After watching the film In the Age of AI, I had a lot of thoughts and take-aways. My initial thought was that it's incredible how advanced we, as a society, have become in the terms of technology. Artificial intelligence is becoming unbelievably smart in such a short amount of time.
The biggest impact of AI is how it is increasing production across all fields. Restaurants and convenience stores were using AI to make ordering food easier for customers and using it to make purchasing food simpler.
Plenty of companies use trucks to transport goods across the country and AI is making that process far more efficient. With self-driving cars, those companies won't need to pay drivers and can have trucks driving 24/7.
AI is also assisting in the medical field. Before, doctors were diagnosing patients from their x-ray scans, symptoms, and blood samples. Doctors then had to study all these in order to give an accurate diagnosis, which may not be perfect. AI, however, can far more accurately diagnose patients by looking for patterns that humans may have missed or never thought about and by being able to read data far more effectively.
Nothing is without flaw and even AI has its issues. If AI is helping by increasing production, then it is also hurting by eliminating the need for people to be in those jobs. It was estimated that in the very near future, upwards of 50% of jobs are going to be automated by AI. That's 50% of the population without a job.
Not only will AI cause unemployment, but it will also affect families of laid-off workers. Someone not earning an income won't be able to provide for their family.
Another significant flaw is how AI is being used to invade people's privacy. In China especially, AI is being used to track each and every person and keep a note on every move that person makes, where they go, who they hang out with, the things they purchase. Every little thing a person does is being documented.
What this is being used for is almost like a point system. The better someone behaves, the harder they work, the more points they earn. Someone misbehaving or doing something illegal will cause them to lose points. This system rewards citizens with higher points with awards like discounts on bus tickets and punishes those with lower points with say a travel ban.
Apparently, this system works very well, rewarding better behavior promotes a better environment, and the people of China I've heard like it. Coming from someone not in China, though, I find this system highly invasive. I wouldn't want to go outside if every single thing I did was being monitored. Maybe that's just me but certainly wouldn't like the government knowing what I do on a daily basis.