AI Hype and the Practical Truth

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a software approach to make applications appear smart. It has been pursued from the earliest periods of computing. Recently, AI has been used to make Google search better, Amazon recommend the right products, Pandora select the next song, Bank of America detect a stolen credit card, Amazon Alexa to understanding your shopping list, and the Department of Defense to scan satellite imagery for anything suspicious.

However, something very different just happened. Starting in 2016, through 2017, and now heading into 2018, machines started to beat human experts across diverse settings. Two grad students with a mass of images can train an intelligent agent that out performs the best dermatologists. It is not just beating us in chess and Go and Jeopardy, but in clinical diagnostics, driving, investing, guarding, farming. Machines are learning how to acquire expert-level human skills in a few hours. Machines are teaching machines.

As a result, and like never before, we are surrounded by stories of recent AI-driven breakthroughs and potential. AI is seen as the critical game changer in productivity, economic growth, job displacement, daily living, national defense, healthcare and transportation. We are just at the beginning of a new industrial and computer revolution. Everyone needs to be aware of the what is possible versus what is overhype. We all need to have a solid grasp of the how, the what and the when we are going to see AI effect of lives, our business, and our nation. An AI breakout is coming, and we need to get ready.