How Artificial Intelligence Could Alleviate Hunger, Limit Disease and Jazz Up your life….
No news breaks ground like bad news. And Artificial Intelligence or AI has had its fair share of bad press. Will it turn against humanity? Will it be a force of evil? The short answer is: most likely no! Will it take over my job? It may well do. But that may not be the worse thing yet.
But first, let’s demystify all the buzz words around AI like ‘Big Data’, ‘Machine Learning’ & ‘Deep Learning’.
Artificial Intelligence is simply technology that can substitute human intelligence in the performance of any number of tasks. More specifically, it is a group of tools and programs that have predictive power and the ability to learn autonomously to varying degrees.
At a basic level, AI feeds off data input stored in databases. Databases have morphed and developed significantly in order to handle another buzz word, ‘big data’. These are huge data sets. To give you a commonplace example, YouTube receives over 400 hours of video content each minute. Its content overload.
Machine Learning is a component of AI. It is the ability perform without being explicitly programmed to do so. So, unlike being told specifically what to do via a program, Machine Learning creates its own ‘rules’ on the basis of input data and eventually ‘learns’ from it. Image recognition and unmanned self-driving automobiles are examples of this.
Deep-learning is a more developed form of machine learning. Computing systems labeled neural networks learn from large amounts of data. As neural would imply, this works with algorithms inspired by the structure and function of the human brain.
Limiting Food Insecurity via AI
According to the UN, 11% of the world population or over 821 Million people suffered from hunger in 2018.
Based on a report by Prescient and Scientific Research, over $850 million have been invested in agricultural related AI applications till 2019 alone. How exactly will it be utilized? The applications are limitless. From efficient crop monitoring via AI empowered drone technology to using smart seeding (optimizing inputs and minimizing waste) to save money. It can augment longevity of storage and minimize pilferage and other waste by various AI driven audit and stock monitoring devices. It can also optimize speed to market and ensure the farmer has the best bang for the buck with each harvest.
Crops have traditionally been wasted in great amounts in both developed and underdeveloped countries due to pests, unpredictable weather and other exogenous shocks to the system. AI can now be deployed at to identify these adversities much earlier and prevent or limit damage and monetary loss.
Big data gathered from various databases is already helping alleviate hunger by improved seed development, targeted and more environmentally friendly application of pesticides and better control and cure of diseases associated with crops and livestock.
AI will reduce need for manual labor somewhat in most locations. However, in the long run it will improve farm yields, overall volume of production and its net cost. Manual labor overall will need to adapt and learn newer skills to upgrade. And in this sphere the role of Government will be key to ensure adequate vocational training is provided to upgrade manual workers. So some may lose current jobs but have the opportunity to upgrade themselves via new skill acquisitions. AI will indirectly improve human capital as well.
Preventing Disease Growth and Limiting the Next Pandemic
Data empowered AI tools can offer the best preventive care via predictive models on disease patterns. Combined with advancements in genetics, this will be the main foray of disease control and treatment in the future.
Advantages of AI application in infection control especially in a pandemic situation such as that of COVID19 include shortening time to diagnose, identifying hotspots, replicating control and limitation protocols and the ability to analyze huge datasets from across the world.
A great example of this is BlueDot, an AI driven Canadian tech start-up. BlueDot is a proprietary software designed to track and locate disease spread. It was instrumental in early identification and tracking of COVID19 and attained considerable media coverage overnight.
BlueDot managed this with ‘Big Data’ analyses. It employed state of the art machine learning to gather data from a multitude of inputs such as population and demographical statistics, digital and social media, airline ticketing data, official government statements and many other sources. It can process an astonishing amount of data almost in real time. Once you have all the analysis, human intelligence can be incorporated to develop policy frameworks with physicians and governmental personnel. It saves time and time is of the essence in managing pandemics and disease progression alike.
Similarly, HealthMap is another AI run system that scans social media, internet queries, digital media and other information streams for early signs of disease spread. It is run by Boston Children’s Hospital. It also helped identify COVID19 in quick time.
In terms of disease control and treatment of various types of cancers, AI can add tremendous value via personalization of treatment based on big data. AI can help further with trended analysis specific to patients with certain preconditions and risk factors such as obesity, family history, certain genome traits and past success of similar regimes in large data sets of other patients. The current challenge is getting doctors and treatment centers access to this data via licensed AI driven tools to ensure they are empowered to transmit the best treatment options for each patient. It can be instrumental in earlier diagnosis, patient screening, treatment regimes and research inputs for oncologists world wide.
And last but not least, how will it jazz up your life!
TV
As consumers we have grown more impatient and continue to live in the moment. Watching TV and waiting on your favorite show for a week is no longer the preferred modus operandi if you can simply binge watch what you want on Netflix. But imagine customized stories to match your type of entertainment in the future with real life like virtual characters. Perhaps an avatar of yours will feature in it as well and be modelled after your real life based on your social media signature! This may be exciting for some and rather too close to comfort for others but it is now a mater of time before virtual reality is integrated into many forms of traditional entertainment.
Music, Poetry & Prose
Did you know, AI can be harnessed to produce music! It could tailor it to specific tastes and model your preferences to produce the most personalized song to fit your taste. The same holds true for poetry and prose. This is an emerging area and the end product is not quite there yet but is getting closer by the day and should not be too far off. The Guardian recently published an article written by an AI driven GPT-3 system. The system is OpenAI’s language generator. Open AI has funding and support from none other than Mr. Elon Musk himself.
Travel: Self Driven Vehicles
How apt that a mention of Elon lands us into the self-driven arena! Machine Learning algorithms are getting better and better at catching up with every driving nuance possible. This is definitely on the agenda for innovative car manufacturers over the next decade.
In retrospect
Whether its feeding the world’s hungry, empowering farmers and businesses with tools, curing disease and improving patient care or simply adding more jazz to your life, AI is the big thing resting on big data. It will catch up with you, mostly for the better. It will also improve human capital, as you and I need to keep developing our skill sets to stay a step ahead of the machine or become redundant like that rather heavy old desktop computer in your Attic.