Syed Muhammad Qaseem:
Artificial Intelligence(AI) is the simulation of human intelligence in computer systems. In simple words, AI enables machines to perform tasks that require human intelligence. Those tasks can be learning from past experiences, solving problems, and making predictions based on provided data. Until now, AI has just started taking baby steps but it is growing at a much rapid rate.
Every invention had various positive and negative impacts on human civilization. According to Google’s CEO, Sundar Pichai “AI will have a more profound impact on human beings than fire, electricity, and the internet”. This innovation also has both positive and negative impacts on human beings. If it is left unchecked it will have adverse impacts on human creativity, the job market, and the flow of information. However, the positive use of AI will bring major advancements in medical science, education, agriculture, etc. In the following paragraphs, the impacts of AI on humans are described.
Negative Impacts of AI:
AI is a technological tool and its use can be both positive and negative, although, it is in the hands of human beings on how to use it. Following are some negative impacts of AI on humans.
Deep Fakes Through Generative AI:
In the age of information technology, misinformation is a major issue. The introduction of generative AI into public space has further worsened the predicament of information flow. Through generative AI, deep fakes are generated. These deep fakes are difficult to judge, as original or fake, for a person who has no knowledge of AI. The deep fakes can be an image, a video, or a voice note. Recently, in Slovakia’s 2023 elections, a fake voice of a party’s leader and a journalist was shared on social media, in which they were talking about purchasing votes from the poor population. This voice badly reduced the vote bank of that party during elections. Another example of the deep fakes that created uncertainty was pictures of the former US president, Donald Trump’s arrest, which provoked his supporter’s sentiments against the state. Therefore, if the use of generative AI is left unchecked, bad actors in society will use it for their own purposes and spread wrong information.
AI’s use in War
Using AI for the purpose of AI will have ferocious results. Because AI unlike humans has no fear, doesn’t commit mistakes, doesn’t get tired, and has no mercy. So, it can fight much better than a soldier. Thus, Countries are trying to develop AI fighters, robots, and drones for the maximization of power. This will attract the attention of their rival countries to build AI war machines for the balance of power. Hence, like nuclear weapons, AI will further worsen security dilemmas if used for the purpose of war.
AI is a Major Threat to Human Creativity
Creativity is a unique characteristic of human beings due to which they bring development, prosperity, modernization, and easiness in their lives. But man-made intelligence is growing so rapidly that it has posed a grave threat to the creativity of God’s humankind. With only a few clicks and in some seconds, an AI program can write a book, a novel, a poem, an assignment and an article. Furthermore, it can sing a song, draw a painting, solve a problem, and make a prediction. On the other side, it takes much effort and time for a human to do all these tasks. Due to the lazy and comfort-seeking nature of human beings, now they mostly rely on AI to perform these tasks. With the passage of time AI is learning more skills and human’s reliance on AI is further increasing. This increase in reliance on AI will cause the death of creativity in humans.
AI and Job Market
“ AI is coming to take your job”, this news was seen on many news platforms when ChatGPT was launched in Nov 2022. As stated earlier, AI is efficient and less time-consuming in performing a task. Therefore, it has made millions of people jobless in almost every field, whether they are hotel waiters, drivers, journalists, software engineers and content writers etc. AI-driven cars neither cross the speed limit nor have sleep problems, consequently, companies are manufacturing AI-driven cars to avoid road accidents. Journalists and content writers demand huge salaries for their work, while, ChatGPT is a free AI app that can do the same tasks freely and quickly. More interestingly, AI will replace its own founders(Software Engineers) who developed AI, as AI can write code and find errors in it. To sum up, AI has much potential to replace the human workforce.
Positive Impacts of AI
Along with negative impacts, AI can also be advantageous for humans if used for welfare purposes. In the following paragraphs, some advantages of AI are described if AI is used positively.
AI can Revolutionize the Medical Field
AI along with synthetic biology can transform the world shaped until now. AI and synthetic biology can eradicate debilitating diseases, and find treatments for pandemics, thus providing health benefits. AI has also made a lot of achievements in the field of surgery. Last year, an AI robot performed a successful egg surgery in which the inner layer of an egg was stitched. Additionally, an AI Chatbot can also prescribe medicines and treatment for a disease based on the provided symptoms. In the coming years, AI will further advance itself in the medical field and people will take numerous benefits from it.
Prediction Based on Provided Data
Humans remain curious to predict things or the outcome of events. If data is fed to an AI, it can find patterns in that data, and based on those patterns it can give predictions. For example: AI can predict election results, market demand for a product, predict weather etc. In the US 2020 presidential elections, an AI model was trained to predict the outcome of elections. Tweets and Facebook posts were fed to the model from which AI separated positive and negative sentiments about former US President Trump and current US President Joe Biden. Based on the high number of positive sentiments, the AI model predicted that Trump would win the elections, and he won. So, humans can take advantage of this feature of AI and can reap its benefits.
Boosting Agriculture Through AI
Pakistan is an agriculture-based country, and enhancing the agriculture sector will boost the country’s economic performance. AI can increase agricultural production by predicting the best time to cultivate and harvest a crop. It is also capable of identifying soil conditions, plant diseases, weather forecasts, and when plants need to be irrigated. Moreover, AI can analyze the market’s supply and demand chain. AI will be efficient in saving the loss of water during irrigation. Secondly, it will provide a suitable environment for the plants to grow through maintaining soil fertility and water needs. To sum up, equipping agriculture with AI systems will boost agricultural production and prevent heavy water losses.
Recommendations for the Pakistani Government
The world has entered into the race of AI development. Fortunately, Pakistan has a huge human resource, but making them skilful in the field of AI is a hard task to do. All provincial governments should include AI in the school curriculum. There should be an AI portal for students, from where they can get updates about AI developments around the globe and jobs announced by the government. Furthermore, universities must be directed to increase practical work in AI rather than theoretical.
Conclusion
In conclusion, AI nevertheless advantageous, poses a grave threat to human civilization. If AI is left unchecked, it can spread misinformation through deep fakes, worsen the status quo of security dilemmas, cause the death of human creativity, and take jobs. So, all countries should sit on a single platform and form laws to control the development and introduction of AI tools in public space. In addition, AI companies should include a watermark to the content generated through AI to cope with misinformation. In the end, AI will be more hazardous if it gets consciousness and moves physically freely without being dependant on humans.
