Page 44 - Fortune-November 01, 2018

ar tifi c i al intelli gence + kai -fu lee

web, Internet A.I. leverages the fact that users and then using that information to make decisions (apply-
automatically label data as we browse: buying ing pressure to the brake in order to slowly stop the vehicle).
vs. not buying, clicking vs. not clicking. These In the area of robotics, such advanced A.I. algorithms will be
cascades of labeled data build a detailed profile applied to industrial applications (automated assembly lines
of our personalities, habits, demands, and and warehouses), commercial tasks (dishwashing and fruit-
desires: the perfect recipe for more tailored harvesting robots), and eventually consumer ones too.
content to keep us on a given platform, or to
maximize revenue or profit.
The second wave is “business A.I.” Here, THE CHANGES YET TO COME
algorithms can be trained on proprietary data
sets ranging from customer purchases to ma-
chine maintenance records to complex business BECAUSE A.I. CAN BE PROGRAMMED to maximize profitability or
processes—and ultimately lead managers to replace human labor, it adds immediate value to the economy.
improved decision-making. An algorithm, for A.I. is fast, accurate, works around-the-clock, doesn’t complain,
example, might study many thousands of bank and can be applied to many tasks, with substantial economic
loans and repayment rates, and learn if one benefit. How substantial? PwC estimates that the technology
type of borrower is a hidden risk for default will contribute about $16 trillion to worldwide GDP by 2030.
or, alternatively, a surprisingly good, but over- But that gift doesn’t come without challenges to human-
looked, lending prospect. Medical researchers, ity. The first and foremost is job displacement: Since A.I. can
similarly, can use deep-learning algorithms to di- perform single tasks with superhuman accuracy—and most
gest enormous quantities of data on patient di- human jobs are single-task—it follows that many routine jobs
agnoses, genomic profiles, resultant therapies, will be replaced by this next-generation tech. That includes both
and subsequent health outcomes and perhaps white-collar and blue-collar jobs. A.I. also faces questions with
discover a worthy personalized treatment proto- security, privacy, data bias, and monopoly maintenance. All are
col that would have otherwise been missed. By significant issues with no known solution, so governments and
scouting out hidden correlations that escape our corporations should start working on them now.
linear cause-and-effect logic, business A.I. can But one concern we don’t have to face quite yet is the one that
outperform even the most veteran of experts. may be most common these days, cast in the image of science-
The third wave of artificial intelligence— fiction movies—that machines will achieve true human-level
call it “perception A.I.”— gets an upgrade with (or even superhuman-level) intelligence, making them capable
eyes, ears, and myriad other senses, collecting presumably of threatening mankind.
new data that was never before captured, and We’re nowhere near that. Today’s A.I. isn’t “general artificial
using it to create new applications. As sensors intelligence” (the human kind, that is), but rather narrow—lim-
and smart devices proliferate through our ited to a single domain. General A.I. requires advanced capabili-
homes and cities, we are on the verge of enter- ties like reasoning, conceptual learning, common sense, planning,
ing a trillion-sensor economy. This includes cross-domain thinking, creativity, and even self-awareness and
speech interfaces (from Alexa and Siri to emotions, which remain beyond our reach. There are no known
future supersmart assistants that remember engineering paths to evolve toward the general capabilities above.
everything for you) as well as computer-vision How far are we from general A.I.? I don’t think we even
applications—from face recognition to manu- know enough to estimate. We would need dozens of big break-
facturing quality inspection. throughs to get there, when the field of A.I. has seen only one
The fourth wave is the most monumental true breakthrough in 60 years. That said, narrow A.I. will bring
but also the most difficult: “autonomous A.I.” about a technology revolution the magnitude of the Industrial
Integrating all previous waves, autonomous A.I. Revolution or larger—and one that’s happening much faster.
gives machines the ability to sense and respond It’s incumbent upon us to understand its monumental impact,
to the world around them, to move intuitively, widespread benefits, and serious challenges.
and to manipulate objects as easily as a hu-
man can. Included in this wave are autono-
mous vehicles that can “see” the environment This essay is adapted from Lee’s new book, AI Superpowers:
around them: recognizing patterns in the China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order (Houghton
camera’s pixels (red octagons, for instance); Mifflin Harcourt). He is the chairman and CEO of Sinovation
figuring out what they correlate to (stop signs); Ventures and the former president of Google China.

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