Author: Mauro Rodríguez, professor researcher at Center for Digital Evolution of Business School of Tecnológico de Monterrey.
Artificial intelligence (AI) has emerged as a revolutionary technological force, overflowing with possibilities and versatile applications. With the appropriate predispositions for information processing, AI can be developed to explain, reason and adapt to the reality it encounters. Furthermore, AI offers an opportunity for various disciplines, including medicine, to amplify their impact on society.
The prowess of AI lies in its ability to mimic human intelligence, as seen in its applications during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, to fully realize the potential of AI, it is crucial to integrate it with industrial development across the board.
As AI continues to evolve, it is essential to recognize its capabilities and limitations to ensure its positive trajectory. Integrating AI principles into a comprehensive framework is vital for its responsible and ethical development. As we move forward, the crucial role of AI in shaping a sustainable and innovative future is becoming increasingly evident.
However, like all technological wonders, it comes with challenges and limitations. AI stands out in the digital era for its ability to process and analyze large sets of data at impressive speeds, being essential in sectors such as finance, health, supply chain and marketing. Their analyzes drive decisions, optimize processes and predict trends.
AI's skill in natural language processing has given rise to chatbots, advanced translation services and sentiment analysis tools, improving communication and providing real-time feedback.
AI has transformed interfaces by recognizing images and voice, from unlocking smartphones with facial recognition to voice-activated virtual assistants. Its automation capabilities range from simple tasks to complex manufacturing processes. Additionally, in entertainment, AI has elevated the gaming experience, and in medicine, it has revolutionized diagnosis and treatment.
Among the limitations that AI has, we find that, despite its computational power, it sometimes lacks common sense, leading to illogical decisions. Its effectiveness depends on the quality of the data entered; and although he can recognize or simulate emotions, he does not truly understand them. It has also generated ethical debates about privacy, autonomous decision-making, and algorithmic biases, which, in the context of AI, refer to the systematic and unintentional biases that can arise in the results of an algorithm due to unrepresentative training data or prejudiced. These biases can reflect, perpetuate or even amplify existing prejudices and inequalities in society, such as gender, skin color, age, ethics and transparency, among others.
Among other challenges and concerns raised by AI is automation and the fear that it will lead to job losses, although, seen from another perspective, it also offers the opportunity to reduce operational work and repetitive routines, such as the production of a consumer product. massive, giving the opportunity to focus talent on innovating and promoting creativity.
Another aspect discussed among experts is advanced AI models, in particular deep neural networks (DNN), machine learning models inspired by the structure and function of the human brain, which to this day can may be enigmatic, but with a practical application in business and other disciplines. Furthermore, like all digital systems, AI is vulnerable to attacks, and its development and deployment currently requires significant resources.
The perspective is to create a manifesto of global reach, not just local, that reflects the commitment to excellence in AI. This manifesto not only seeks technological innovations, but also a deep and positive social impact. The goal is to establish an AI ecosystem based on ethics, integrity and trust. Our vision is unequivocal: we aspire to an AI that serves the common good, is trusted and acts with integrity at all times. Looking to the future, our goal is to promote AI that transcends mere technology and stands as an instrument for the advancement and well-being of all.
Finally, although AI excels at specialized tasks, such as driving a car, creating a generalized AI that has the ability to understand, learn, and apply its intelligence to a wide range of tasks and problems, at the level of a human being, remains being a distant objective for the moment.
Originally published in El Financiero.