AI – Should We Embrace it or Fear it?

When American podcaster Joe Rogan interviewed Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on YouTube on February 22, it immediately went viral, with 135,000 views. Most people who saw it though, didn’t take it seriously, and those who did were quite confused, particularly when Trudeau suggested the interviewer say ‘humankind’ rather than ‘mankind’.

But the interview really went off the rails when Trudeau said he wanted to use nuclear weapons to end the Freedom Convoy. At that point, although both Rogan and Trudeau appeared to be real, and sounded real, anyone could see the entire video was not at all real. It was what is increasingly being known as a ‘deep fake’ created by Artificial Intelligence.

So, what is Artificial Intelligence, and when did it first surface? It is not a new concept, having come into existence in 1956, after decades of work in developing a system to make it a reality. It is still in its infancy, although progress in its evolution from a simple, rules-based system (like spellcheck) into machine learning, has been swift.

In machine learning, machines are given access to data and then learn from it rather than having to be programmed by humans who tell them what to think and what do about the data. It is significant that they can be programmed to predict outcomes, thus making the robotic process automatic.

The robotic process, to define it more clearly, involves the use of factory robots in manufacturing operations, applications that can be divided into three categories: (1) material handling, which includes the transfer of material, which in turn involves loading and unloading (2) processing operations, and (3) assembly and inspection.

About Alexa and Siri

These processes in themselves are amazing, but what makes them even more stunning is that Alexa and Siri, two applications of computer learning, have gone beyond carrying out direct requests.

Alexa has learned how to carry the conversation from one question to the next the way humans can handle follow-up questions. On a practical level, with Alexa people can use voice commands, and simply call out and have Alexa control the lights or adjust smart appliance settings. Those with smart technology can control the thermostat, turn on the TV, adjust the oven temperature, monitor security systems, and more.

Alexa can interpret a request even if you do not state it directly. Using a feature called Alexa Hunches, it can proactively complete tasks for you without having to ask permission. Alexa can perform those hunches— like automatically turn off your lights—all based on your past habits and requests. It can predict what you want. If you don’t know the exact name of a skill you want Alexa to do and if you provide key words or phrases, it will likely be able to summon what you want.

In addition, through Alexa Hunches and smart home connected devices, Alexa is able to alert you if a regular pattern hasn’t been followed (such as lights being left on or a door unlocked) and offer to fix it for you.

Every time Alexa or Siri make a mistake when responding to a request, it uses the data to improve. If an error was made, it takes that data and learns from it. If the response was favourable, the system notes that as well.

Apple’s Siri is now able to sort through background noise and loud music to ‘wake.’ For example, I’ve been with my daughter, and heard her say, “Hey Siri”, to her iPhone. She would ask Siri to lock her device or wake it so she could use it. Apparently, the listening feature doesn’t turn off, but puts the microphone to sleep until you wake your device with a command.

More about Alexa and Siri

These iPhone applications continue to get smarter. If you don’t know the exact name of a skill you want Alexa to do and if you make a good guess, it will likely be able to summon what you want. If you ask, “What’s the weather going to be like today?” you can receive a response in audio detailing the day’s forecast. This all happens in a mere moment. Telling you the day’s forecast is just one of the more than 70,000 skills Alexa can do.

Intelligent systems such as Alexa and Siri, have been accepted in mainstream society as they continue to get smarter and increase the number of their own skills.

The way the company reached this extraordinary level in such a short time was achieved by Amazon giving developers free access to AVS so that they could keep building skills to augment the system. Currently, there are more than 28,000 smart home devices that can work with Alexa.

What does this mean for writers?

The very complex process of speaking and writing that humans take for granted was a challenge for computer scientists to unravel and replicate.

For these skills, they developed Natural Language Processing (NLP), a program that allows a machine to ‘read’ or ‘understand’ the speaking and writing produced by humans and create content in either written or spoken language so that it can be understood by them.

For writer like me the presence of AI is particularly worrisome. Since I love writing, it gives me the shivers. An AI program like Text Generator can be given a few keywords and spit out a passable piece in seconds.

However, it’s true that at the moment the writing of these programs is stilted and predictable. It may be only a matter of time though, that we will not be able to tell the difference between what we write and what is composed by a chatbot. All we can hope for is that if we write authentically and humanly, no machine will be able to compete with us.

A Parting Thought

I am amazed how rapidly this has been taken mainstream. This week I opened our very own local newspaper, The Times Colonist, to find an article about Microsoft’s Bing chatbot. On another page was an article about how a Canadian studio was using AI to touch up facial features on actors, and there was yet another piece on how Russia and China are targeting Canada’s AI sector.

Like almost every new invention, there are people who will embrace it, and others who will shy away and resist it until they are forced to incorporate it into their lives. I’m ambivalent about AI. I don’t trust it, and I’m afraid it will change us and society faster than we can cope with.

Some of us will resist. There are always people like me, who do. But at some point, it will be almost impossible to dismiss it.

And the truth is that AI is irresistible. It is already making our lives easier in many ways. All I have to do is think back before computers, Google Search, credit cards and iPhones. We all use those innovations now, and they have improved our lives.

But some people do seriously worry about the growth of AI. They worry that its rise may lead to AI getting out of hand. And of course, there are also the doomsayers that say it will eventually overcome humans and take over the world.

I may have my head in the sand, but I think that AI doesn’t create anything, so it can’t do anything that radical. What it does is simply utilize information/data to achieve outputs, goals, or tasks. I admit it does this with amazing speed and complexity, and that could become a problem.

An interesting footnote, that astounded me:

I was reading this presentation aloud, which I always do before I publish and my iPhone, which I’d placed beside my computer, lit up, and a voice said, “Okay, I found this about your iPhone. Check it out.” Needless to say, I quickly moved my phone into the front room before I continued reading!

Glossary:

AVS is the cloud-based service that allows device makers to integrate an ever-increasing set of Alexa features and functions into a connected product. Amazon’s AVS team assists device makers with the Alexa integration process.

Finance chatbots are bots used by the financial services industry. They communicate with clients providing 24/7 support 365 days a year. They can answer commonly asked questions, check the customer’s account balance, and offer financial advice amongst other functionalities.

Chatbots

A chatbot or chatterbot is a software application used to conduct an online chat conversation via text or text-to-speech, in lieu of providing direct contact with a live human agent.

Smart Technologies also known as Smart, is a Canadian company headquartered in Calgary, Alberta, Canada and wholly owned by Foxconn. Founded in 1987, Smart is best known as the developer of interactive whiteboards branded as the “SMART Board” popularly used in education and business.