The One Thing AI Still Can’t Replace

The more I use AI everyday, the more I get the uncanny feeling about it’s use, or rather misuse,  by myself and by everybody in the world, who do not realise how it affects our decisions.
So rather than making a large unreadable list of do’s and donts, let us understand and decipher synthetic Intelligence in simple words non-technically, so that we understand it’s responsible use.

So Here goes.

Also, Lets also use an analogy –  say the packet of chips or some fast snack that you are probably munching while reading this.

The 3 Layers of Information

Lets start by breaking the gamut of all INFORMATION that we perceive, in 3 Layers
– Knowledge, Intelligence, and Wisdom.

The first layer – Knowledge:

This is your initial Information component; the basic facts, basic building block, or some combinations of the same.

Just like for your packet of chips, you started with the basics – the grains, fields, land, weather and agriculture and so on.

Let’s add a Knowledge insight here.

All Knowledge – the basic blocks, just like the food grains, are just initial components.

It is a form or structure that has No Polarity of it’s own; i.e, it does not in itself define good, bad, useful, useless, positive or negative.
And so, The food grain, on it’s own, cannot decide or act about what is to be made out of it.

Here we need the second layer – Intelligence.

This layer is what uses the first component layer to build on – to create or do something.
This is also what we can practically define Intelligence as.

Intelligence uses the knowledge blocks to create bigger structures and processes that are usable by us humans. To ‘make sense‘ and ‘usability‘ out of the knowledge component.

Your grains now need all the agricultural processes, manufacturing methods, logistics, packing, etc to reach into your kid’s handful pack of chips.

So, that is the Intelligence layer, without getting technical about the how of it.
Upto now Intelligence was a totally a human function, but is now increasingly being augmented by many types of Artificial or synthetic intelligence.

That is why the insight on ‘Intelligence’ is very important here

Let’s see. Is AI shaping our decisions and society? — Definitely !

That is probably the most obvious answer.
But no, not really. And why not?

Because we need to realize that ‘Intelligence’, and specifically Artificial Intelligence, has No Polarity either.

This also begs the deeper question for the perspective  – So What is Artificial Intelligence actually?

For a moment, let’s just step back into the past and think about the Internet
– when it appeared on the scene.

What did we think it was – was it mainly hotmail?, A communication protocol? and then websites?
But, In actual world perspective, it was an Equaliser.

It allowed the common man to do what earlier could be done only by large corporations with large pockets.
And that changed the world.

Similarly, in Perspective, What is Artificial Intelligence?

Is it a chatbot that can chat almost like a human? Is it a good programmer and coder that replaces jobs?
But think, in real world perspective, it is an Amplifier, a magnifier.

Again you must already have noticed, it has No Polarity.

Give it a pebble to trip on, and it will make you a Wall of China so large you can’t cross it.
Likewise, give it a pretty feather, and it will fly you to the moon with it.
It just behaves like kids debating for and against a topic in a school debate; – And amplifies what it gets.

We have become so used to it, that we do not even think what is really happening here.
It is not the AI that decides on its own. You can use the AI for good or for bad.

Our use, or misuse, of AI

But we delegate our decisions to it without realizing the direction or context we had pointed it to.
So AI does not shape our society, we do.

Getting back to our food industry analogy, All the Food Process Intelligence – the manufacturing, the logistics and packing – is not polar. It cannot decide on its own who the food will be provided to or why, or whether the food will be used for the rich, poor, good, bad etc.

This brings us to the thin line that differentiates the third layer – Wisdom.

While knowledge and intelligence are non-polar. Wisdom comes from the perspective of human good.
Wisdom comes from human experiences of love, beauty, ego, greed, hunger, pain, relationships, etc – not something that an AI will easily emulate.
At least, not in the near future. In a hundred years? – who knows!

So while food grains (knowledge), and the processing and packaging and transporting the potato chips (intelligence) gets it to your home,
Wisdom tells your kids not to eat it !

So when using AI, Stay responsible, Stay wise.