Daily Times

The day may not be too far away when we may be faced with the challenge of rivaling with Artificial Intelligence (AI). We Will be forced to determine if AI is help or hinderance?. A very large number of organizations and companies around the world are focusing on AI because it promises to transform the world. Some forecasts say that in a few years’ time, this technology could outpace human intelligence. Huge amounts are being spent and research being prioritized for possible benefits and risks of AI.

In fact, AI is not a new phenomenon as it has been in practice in one form or the other since the early fifties. There have been movies on robots performing various tasks like humans and we have been reading fictions depicting the future world. Now, the topic is real and popular. But what is AI? Simply stated, AI is the science and engineering of making computers and machines that would think as intelligently as humans. It is accomplished by studying how human brains think, learn, decide, and solve problems and developing algorithms to enable the machines to act as humans. Intelligent computers process large amount of data, information and pictures and they learn and improve without any special programming to do so.

A subfield of AI is machine learning, which is an application AI. It provides systems the ability to automatically learn and improve from experience without being explicitly programmed. It focuses on the development of computer programmes that can access data and use it to learn for themselves. Machine leaning again has a subfield called deep learning which processes huge amount of data to detect relationships and patterns that humans are often unable to detect. Deep means the number of layers.

AI and machine learning is enhancing the hardware and software within computers and smart phones thus making our lives easier with every update. “An average individual looks at his/her mobile phone for more than 2.5 hours and makes about 35,000 decisions in a single day”, writes Ralf Lianasas, a tech writer and digital marketing expert. Mobile phone marketeers study behaviours of mobile phone users to find out customers’ needs. Mobile phones are now designed to conduct AI tasks efficiently. Only three per cent phones had this capability in 2017, but in 2020 it was 35 per cent. According to various studies, an average smart phone has around one dozen sensors like accelerometers, GPS, microphone, camera, etc. For years, mobile phones have been gathering data on us through these sensors. The camera, AI and machine learning algorithms are capable of recognizing owner’s face. May be one day, the 35,000 decisions or at least some of them that the owner makes will be taken over by the phones.

It is vital to innovate and create interface with computers and upload our minds to computers so that human and machine intelligence can multiply

Now more and more mobile phones incorporate processors with deep learning based on neural networks. A neural network seeks to initiate functioning of the huma brain. This network can detect patterns and make decisions based on them. However, currently only 10 per cent smart phones have built in deep learning capacity, a feature that is forecast to reach 80 per cent by 2022.

Most people ask if AI can change the world with the innovations currently in vogue in many countries? In the years to come, the AI technology could even replace human intelligence. May be within 30 years, we will have flying cars, as huge amounts are being invested in this technology. In the field of autonomous or self-driving cars, according to Allied Market Research, the market is expected to hit $556.67 billion by 2026 which means a compound annual growth rate of 39.4 per cent. At the same time, developing completely autonomous cars is not an easy undertaking because of security and safety issues. It may take more than 30 years before such cars come on roads.

According to various studies, China may become the leading player in AI within a few years. It has an ambitious goal of spending $150 billion by 2030 to promote this technology. It is speedily developing its human resource in AI and many young people are pursuing a career in this field. China is also working on erecting next-generation cities for autonomous cars besides aggressively working in 5G networks.

For many years now, robots have been used across a wide range of industry. With AI, work is being done effectively by employing robots in other areas like security of installations and defence fields. However, developing completely intelligent robots is a gigantic task, especially, when they must sense and negotiate the environment in which they are operating. With the speed of development, very soon robots may be working alongside humans to complement each other’s strengths.

The US Air Force Research Lab is working on building robots that will be co-pilots in fighter jets and will take over if the pilot becomes incapacitated. Drones that are being developed would be capable of making decisions while flying over the target rather than being controlled remotely from the operation room. There have been significant advances in curing serious diseases by discovering appropriate drugs. The AI speeds up the process because it can identify complex patterns.

However, when all is said and done, there is a danger of significant technological unemployment because machines will be as intelligent as humans and they will take over most professions. The expectation is that robots will outperform humans. There is, therefore, a need to explore how this transition from the present mode of working to AI based modes will take place. What would need to be done to replace present human skills with the ones that would work alongside machines.

It is vital to innovate and create interface with computers and upload our minds to computers so that human and machine intelligence can multiply.

In Pakistan, it is heartening to note that there is now greater awareness of the changes that AI would bring to us. Some of our universities are now offering training in AI which would produce the required human resource to work in this field. Pakistan has been able take advantage of AI in identifying the risks involved because of the prevailing pandemic. Efforts are also on to use AI in the agriculture sector, and monitoring weather. This would help forecast the impending disasters. However, Pakistan is far behind in tapping the benefits of AI. The government, under the Knowledge Economy Initiative, has allocated Rs 2500 million in the federal budget 2019-20, but it is still in the air. The amount was to be spent on research in the fields of Artificial Intelligence and Allied Technologies.

We must focus on the research and development of AI lest we miss the boat and lag many years behind in this fast-developing technology. Seeking Chinese assistance in this field would be a wise step.

The writer is a senior advisor in the Sustainable Development Policy Institute Islamabad