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| My hp laptop- 3rd Otswe St., South La Estates, La-Accra, Ghana |
Artificial intelligence (AI) is a
common phrase in the digital space. Artificial intelligence dictates trends in
our everyday life. Artificial intelligence has infiltrated our everyday life.
Artificial intelligence has been integrated into our culture. If you ask, how
so? I should tell you that smart phone, laptop and even calculator are
manifestations of AI.
EXAMPLES
Some examples of artificial
intelligence use in our everyday lives are as follows:
- Cortana- the hp laptop I am using has this app. It is a Microsoft app. When I have difficulty going through the internet I feed Cortana with the problem, and it helps me out. When I turn on the laptop Cortana greets me! A relationship is developed between Cortana and the user. If one consults it frequently it gathers information about one which it uses to help one out. Cortana functions as such because it is fitted with artificial intelligence. Siri, Google Now are other similar apps.
- Artificial intelligence is used in video games. Weather you play the video game in the sitting room of your hall or in a pub, artificial intelligence play an important part to make you enjoy the game. Video game characters get to know their users, develop a relationship with them because of the artificial intelligence embedded in the characters.
- Smart phones use artificial intelligence. A smart phone can ask you to leave a message when the one you are ringing is not around.
- Robots in the automobile industry, for example, are performing tasks to help craft automobiles that facilitates our movements from place to place. The robots are fitted with artificial intelligence.
- You might have heard of self-driving cars. The cars are able to drive around without drivers because they have been fitted with artificial intelligence. The cars have been programmed to function as such by man.
- Banks and houses are making use of artificial intelligence. Teller machines help get money to meet urgent needs when banks have closed.
DEFINITION
What then is artificial
intelligence? The term is two words put together. Artificial is something that
is not natural. Intelligence is the ability to grasp knowledge and use it. There
are artificial flowers. Artificial flowers do no derive their growth from
nature so they are different from natural flowers which derive their growth
from nature- life- giving nutrients. The principle is the same for artificial
intelligence. Artificial intelligence is intelligence conceived, designed and
created by man and put in a machine to perform specific tasks like humans. This
kind of intelligence is not fed and sustained by life-giving nutrients, as is
natural intelligence. Brittanica.com
defines artificial intelligence as “the ability of a digital computer or
computer- controlled robot to perform tasks commonly associated with
intelligent beings”. It says further that: “The term is frequently applied to
the project of developing systems endowed with intellectual processes
characteristic of humans such as the ability to reason, discover meanings,
generalize, or learn from past experience”.
What is the link between artificial
intelligence and the natural environment? Can artificial intelligence help in
inducing and keeping a clean and balanced environment in a sustainable way as
espoused by this blog?
UPSIDE
The following are some of the ways the
natural environment benefit from artificial intelligence, a built environment:
- AI can help in environmental studies in a transformational way. Through AI a digital dashboard can be built for the planet allowing for the running of the natural environmental systems on an unprecedented scale.
- AI can help to speed up the process of collecting and collating data on species, particularly species on the verge of extinction. Species play an important role in the ecological balance which humans for one rely on.
- Through AI machines can get to areas that man cannot go to with a view to gathering data. Examples of such spaces are outer space and deep sea. AI machines do deep sea oil well maintenance.
- Through AI, activities in the natural environment can be monitored. Some examples of such activities are mass movement of species and control of species population.
DOWNSIDE
- When a machine breaks down in the process of gathering critical environmental data, it can spill the data gathered. That could disrupt and delay a project on say an endangered species, and even irretrievable loss of project information.
- The increase in use of AI in machines for the leisure and comfort of humans, and thereby replacing humans in workplaces with concomitant steady increase in the population of such creatures. The disposal of an increasing number of AI driven creatures could result in the pollution of the natural environment, if the disposal is not properly done. The disposal of e-waste which is AI driven product is a case in point.
PARTING SHOT
Artificial Intelligence has made its mark
in our everyday lives, directly or indirectly.
A smart phone, for example, is a beneficiary of artificial intelligence.
A smart phone can receive a voice message for you. Artificial Intelligence is a
program designed and placed in a machine to enable the machine to behave like a
human being. Artificial intelligence has its upside and downside as far as the
natural environment goes. Machines using artificial intelligence are directed
to places man cannot go to so as do things that help in the improvement of the
environment. An example is that robots are used in cleaning oil spills- Gulf of
Mexico, 2010. A downside of artificial intelligence is when it breaks down in
the process of gathering critical environmental data.
In so far as AI facilitates the improvement
of the environment its use must be encouraged. There is a fear in certain
circles, perhaps a far-fetched fear, that AI creatures could outnumber and
overrun humans, for that matter the natural environment. Already, robots are
being programmed to go and kill people (AI assassins!). So, whether AI
creatures will destroy the natural environment one day, or help improve and
preserve it will depend on how humans program and apply them.
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