The next wave of machine learning

Athena, the first robot to buy a ticket, flew on a commercial airplane. She recently boarded her flight at Los Angeles International Airport with everyone else in economy. Interesting. Isn't it?

Now, consider this. A team of engineers have designed the world's first bionic man, a walking, talking robot made up of 28 mechanical body parts from 17 international manufacturers. Frank(short for Frankenstein) the bionic man even features a circulatory system and beating heart. Agree, there is a way to go, yet, as man and technology take the digital leap together, they are evolving together in radically new ways.

The future has arrived. As exponential growth of disruptive artificial intelligence (AI) and cognitive computing continues, the dawn of the "conscious machines” seems not too far. Machines that could be loaded with human consciousness, machines that are smarter than us, albeit, with different values, ethics, and virtues…Homo sapiens 2.0?

Going by the digital transformation all around us and the tech breakthroughs robots will rise, and, machines will assume critical control of many human tasks, perhaps sooner than we realize.

A study by Carl Frey and Michael Osborne of Oxford's Program on the Impacts of Future Technology put the matter starkly. In their analysis of over 700 different jobs, almost half could be done by a computer in the future. This wave of computerization could destroy not simply low-wage, low-skill jobs, but also impact the way we work, and live. A human revolution is in the offing. This is possible as power of digital insights is “converging”, and infiltrating all disciplines artificial intelligence, computing and networks, robotics, 3D printing, genomics, and healthcare.

So, are we poised to wrest biology from nature? To develop machines with intelligence that rivals or outstrips our own? Can we manipulate the material world on molecular scales? What happens to humanity, then, when super intelligent robots take over? Will it be the end of the mankind as we know IT? Are we prepared for smartly navigating the post human era?

According to Stephen Hawking, one of the greatest living scientific mind, while the primitive forms of artificial intelligence we already have, have proved useful, the development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race. Humans may not effectively compete with an AI which would take off on its own, re-design itself at an ever increasing rate and reach an intelligence that would surpass that of humans. Limited by slow biological evolution, human race may be superseded.

Tesla/SpaceX founder, futurist and famous industrialist, Elon Musk too recently warned that our sci-fi nightmares about artificial intelligence could actually come true in our lifetimes. He called artificial intelligence humanity's biggest "existential risk" and likening it to "summoning the demon."

Stuart Armstrong from Oxford University’s at the Future of Humanity Institute takes that risk too seriously, as he feels that AI could kill us all, if we don’t take steps to program it right. This resembles an event that's been dubbed the intelligence explosion -- a term used by scientist Irving John Good in a paper outlining the development path for artificial intelligence. For Irving John Good the development of an ultra-intelligent machine could be the "last invention that man need ever make" as after that, humanity would cede innovation and technological development to its smarter progeny.

Not all are skeptical about the future and the positive possibilities and amplification of human capabilities, in every sphere.

Ray Kurzweil, leading futurist and MIT professor, stresses that the exponential growth of artificial intelligence will lead to a technological singularity, a point when machine intelligence will overpower human intelligence. Interestingly, Kurzweil who is also Google’s Director of Engineering, striked back recently against the likes of Musk and Hawking—and in Hawking’s case, even took a bit of a swipe, noting that AI is “helping the disabled (including providing Hawking’s voice).”

Let’s dive deeper... For Demis Hassabis, co-founder of the Google-owned artificial intelligence startup DeepMind, is focused on creating "AI scientists".  It’s all about mimicking human brain, in the form of algorithms and data to retrieve them for tasks it was not previously been programmed to do.

Significantly, The Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies (BRAIN) Initiative aimed at revolutionizing our understanding of the human brain too could have far reaching impact beyond new ways to treat, cure and prevent brain disorder. It’s all also about decoding the human brain, and the infinite possibilities and powers that it would bestow.

For instance, Nick Bostrom thinks that super-intelligence could help us solve issues such as disease, poverty, and environmental destruction, and could help us to “enhance” ourselves. In The Second Machine Age, MIT's Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee highlight how we build, use, and live with our digital creations will define our success as a civilization in the 21st century.

While the opportunities of AI are unlimited, from helping to cure disease and treating disabilities, to advance renewable energy and bring education to people around the globe - the uncertainty around AI is why we shouldn’t ignore warnings from folks like Hawking et al.

The world needs to watch IT more carefully as the race to conquer human mind intensifies, and so are the tools to win the human consciousness. Individuals, businesses, society and nations must learn to compete smartly with machines.

We need to move beyond the rhetoric of "manufacturing consent" and think conscientiously to explore how the next wave of machine learning will impact the human race? How is this is going to complement human jobs? How the next generation of “digital natives” will leverage their skills in a new labor market? How we will design the future cities when cars are autonomous and so are many of our gadgets? Who will own the rights to our DNA? How our policies can keep pace with accelerating change?




The age of Homo sapiens 2.0 is arriving fast. Digital Gurus like Nicholas Negroponte find no reason to disbelieve that nanobots in our brain might shape the future of learning, and much more as humanity is moving to a post-biological future.

When the super intelligent machines rise, we’ll surely need to be ready for them. Are we ready for the human revolution?

The Blogger is Kiran Kumar Yellupula:  The views expressed here are purely personal. Please share your feedback at mediavalue@yahoo.com