Artificial
Intelligence

A paradigm shift in how we interact with computers

At the moment we are a still a few years away until we reach an artificial general intelligence. But for the time being this term covers a lot of machine learning models that use “self-guided” algorithms in a variety of different models.

What is Artificial Intelligence? ¹²

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a branch of computer science aiming to create systems performing tasks that typically require human intelligence, like learning, reasoning, problem-solving, understanding natural language, recognizing patterns, and adapting to situations that have not been determined by a programmer beforehand.

To achieve this the programs are modelled after the human brain. At its core, AI is about creating machines that can behave in ways a human would be behaving. As AI continues to evolve, it promises to be a driving force in shaping the future of technology and society and is arguably the biggest paradigm change we are facing in the next decade.

What can Artificial Intelligence do for us?

Artificial intelligence can do a lot of useful things for us. For example, Amazon is researching into providing a system for older people that is not only intended to search for things on the Internet like Amazon Echo or Alexa, but above all to monitor people and their surroundings. Not in a negative sense. It is designed to help in everyday life, for example to see if my grandmother has forgotten to lock the door to the garage or the door to the garden. As a relative I can react to this by either calling my grandmother and telling her that I will be driving past in a moment or by setting the device up in such a way that it helps her to remember to lock the door.

There are also many useful areas - the question is, of course, how do we manage these areas? Yes, how do we manage to separate these areas from the big commercialisation machines like Amazon, Google and Microsoft.

It is crucial to avoid that these machines leak information to the outside world but to enable them to be still useful. This is not an easy task because of the billions of parameters that are collected. It it is not too late to think that maybe one day an artificial intelligence could be helpful in the kitchen or benevolent like the board computer in Star Trek. That it helps us instead of spying on us.

The impact of Artificial Intelligence ³

The biggest change ⁴ our society is facing right now is the advent of generative AI and AI on a broader spectrum which are signalling a huge shift in the way we conduct our working lives. It is one of the biggest changes society has to face, because the first time in history we humans have created another entity that can make decisions and act on it’s own behalf.

Artificial Intelligence and Romanticism ⁵

I try to always be an optimist, even in the face of doom and gloom, so I still believe that more good than bad will come from AI. Like with all technology, the problem is not the technology itself, but the environment it is deployed in and especially the mindset and moral framework of the people employing it. Since the main players in the current AI development are mainly huge multi-billion-dollar companies from the United States I fear that a lot of what comes to AI in the coming years will lean heavily into a hyper capitalist mindset that tries everything it can to maximize the return on investment by cutting out as much humans from the equation as possible.

I deeply believe into technology being used in accordance with humans and human values. Technology should always be a tool to improve our lives and our work instead of making our work or ourselves obsolete. But to achieve that is not alone the responsibility of the AI developing companies, but falls into our own responsibility as well. Because at the end of the day, most companies are only developing what the market, and that includes us as the users and consumers, demands.

Sources

John Maeda’s Design in Tech Report 2024: Design Against AI | SXSW 2024 Ted Chiang - The New Yorker - ChatGPT Is a Blurry JPEG of the Web