The Age of Artificial Intelligence has Arrived

The Age of Artificial Intelligence has Arrived

The Industrial Era took humans beyond the physical capabilities that we once thought were possible. This was something that was so important to our society and created opportunities we never thought were once possible. The age of AI in a whole new ball game that we never thought could ever happen. Well, if you like it or not, it is here and it is about to be huge.

AI, short for artificial intelligence, uses the coding of machines that can teach itself. Similar to the Industrial Era, AI is going to breach a barrier that we once thought was unbreachable. The industrial Era was with physical power, AI is going to be with our minds.

The video did not make AlphaGo beating legendary Go player Lee Sedol in a match as big of a deal as they needed it to be. 

Go is a board game that originated in China over 4,000 years ago. It is one of the oldest board games in human history. While it may seem like a simple game, it is one of the most complex. There are more moves/situations in the game of Go that you can encounter than there are atoms in the universe. Think about that for one second.

Other companies have tried to create algorithms to create online versions of the game of Go, yet none were very good and none of them could even come close to beating a professional. 

This is because none of these programs before had used AI like AlphaGo did. AlphaGo is a machine that uses AI to learn from hundreds of thousands of games from both professional Go players and amateur Go players to understand what is the best possible move for every situation it is put in.

Lee Sedol is one of the greatest Go players to ever live. He is a 9-dan ranked professional, the highest rank you can achieve in the game of Go. This rank is only given to the best professional players in the world. Lee Sedol has won 18 world titles and is regarded as a celebrity on par with the best athletes in Korea.  

Nobody expected AlphaGo to beat Lee Sedol, but when AlphaGo did, it showed humanity that machines now have the capabilities to learn and create at a level that we never thought could be achieved.

AlphaGo will never stop learning the game of Go, it will only get better through time and may never be beaten again. 

Having a machine that can learn by itself is not just going to affect people playing a board game, it is going to affect everybody. Self driving cars and trucks have already been seen on the road and are going to eliminate any jobs that involve a person operating a vehicle. 

The world of AI is going to see innovations that we never would have thought of, but with every innovation means countless jobs that will eventually be lost. While that may increase production it will only benefit the people at the top. Creating a bigger wealth gap than our country already has right now.

There are other factors that many people do not think about when it comes to this new age of AI. Every job that is lost to a machine means one less person that is working. Machines do not pay taxes. This will cause the standard of living to become even worse as well.

AI may be something that exponentially changes the way that the world works which is a very scary thing. Seeing all of the jobs that will be lost in this new world makes it look like the rich are going to get richer and the poor will remain poorer. We need to make sure that we implement AI in a way that can better society as a whole.