Tag: AI
In 1967, Lynn Margulis, a young biologist, published a paper that challenged more than a hundred years of evolutionary theory. It proposed that millions of years ago, the eukaryotes emerged not from competition, as neo-Darwinism asserts, but from collaboration.
Margulis’ research showed how single-celled lifeforms working together created an entirely new organism that became the foundation of all advanced life on earth. This was an inflection point in the development of evolutionary biology, shifting the scientific and cultural narrative away from “survival of the fittest” towards “survival of the most cooperative.”
Though competition contributes to better individual or organizational performance, it...
In my previous post I argued that if Canada wants to succeed with its AI-focused innovation agenda, it should also be at the forefront of 5G innovation and development. Canada could get ahead in the global 5G race not by being the first to 5G, but by being the first to roll out 5G in the right way - addressing cybersecurity, linking development of AI and 5G, addressing regulatory and policy prerequisites, etc.
Canada could leap ahead in development of both, 5G and AI, by tackling them collaboratively rather than in parallel but separately as is the case now. One...
Canada has been investing in machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) for longer than most of the industrialized world. Dr. