What to expect:
By taking 5 mins to read this article you can expect some food for thought as to where AI vs humans will end up in the not-too-distant future.
The Worries of Individuals:
Many people today harbor a multitude of concerns and anxieties when it comes to the future of artificial intelligence (AI). These apprehensions revolve around a range of critical issues, reflecting both the potential benefits and drawbacks of AI technology.
One prominent concern centers on the impact of AI on the job market. Individuals worry that as AI continues to advance, it may replace human workers in various industries, potentially leading to job displacement and economic insecurity for many.
Another significant worry is the potential for AI to compromise privacy and personal data security. With AI systems gaining access to vast amounts of information, individuals are concerned about the misuse of their personal information, leading to surveillance, identity theft, or data breaches.
Ethical concerns are also at the forefront of people’s minds. They fear that AI may perpetuate bias and discrimination, as algorithms can inherit the biases present in the data they are trained on. This could result in unfair decisions in areas such as hiring, lending, or criminal justice.
Furthermore, there are concerns about the development of autonomous weapons powered by AI, raising fears of uncontrolled, potentially catastrophic outcomes in warfare.
AI’s potential to outpace human understanding is another source of anxiety. This is because people worry about losing control over systems that become too advanced for us to comprehend.
Lastly, the existential concern of superintelligent AI, often depicted in science fiction, raises questions about the long-term impact on humanity. If AI reaches a level of intelligence and autonomy beyond human control, could it possibly jeopardizing our place in the world.
The Worries of Companies and Organisations:
Companies and organizations share several significant worries when it comes to the future of artificial intelligence (AI). These concerns are whipped up by the increasing integration of AI into various aspects of business operations and decision-making. Here are some of the primary concerns:
Data Privacy and Security: Organizations are deeply concerned about safeguarding sensitive data and ensuring the privacy of their customers and employees. The potential for data breaches, misuse of AI-generated insights, and regulatory compliance challenges are major worries.
Ethical Use of AI: Ethical concerns are amplified for organizations. They fear that AI systems may inadvertently perpetuate biases or be used unethically, which could result in public backlash, lawsuits, and damage to their brand reputation.
Regulatory Compliance: With AI being subject to increasingly stringent regulations, organizations are concerned about keeping up with evolving legal requirements. Failure to adhere to these regulations can lead to fines, legal consequences, and reputational damage.
Dependency on AI Systems: While AI offers efficiency and automation, organizations worry about becoming overly dependent on AI systems. Technical failures or cyberattacks that disrupt AI-powered processes could have a cascading impact on their operations.
Job Displacement and Workforce Reskilling: Companies are concerned about the potential impact of AI on their workforce. They need to navigate the delicate balance between using AI to improve productivity and ensuring that employees have the skills necessary to work alongside AI or transition to new roles.
Competitive Pressure: As AI adoption grows, organizations fear falling behind their competitors if they don’t integrate AI effectively into their operations. The rapid pace of technological change can create challenges in staying competitive. One question that may be at the back of their minds is, if their competitors are more ruthless at replacing personnel with AI will they fall behind their competitors?!
Intellectual Property and Security: Concerns exist regarding the protection of AI-related intellectual property. Organizations worry about their AI models, algorithms, and proprietary data being stolen or replicated by competitors.
Bias and Fairness: Ensuring that AI systems are free from bias is a critical concern for organizations. Biased AI could lead to lawsuits, damage to reputation, and erode trust in their products and services.
Cybersecurity Threats: AI can be used both defensively and offensively in cybersecurity. Organizations are worried about the potential for AI-driven cyberattacks, and they also seek to leverage AI for enhancing their own cybersecurity defenses.
Return on Investment (ROI): Implementing AI can be costly, and organizations worry about whether their investments in AI will yield the expected returns. Assessing the ROI of AI initiatives is a significant concern for decision-makers
The Advantages AI and Robots have over Humans in the Workforce throughout various Industries:
Efficiency and Productivity: AI and robots can work around the clock without fatigue, breaks, or vacations. They consistently maintain high levels of productivity and accuracy, which is particularly valuable in manufacturing, logistics, and repetitive tasks.
Precision and Consistency: AI-driven systems and robots perform tasks with exceptional precision and consistency, reducing errors and variability in output. This is crucial in industries such as manufacturing, healthcare, and quality control.
Speed: AI and robots can complete tasks much faster than humans. This speed is advantageous in industries like finance for high-frequency trading, e-commerce for rapid order fulfillment, and data analysis for quick decision-making.
Data Analysis: AI can process and analyze vast amounts of data in a short time, extracting valuable insights. This is essential in industries like finance, healthcare, and marketing for data-driven decision-making.
Safety in Hazardous Environments: Robots and AI can perform tasks in dangerous or hazardous environments, such as deep-sea exploration, nuclear plants, or disaster response, without risking human lives.
