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Pros and Cons of Artificial Intelligence

Pros and Cons of Artificial Intelligence

When we hear about Artificial Intelligence (AI), we have the images of Robots and machineries flashing around our mind. We all have seen Arnold Schwarzenegger as a humanoid from future in Terminator series. Have seen those funky Transformer series, all those movies that had robots doing things like a real human and all those kept us in awe about how is it even possible but let me tell you that they were animated movies. Yet there are robots present in world that are capable of doing tasks that were for human. All these are possible due to the advancement in Artificial Intelligence. Let us learn the pros and cons of Artificial Intelligence in the post further.

Artificial Intelligence is intelligence that is demonstrated by the machine in contrast to the natural intelligence possessed by the human and other animals. The term “artificial intelligence” is applied when machine mimics the cognitive function that humans associate with other human mind’s behavior, such as learning and problem solving. The concept of artificial intelligence is that computer mimics the act of human that humans are supposed to be doing. The scope of AI ranges from speech recognition and translation into different language and even decision making sometimes. Talking as a whole, anything that involves program doing something that usually involved the use of human intelligence is Artificial Intelligence.

Levels of Artificial Intelligence

Within the range of Artificial Intelligence, there are different classifications of AI.

  • Strong vs weak

Strong intelligence refers to the work that genuinely looks like imitation of a human being and it could even be helpful in understanding how human thinks. Weak intelligence simply is aimed at building a system that behaves like human but doesn’t aim of thinking as human.

  • Narrow vs General

There is certain intelligence that is aimed at solving some specific tasks, known as narrow intelligence. There is another that aims at general reasoning or for general tasks known as general intelligence.

Pros and Cons of Artificial Intelligence

artificial intelligence pros and cons

Image: Entrepreneur

If you are someone like me who has grown up watching those science fiction robotic movies that introduces Skynet and Terminators, the transformers, and similar science fiction movies, then you definitely might have thought at least once that whether this world will be taken down by robots one day. I grew up waiting for the Skynet attack to happen. Let’s discuss some pros and cons of Artificial Intelligence.

Pros

  • Mundane tasks: When it comes to doing same thing over and over again and again, we humans get bored after fewer such sessions. But machines on the other hand don’t get bored. AI helps improve the automation process leading in the increased productivity of resources and takes repetitive, boring task off the shoulders of human.
  • Faster action and decision: When it come to the decision making involving few to many factors, our mind gets slower and slower while machine work at same pace taking all the factors in consideration. Machine takes far less time in taking decisions and are useful in conditions when quicker decisions is needed.
  • Avoiding Errors: To Err is to human, but the same doesn’t holds to the machine. Machines do the repetitive task as they are programmed to do given that they are provided with power that requires to operate the machine.
  • Machine Learning: Machine learning is the biggest advantage when it comes Artificial Intelligence. Artificial Intelligence can easily swim through several petabytes of data that is just too much for human. Learning through the repetitive task and preparing itself for further advancements. Through artificial neural networks, machine emulates the structure and function of human brains.
  • Taking Risks Instead of Human: Intelligent machines are often employed in situations when it isn’t safe for the human involvements. There are various research works and other similar tasks that just cannot involve human. Like discovering unknown places in universe, the Mars exploration is the perfect example. Other medical diagnosis that require precision to unhuman level, intelligent machines can help decrease the errors and improve the timing.

Cons

  • Distribution of power: Artificial Intelligence imposes the threat of taking control away from Human operator. As of July 2017, Facebook shuts down its AI programs after they started to talk in languages of their own. The machines started to develop their own language. This could be start of cyborg attack that we have been imagining.
  • Job Losses: It is a serious threat that the AI implementation could replace many low-skilled jobs. Some simple tasks that were dependent upon human could easily be replaced by Intelligent Machines. There are frequent such incidents that had taken place where huge number human lost their job when newer technology employed took their places.
  • Lack of judgement: Machines can easily do the repetitive task they have been programmed to do but when it comes to take decisions they are not programmed to do, they just fail there. They cannot make decisions on their own unless they have proper environment to make decisions.
  • High Cost: The cost for the research of Artificial Intelligence is very costly and takes huge time for smaller advancements. For the AI to be called trained enough or for the machine learning to happen, the data set requires to be huge to make these machines learning effective.
  • Abilities of Humans may diminish: As we rely on machine for most of the work these days, our life has grown easier. Due to this ease, we are leaving behind our precious little skills that build up to be bigger. We just have neglected the root of the techniques and skills and go with the output that machine provides. These reduce our ability to use our full potential.
  • Wrong hand: Machines are growing intelligent every day. They are growing and learning day in and out. Just realize the outcome if that particular machine goes to the wrong hands. The world that could have headed towards development, can easily head towards destruction.

Also Read: Pros and Cons of Sony Aibo Robot Dog

Conclusion

Hence, these are few of the pros and cons of Artificial Intelligence. Artificial Intelligence is still in the process of development. The movies gave us more dimensions to think about machine taking over the world. This could be very far to be true, but something is absolutely true and is sure to happen and has happened. In January of 2017, the employees of Fukoko Mutual Life Insurance in Japan, 34 employees to be precise, were dismissed from the jobs because the insurer had installed a new artificial intelligence system that could read medical certificates, gather data on hospital stays and surgeries and saved 140 million Yen per year in salary cost. In one way it was profit for the company while 34 of the employees lost their jobs.

So, it is clear that the cyborg attack may or may not happen, but the jobs of low-skill people are in danger while their places are being taken over by machines. Thus, while the Artificial Intelligence is blessing for human kind, it definitely can be a curse for the human being. Hence, depending on the situation, Artificial Intelligence has pros and cons that needs to be addressed.