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Artificial Intelligence

How Artificial Intelligence Will Change the World

How Artificial Intelligence Will Change the Future

Artificial intelligence is impacting the future of virtually every industry and every human being. Artificial intelligence has acted as the main driver of emerging technologies like big data, robotics, and IoT, and it will continue to act as a technological innovator for the foreseeable future.

Employing machine learning and computer vision for detection and classification of various “safety events.” The shoebox-sized device doesn’t see all, but it sees plenty. Like which way the driver is looking as he operates the vehicle. How fast he’s driving, where he’s driving, locations of the people around him. And how other forklift operators are maneuvering their vehicles. IFM’s software automatically detects safety violations (for example, cell phone use) and notifies warehouse managers. So they can take immediate action. The main goals are to prevent accidents and increase efficiency. The mere knowledge that one of IFM’s devices is watching, Gyongyosi claims, has had “a huge effect.”

“If you think about a camera, it is the richest sensor available to us today at a very interesting price point,” he says. “Because of smartphones, camera and image sensors have become incredibly inexpensive, yet we capture a lot of information. From an image. We might be able to infer 25 signals today. But six months from now we’ll be able to infer 100 or 150 signals from that same image. The only difference is the software that’s looking at the image.  And that’s why this is so compelling because we can offer a very important core feature set today. But then over time, all our systems are learning from each other. Every customer can benefit from every other customer. That we bring on board because our systems start to see. And learn more processes and detect more things. That are important and relevant.”

Will AI Take Over the World?

AI is projected to have a lasting impact on just about every industry imaginable. We’re already seeing artificial intelligence in our smart devices, cars, healthcare system, and favorite apps. And we’ll continue to see its influence permeate deeper into many other industries for the foreseeable future.

The Evolution of AI

IFM is just one of countless AI innovators in a field that’s hotter than ever and getting more so all the time. Here’s a good indicator: Of the 9,100 patients received by IBM inventors in 2018, 1,600 (or nearly 18 percent) were AI-related. Here’s another: Tesla founder and tech titan Elon Musk recently donated $10 million to fund ongoing research at the non-profit research company OpenAI — a mere drop in the proverbial bucket if his $1 billion co-pledge in 2015 is any indication. And in 2017, Russian President Vladimir Putin told school children that “Whoever becomes the leader in this sphere [AI] will become the ruler of the world.” He then tossed his head back and laughed maniacally.

OK, that last thing is false. This, however, is not: After more than seven decades marked by hoopla. And sporadic dormancy during a multi-wave evolutionary period. That began with so-called “knowledge engineering,” progressed to model- and algorithm-based machine learning and is increasingly. Focused on perception, reasoning, and generalization. AI has re-taken center stage as never before. And it won’t cede the spotlight anytime soon.

Why is Artificial Intelligence Important?

Artificial intelligence is drastically important to our future. Because AI forms the very foundation of computer learning. Through AI, computers can harness massive amounts of data. And use their learned intelligence to make optimal decisions. And discoveries in fractions of the time that it would take humans. Artificial intelligence is becoming responsible for everything from medical breakthroughs in cancer research. To cutting-edge climate change research.

The Future Is Now: AI’s Impact Is Everywhere

There’s virtually no major industry modern AI — more specifically, “narrow AI,” which performs objective functions using data-trained models and often falls into the categories of deep learning or machine learning — hasn’t already affected. That’s especially true in the past few years, as data collection and analysis have ramped up considerably thanks to robust IoT connectivity, the proliferation of connected devices, and ever-speedier computer processing.

Some sectors are at the start of their AI journey, others are veteran travelers. Both have a long way to go. Regardless, the impact artificial intelligence is having on our present-day lives is hard to ignore:

  • Transportation: Although it could take a decade or more to perfect them, autonomous cars will one day ferry us from place to place.
  • Manufacturing: AI-powered robots work alongside humans to perform a limited range of tasks like assembly and stacking, and predictive analysis sensors keep equipment running smoothly.
  • Healthcare: In the comparatively AI-nascent field of healthcare, diseases are more quickly and accurately diagnosed, drug discovery is sped up and streamlined, virtual nursing assistants monitor patients and big data analysis helps to create a more personalized patient experience.
  • Education: Textbooks are digitized with the help of AI, early-stage virtual tutors assist human instructors, and facial analysis gauges the emotions of students to help determine who’s struggling or bored and better tailor the experience to their individual needs.
  • Media: Journalism is harnessing AI, too, and will continue to benefit from it. Bloomberg uses Cyborg technology to help make quick sense of complex financial reports. The Associated Press employs the natural language abilities of Automated Insights to produce 3,700 earning reports stories per year — nearly four times more than in the recent past.
  • Customer Service: Last but hardly least, Google is working on an AI assistant that can place human-like calls to make appointments at, say, your neighborhood hair salon. In addition to words, the system understands context and nuance.

But those advances (and numerous others, including this crop of new ones) are only the beginning; there’s much more to come — more than anyone, even the most prescient prognosticators, can fathom.

“I think anybody making assumptions about the capabilities of intelligent software capping out at some point are mistaken,” says David Vandegrift, CTO, and co-founder of the customer relationship management firm 4Degrees.

With companies spending nearly $20 billion collective dollars on AI products and services annually, tech giants like Google, Apple, Microsoft, and Amazon spending billions to create those products and services, universities making AI a more prominent part of their respective curricula (MIT alone is dropping $1 billion on a new college devoted solely to computing, with an AI focus), and the U.S. Department of Defense upping its AI game, big things are bound to happen. Some of those developments are well on their way to being fully realized; some are merely theoretical and might remain so. All are disruptive, for better and potentially worse, and there’s no downturn in sight.

“Lots of industries go through this pattern of winter, winter, and then an eternal spring,” former Google Brain leader and Baidu chief scientist Andrew Ng told ZDNet late last year. “We may be in the eternal spring of AI.”