Yes – Rania Raj
As I put my email draft into ChatGPT to fine-tune and perfect it, I couldn’t help but notice the amount of chats in my sidebar. I soon realized I had been using ChatGPT almost every day for the past few months for questions and help with various tasks. Artificial intelligence is rapidly becoming more implanted in society and is advancing at an exponential rate. Whether it’s the supercomputer behind our social media algorithms or the Grammarly Chrome extension I use for my English essay, AI is prevalent and widely used in our lives.
This technology is enhancing human society’s development and positively impacts education, research and all aspects of society.
AI has revolutionized education. It can be an expert in any subject, such as language learning and grammar, philosophical conclusions and even complex scientific concepts. This powerful tool allows a variety of people to access information. We all can benefit from the use of AI as a personalized teacher.
Interestingly, according to a survey conducted by Forbes with 500 respondents, 60% of educators already use AI to enhance their students’ learning experience. Teachers are not replaceable; however, if a school doesn’t have access to experts in every subject, AI can play a role in educating students. For example, companies such as Carnegie Learning have created mathematics programs that help students learn and practice various skills and concepts — all in neat packages that cater to their age.
One common criticism of AI is that it is only accessible to individuals with a high degree of learning, as it sometimes uses prompts that already require a deep understanding of a topic. Thus, people classify it as an elite technology applicable to the rich. However, various types of AI cater to young people learning new concepts such as reading, writing and math. AI has the potential to radically transform the educational experience by making information accessible to all, no matter how much funding or how many resources their school has.
Imagine a young person who wants to learn a language but does not have access to a professional in that language. AI can teach the basics of that language and communicate conversationally. According to Tomedes, ChatGPT knows over 80 languages. Comparatively, the world record for the most languages spoken by one person is 59, according to Science Focus. I have personally taken advantage of ChatGPT’s convenient understanding of many languages and used it to practice reading and writing in the ones I have learned.
Moreover, AI conveniently delivers information. When using traditional search engines to conduct research, the answers may not be provided in an understandable format — People often have to spend hours sifting through and summarizing information from several sources to find what they were looking for. It is frustrating and time-consuming to meticulously search the internet for answers to niche questions. AI can reroute information to you in a fraction of the time, making tasks more efficient.
Even for students, AI is frequently used for simple questions due to its accessibility. For example, I search for synonyms and definitions using ChatGPT, as I find it more straightforward than Google.
In addition, AI’s ability to answer questions in curated ways creates a catered learning experience for individuals. For instance, I can ask ChatGPT to help outline a research paper in a form I understand — this could be a bullet point list, a paragraph or argument format. The ease of receiving a curated answer cultivates an inclusive learning environment online, where information is easily accessible to people with differing learning preferences and styles.
Additionally, AI can enhance scientific and medical research. One of the great challenges in medicine is that biological systems are highly complex. Biomedical experiments generate vast amounts of data, and making sense of this information is time-consuming and difficult. AI can mine large amounts of data and easily detect patterns in experiments and tests far more efficiently than people can.
Companies such as Exscientia are already using AI to enhance diagnostics, drug development, treatment plans and patient care. Machine learning algorithms are able to identify patterns in the detection of disease and even predict disease with greater accuracy than before the introduction of AI into the field.
We are moving toward a future where accurately identifying a predisposition to disease can help reduce morbidity and increase life expectancy. AI is in that future.
Like most new developments, AI still has some issues to be resolved. However, as AI develops and improves, mistakes will be minimized. Ultimately the best outcome would arise from focusing on AI innovation and trying to make it the best it can be.
The rise of AI is a significant step forward for society, offering benefits that extend far beyond human ability. AI is one of the biggest inventions in our history, and it is the definite way forward.
No – Alexandra Theofilopoulou
Artificial intelligence has impacted nearly every demographic — from students and working adults to the elderly — and is making its way into the most professional environments.
With public awareness of AI greatly increasing over the past year, its unethical values, efficacy and roles in day-to-day life have made it a detrimental component of society.
Firstly, the lack of specificity integrated into AI technology can and has led to multiple incidents of racism, according to Harvard University. Facial recognition algorithms that play integral roles in airport security, housing decisions and law enforcement surveillance are universally known to be over 90% accurate, according to the Gender Shades Project. Yet, the technology that prides itself on reliability has proven to be unreliable in practice.
The Gender Shades Project was a study dedicated to making trivial facial recognition technologies as ethical as possible. The project’s goal was to analyze the ethics of gender-based facial recognition technology. To do this, participants from both African and European countries were separated into four categories based on gender and skin type: darker-skinned females, darker-skinned males, lighter-skinned females and lighter-skinned males.
Companies that offer gender-based facial recognition technology were tested, some of which were Microsoft, Face++ and IBM Watson. When participants tested the effectiveness these technologies had on them, it was found that there was a 9.1% discrepancy in favor of males. Microsoft technologies were 89.3% accurate on females and 97.4% accurate on males.
Face++ showed an ever greater imbalance, with a 20.6% discrepancy in favor of males. Facial recognition technologies do not live up to their predicted accuracy which not only threatens a corporation’s integrity but also reaffirms pre-existing gender biases in society.
In a world where sexism and racism are prevalent, the creation of discriminatory facial recognition algorithms is damaging. The fact that a 20% gender discrepancy is ignored and the technology still upholds a reputation of being 90% accurate is utterly unacceptable. AI is incapable of performing identification tasks accurately, making humans a more reliable alternative.
Equality and ethics must be taken seriously and not put at the risk of convenience that AI systems may offer in replacement to humans. Additionally, considering a face scan can be the deciding factor between having access to someone’s credit card details and confidential information on someone’s phone, it is integral that every algorithm caters to everyone, not risking a particular demographic.
In addition to discriminatory algorithms, AI hinders employment opportunities. According to Built In, automated machinery has slowly taken over numerous manufacturing jobs since 2000. This development is hampering employment opportunities for the broader workforce.
According to a Goldman Sachs Report from February 2024, AI will assume more than 300 million full-time jobs per year. The report also states that AI is predicted to replace more than a quarter of work-related assignments in the U.S. and Europe, with two-thirds of jobs in the U.S. and Europe being prone to some degree of AI automation.
Although AI will not take over high-risk professions such as medical specialists and first responders, AI threatens an already impacted economy and rising unemployment rate from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Over 825,000 people fell into unemployment from January-March and October-December of 2020 alone due to the pandemic. It is these same people who are already economically disadvantaged who would be most affected by the takeover of AI in their workplace, according to the House of Commons Library. These specific groups of people are being continuously negatively affected, revealing how AI isn’t catering to the people who need it most, rendering it ineffective.
Community representatives might be replaced with automated chatbots and virtual assistants, a result of AI taking over the job market. While the use of AI workers is less labor-intensive and more efficient, programmed assistants are unable to tailor their advice with the same specificity as humans, making programmed assistants a less effective option. This poses a concern over the accuracy and effectiveness of AI-generated advice.
In the medical field, where personalizable help is essential to best aid the patient or assess the urgency of a situation, such inaccuracy is particularly concerning — Even the slightest mistake could be fatal.
In addition to ethical concerns, AI has the ability to hinder social connection. As AI chatting systems rise in popularity, people are becoming increasingly dependent on them, leading to a lack of human interaction, according to Psychology Today. AI may feel like the more convenient option to some; however, it can lead to extreme social alienation and loneliness.
Finally, although AI may paint a picture of a more efficient future, it will come with negative impacts on society. Known to be biased and inaccurate, detrimental to employment opportunities, unethical and the pathway to loneliness, AI is not the way forward.
