every piece of technology that they utilize.

If you know what you’re doing, it’s likely that you won’t do much harm.