Blog Post #5

 In the Age of AI

     From watching the documentary "In the Age of AI" by Frontline, I could definitely sympathize with alot of what was said by the speakers.  After watching the movie, I found myself thinking about the concepts and ideas talked about for the rest of the day.  What would it really be like if and when the world becomes much further advanced in technology and artificial intelligence?  What happens when it becomes so mainstream that it essentially controls the world?  

     Social Media and technology has become so commonplace in our society today that many of us don't even realize how much time we are spending with our technology.  Because of its success, this social media and market is now driven by their lust to profit rather than their desire to improve the connection of humanity.  Many platforms are using personal user data to take advantage of those who use those platforms.  

     Some very positive aspects of this new age of AI from the documentary are where the the woman with breast cancer had a computer locate problems.  The artificial intelligence by deep learning was able to understand language and was able to predict early stage conditions after it analyzed data and from mammograms and diagnostic notes.  This is a huge deal because if you have the ability to locate the problem early, it is so much easier to diagnose and cure it before and major issues form in the body.   

     On the other hand, the situation about the self driving trucks presented a different reaction among certain people.  The truck drivers, for example, definitely lose out here since there are now machines and technology that can do their jobs for them.  It's become increasingly more difficult for veteran independent drivers to make a living because they are being replaced.  Another example being the situation with Harry Cripps, who is an autoworker and a local union president.  The employment in that area where he worked was near six percent with poverty being around 30 percent.  He mentioned how robots don't have to pay taxes and other things like that which was comedic but also very true.  He exclaimed that "If we continue to go in an automated system, what are we going to do."