Tech Update: Artificial Intelligence First Requires Human Intellige...

AI and cognitive computing are increasingly becoming more utilized in the future business plans of large companies going forward.

To prove my point, I learned that a large business intelligence firm recently conducted a survey in which one in three businesses said they already have fully implemented AI across their organizations.

If this isn't shocking to learn, what about the other 20% of businesses that said they had already implemented AI in parts of their businesses?

It is certainly hard to believe that 33% of today's organizations are already full-functioning AI enterprises.

Can you imagine the types of tasks being accomplished with this new emerging technology as I write this?

Still, its not completely clear what exactly "AI" is or if there is even an agreed upon definition for it so it remains to be a very fluid term.

To prove this point, even the US Congress is unclear about this so they have recently proposed a bill directing the Department of Commerce to define exactly what it means.

However, in investigating this one step further, there is an expert that can help us dig down and get to the bottom of this. David Gershgorn wrote an excellent summary of the true meaning of AI in Quartz.

He defined it as “software, or a computer program, with a mechanism to learn. It then uses that knowledge to make a decision in a new situation, as humans do.”

In the EY survey I referred to earlier, a majority of senior AI professionals say they are in desperate need of people possessing the right skills to assess and design AI systems. Furthermore, fifty-six percent of professionals surveyed said that a lack of talent is the greatest barrier to implementation within their business operations.

Skills is the greatest barrier, and managers also point out that AI technology is a barrier -- 46% feel it has still not reached maturity, so it’s important to take a wait-and-see approach. Many of the leading vendors are bolting AI into their existing offerings, so it may be more ubiquitous in the coming months and years.

The fact is a lot of people are still scared of AI. Furthermore they find this technology to be both threatening and confusing in its present state.

Even with proper training, still many people may never become comfortable or skilled at handling AI systems.

Businesses have been "hampered by a shortage of experts with requisite knowledge of the technology," according to EY's Chris Mazzei. "This serves to demonstrate that successful AI integration is not just about the technology, it’s about the people. Looking to 2018, organizations should prioritize talent acquisition and cultivation—both by recruiting individuals with strong technical backgrounds and investing in skills and training programs to help retain and foster leading AI practitioners.”

Chris went on to say that, “AI requires very sophisticated human resources, such as data scientists to build machine learning models, and computational linguistics professionals to write knowledge extraction applications,"

AI is advancing by leaps and bounds but it still needs qualified professionals to take the lead. Many will be against AI due to their impression that AI and Machine Learning may lead to the eventual destruction of the human race. Many are also waiting on the sidelines trying to get a handle on just how AI is transforming society before making judgement.

What are your impressions of AI and Machine Learning? Do you think this technology will have more positive or negative benefits to humanity as a whole? In what ways do you see AI being used in the future?

Please leave your impressions below.

Thanks for reading @techblogger