Artificial intelligence versus human intelligence - Daily Excelsior
Jyoti Vakhlu
Artificial intelligence, or AI, is a term that can sound scary or difficult to understand. I think many people believe they have never used AI and cannot use it. But that is far from true. We use AI in everyday life. Common examples include voice assistants like Siri and Alexa, Netflix suggesting shows we might enjoy, and Google Maps helping us find our way somewhere. These systems use computers, sets of instructions called algorithms, and large amounts of information, or data, to learn and make decisions. To understand how AI makes decisions, let's look at Google Maps. It began as a digital version of a paper map. Today, it has become a system powered by AI that can predict what is happening around us. It does more than show roads. It constantly gathers information, understands what is happening, and predicts changes in the real world as they happen. How does it do this? Behind the scenes, computers use processing power, algorithms, stored information, and new information coming in all the time. Google Maps was first trained using information from satellites and mobile phones, including Android phones and iPhones that use iOS. This process is called machine learning, or ML. After Google Maps was developed, the system was trained to collect information from satellites and phones by itself. It can now update its information as things change, calculate speeds, check traffic, and identify traffic signs and landmarks. The real world keeps changing. For example, a new skyscraper might be built where there was no building before. Google Maps can notice this change using satellite pictures and street images, then update its maps. These computer systems keep learning, changing, and improving. AI means computer systems designed to do tasks that usually need human intelligence. But if machines can make decisions like humans, why do we call their intelligence artificial? Human intelligence is considered real intelligence, perhaps because it comes from a living biological system that can reproduce itself, unlike a machine. More importantly, humans have consciousness. This means we have feelings and can experience emotions, pain, and pleasure, while machines cannot.
Human intelligence, like artificial intelligence, also develops through learning and training. From childhood, we learn from our mothers, families, neighbours, schools, and others around us. Many of our prejudices come from not knowing enough about other families, neighbours, relatives, cultures, and societies. But human intelligence involves more than learning information. It includes the ability to understand, think carefully, and adjust to new situations. Humans have deep emotions, creativity, and the ability to handle complicated relationships with other people. We learn not only from what happens to us but also from our feelings, instincts, and the emotions connected to our experiences. These give us a deeper understanding that AI cannot currently copy. For example, imagine using Google Maps while driving and missing a turn or an exit. Google Maps does not scold you. Instead, it quickly works out another route. That route might be longer and could ask you to make a U-turn and return to where you started. But if you know the city or ask someone who lives there, you will often find another route that is better than the one Google Maps suggests. You might need to park your car earlier and walk a short distance to reach your destination.
Another example is how music streaming services like Spotify suggest songs. Spotify collects information about the music you listen to, including your favourite songs, lyrics, and artists. It sorts this information into groups and recommends songs that match your tastes. This is another kind of machine learning. Over time, the system learns from the information you give it through your listening habits. If you use Spotify for a long time, it collects enough information to understand what music you like. It can then suggest newly released songs that match your interests. But if we do not think for ourselves and explore other music, we might never hear something very different from our usual choices that we would actually enjoy. The main idea to remember is that a machine cannot imagine things; it can only make predictions. We might miss a new singer with a completely different singing style or music that mixes instruments in new and unusual ways. AI can create pictures, music, and other works by learning patterns from information that already exists. However, it does not have true originality or the ability to imagine something completely new. Humans, on the other hand, can be genuinely creative. We can think about ideas that are not directly in front of us and use our emotions, experiences, and imagination to create something new. The famous scientist Albert Einstein used what he called 'thought experiments' to help solve some of the biggest mysteries of the universe. For example, he imagined what it would be like to travel alongside a beam of light. In a 1929 interview with George Sylvester Viereck, Einstein famously said, 'Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution.'
One of the biggest differences between AI and human intelligence is how they learn. AI learns through machine learning algorithms that study very large amounts of data. Humans learn through their own experiences and the feelings they have in different situations. Because humans can understand emotions, they can deal with complicated social situations, connect with others, and build relationships. AI makes decisions using data and rules that have already been set. Humans make decisions using a mixture of logical thinking, instincts, and emotions. This helps people make careful decisions that take many small details into account in ways AI cannot.
If AI cannot make decisions the same way humans do, why is everyone talking about it so much? The biggest advantage of AI is that it can work with far more information than the human brain can handle. Our brains have limits on how much information they can take in and process. We usually deal with information step by step. We also get mentally tired, and our memories have limits. We can forget things over time. In the past, people used paper maps to find their way when travelling. They marked routes with pencils or pens so they would not have to study the map from the beginning every time. Remembering a map and working out exactly where we were took mental effort. AI makes this much easier. In the same way, it is difficult for a person to remember directions to every place they have visited. That is why people once depended more heavily on road signs for directions. AI, however, can handle extremely large amounts of information. In just seconds, it can take in, store, and compare petabytes of data that is not neatly organised. This could include directions to thousands of places, millions of medical records, hundreds of years of financial transactions, or information about the climate across the world.
Even more importantly, AI can find complicated patterns in information that humans cannot easily notice. This ability is called high-dimensional pattern recognition. A human expert might be able to consider three or four different factors when making a prediction. An AI system can study thousands of factors at the same time. It can discover small but important connections between pieces of information that even very intelligent people might miss. In simple terms, AI can take huge amounts of confusing information, find useful patterns, and turn them into information people can act on. It can do this on a scale that the human brain cannot match.
Even though AI and human intelligence are different, they also have important similarities. Both can solve problems and make predictions. Both can also improve over time. AI improves by receiving more information and using better algorithms. Humans improve by gaining experience and using their imagination.
Looking to the future, it is important to understand that AI is not currently a replacement for human intelligence. Instead, it can work alongside human intelligence and make it more useful. In areas such as healthcare, education, banking, defence, law, and the arts, humans and AI can work together to find new solutions and achieve better results.
Overall, artificial intelligence and human intelligence have different roles. Understanding these differences is very important in today's world of technology. AI now seems difficult to live without, just as the printing press, typewriter, and computers once seemed essential in their own times. However, like all technologies, AI has an environmental cost. We must think about the harm it may cause to the environment when deciding how and when to use it.
As AI becomes a bigger part of our daily lives, it is increasingly important to understand what it does well, what it cannot do, and what problems it may cause.
Jyoti Vakhlu, Professor, School of Biotechnology, University of Jammu, Jammu