Intelligence is a word that is at the core of defining human beings ever since existence was recognized. It is a must have fundamental characteristic for us, humans and which is why you are questioned “මොළයක් නැද්ද?” at once when something is done or said vice versa to the actual way it should be. The standard of intelligence we acquire differentiates us from the rest of the species living on Earth. Even among this branded species called Homo sapiens, which means wise man in Latin, this is at different levels yet consists of the same components such as recognition, identification, evaluation, seeking of solutions through experience, and application. The special abilities people own such as creativity, problem solving, decision-making, adaptation, and reasoning are outputs of this instant yet complex and indeed unique characteristic, which is said in a single word, Intelligence.
But in this modern world of advancement, technology which removed the boundaries of nations, which made the far closer, which made the complex simpler, which made the hard easier, and indeed the lazy, the lazier has conquered all aspects of this globe without sparing a single one. Starting from the empty space millions of miles away up to the core of earth crashing the crust, technology has played and is playing a vital part in continuing its role to the unforeseen future and beyond as well. This advancement, which has spread in such a wide range did not miss the master of existing life in between this sky and Earth too, Humans! Just spare a minute to think whether you are able to figure out a single instance where you do not associate technology into your life in this fast and competitive race. Well, if you do then you are at the back end of the game, my friend! As mentioned before, the intelligence we acquire is what makes us superior than the rest of the livings, which has now been mastered by this technology resulting in the invention of Artificial Intelligence (AI).
This includes cognitive functions of the intellect of human beings namely, recognizing, understanding, and problem solving as mentioned before. Artificial Intelligence though said in two words; its capabilities are definitely out of count.
Let us get onto the practical life under the roof of development. What do you spend your time most with? Your answers may vary here such as family, friends, pets, those traditional leisure activities we use to write in our essays under the topic ‘My Hobby’ back then in primary school which included a collection of stamps, drawing, painting, poetry, singing, dancing, and so on goes the list, and many more other things we may say as a habit but they too somewhere somehow is linked to this modern advancement. But, the well-known, yet untold truth is that for the majority it is spent with that glaring screen that brings the world into your palms. You have all those needed and not apps filling that storage in which artificial intelligence is at the core. Let us go down one by one. Instagram, we might have accepted one or two accounts of cake makers just because they were of our friends’ and from the very next day onwards, we will be having all sorts of cake account suggestions we never knew existed. Like the minds of our ever-loving neighbours, AI has been watching at what we were doing silently and then came up with their suggestions despite we are in need of that or not. Moving on to the search screen in it, something we watched once or twice is noticed and understood that it is our preference and recommended more of that particular category like a friend of ours would do. It is the same case in Facebook and Youtube.
You know that famous saying ‘A friend’s friend is a friend’ right? Even if you did not well, these apps knew it very well and did not forget to remind us via ‘people you might know’ as our beloved aunts and grandmas would do on occasions. Apart from jokes, just imagine how careful we are analyzed and they are organized in approaching us! All our relevant data that even we might have forgotten, is stored and shown so often. Think of a chess game versus the computer. The opponent is just a machine but wins over us. How come that machine reacts so cleverly to our moves that too in a game man invented initially. How well is that programmed! This is Artificial Intelligence. Look into the commercial world. Computer integrated manufacturing systems which have control over the entire production process, autonomous cars or simply addressed as robotic-cars which needs no driver as it is sensitive to the environment and navigates independently, the Siri App which responds on voice recognition, and many more examples for AI is brought live today which has replaced the need of humans.
Yes, it is true! It is true that there are gains through this. That list is well fed into the minds of all of us. But you know, there is always this ‘But’ which reminds us of the opposite. It is fascinating to see how these devices of artificial intelligence have replaced so many characters in our life and even eradicated or mitigated the interaction, which was once considered essential especially by a traditional community such as Sri Lanka. Mom does not come to wake you up in the morning, but your alarm does. You do not fight with your sister or brother to watch your favourite program, instead, you lock yourself up in your room and watch it on your smart device. You do not decide what to eat, your little app suggests you what is best. After lose and replacement of people here we are heading to the next level which is losing ourselves, all isolated with something which is just pretending to be or is imitating the human intellect. Then again, we are ended up in a robotic era. These robots are in the places where years ago men stood for their living. They comprise human vision, touch, understandability, and sometimes even simple decision makings. They do ease work but also do they take away them from us. With all these advancements, what might be the reason that we are still in charge of this planet?
EMOTIONS! That is the only aspect this artificial intelligence has not yet succeeded to the fullest. This what differentiated us from animals to an extent is now differentiating us from these robots or should I say from artificial intelligence. Let it be the positives; happiness, joy, pleasure or the negatives; sadness, disappointment, annoyance and so on are still unique to us, Humans. We are still held tight together because of these emotions and are held from not being fully captured because these are not yet being included in that list of imitations. You would never get that satisfaction or consolation you feel by speaking to Alexa or any other Robot. And that is a fact! Neither of them would smile in your happiness nor shed at least a tear or two at your grief. Then again comes the ‘But’, but for how long? ‘The Today’ was once ‘The Unknown Tomorrow’. Similarly, ‘The Unknown Tomorrow’ would someday become ‘The Today’. So the question is what are we going to do? Are we going to go ahead with this flow? Are we going to let them reach our hearts just like they did to our minds? Or, hold tight to who we are as the Humans we are supposed to be than the puppets of our very own creations!
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