Scalability: AI-driven systems and robots are easily scalable. Once programmed or trained, they can be replicated and deployed to handle increased workloads, making them ideal for industries with fluctuating demands.
Monotonous Tasks: Robots excel at handling repetitive, monotonous tasks that may be tedious for humans, freeing up human workers to focus on more creative and complex aspects of their roles.
Unbiased Decision-Making: AI can make decisions based on data and algorithms, reducing the potential for bias or discrimination in areas such as hiring, lending, and law enforcement.
Predictive Maintenance: In industries like manufacturing and transportation, AI can predict when machines and equipment will require maintenance, reducing downtime and extending the lifespan of assets.
Personalization: In customer service and marketing, AI can analyze customer data to provide personalized recommendations and experiences, enhancing customer satisfaction and loyalty.
Language Processing: AI can understand and process multiple languages, enabling effective communication and translation in diverse industries, from customer support to global business.
Repetitive Testing and Quality Control: In healthcare and pharmaceuticals, AI can automate repetitive testing and quality control procedures, ensuring consistency and reducing human error.
Cost Reduction: AI and robots can significantly reduce labor costs in industries where automation is viable, improving overall profitability and cost-effectiveness.
Innovation and Research: AI can assist researchers by analyzing vast datasets, identifying trends, and generating hypotheses, accelerating advancements in fields such as science, healthcare, and technology.
Non-Judgemental: One thing we rarely talk about is how the personal touch of humans, which is mostly great and welcomed, can be negative in some instances. Instances such as supermarket checkout tills where sometimes people feel they are being judged. A robot at the checkout that gives the human touch is unlikely to make a person feel like they are being judged for what they buy or who they are. Futhermore, the robot can be trained on data in such a way that they end up treating everyone equally without bias or judgement.
What Balances must be Struck in the Future:
Global economic competition is a huge driver of the AI revolution. Various economies try to get an advantage, or at the very least keep pace with others.
Machine learning is promising to catapult some economies many factors above current levels, if only they can adopt it quickly.
AI adoption rate selected countries 2022 | Statista
Final Thought
As you can see above the deployment of AI is really taking off in countries like China, India and Italy whilst the UK lags behind with many others. Competition between countries can help to push innovation, but at what point do we begin to push too hard?! At what point do the concequences for people become too much to be an acceptable trade off between AI vs humans?!
If all we had to consider was increased innovation for innovation’s sake and the rise of AI for AI’s sake, then we could just ignore the plight of us mere humans. Unless AI becomes sentient then there will be nothing else , other than humans, to enjoy or gain from technological innovation or the advances in machine learning. So, clearly humans need to be the main priority with AI serving our wants and needs.
If we are to get the balance right then you would like to think that every country would control their erge to over develop AI to the point of retiring, most if not all, human workers. As work and the human race have always gone hand-in-hand it would be unhealthy and dangerous for humans to suddenly have no work to do. Some of us probably think that it would be great to not have to work at all. To have robots and AI doing everything for us, but after the pandemic it has become clear that bad things can happen to humans when our work/life balance gets abruptly altered.
It is true that wealth can certainly allow some fortunate people to delegate life’s chores and responsibilities. Allowing for the increase of leisure time and the reduction of working time, though this isn’t always the case. But how do we have a thriving economy and society that provides for all people adequately if everyone was afforded the opportunity to increase their leisure time and reduce their working hours?! If there are some workers such as derrick operators1 that can work more than 62 hours then we must assume that there is a need for such time consuming labour. So how do we give people more of what they want / need at the same time as maintaining a fully functioning society?! Indeed how do we pay a person the same salary for doing less hours of work?!
The perfect solution may be to use AI and robots to give humans a three or four day working week instead of the usual five day working week. With the increased use of renewable energy sources there should be huge cost savings, after initial investments, for using robots and automation, compared to traditional energy generation methods. In some industries we would be able to automate four days whilst leaving three days of the week for human workers. With this working pattern we have increased the usual five day working week to seven for no extra cost. If such an increase in efficient productivity turned into profits it could help to maintain the salaries for humans who now work two days less than before. With such a solution some may quetsion whether or not all countries will agree to play by the same rules. Perhaps ISO/IEC 42001, or future iterations, could help with this. Or will some gain an economic advantage by not complying with rules that moderate the use of AI so that we can still include the, less productive, human workers?! Clearly such rules would need to be implemented globally to prevent some from gaining an unfair, economic advantage, which could trigger a global race to exit humans from the workforce entirely.
Now with most people having two parts to their lifes,both work and leisure, wouldn’t all workers like to extend their leisure lives by two days a week every year?!
If you are new to AI and are still getting to grips with the terminology try our Glossary.
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- Lisa, A. (2021) '10 careers known for really long hours,' GOBankingRates, 24 May. https://www.gobankingrates.com/money/jobs/10-careers-known-really-long-hours/.. ↩︎
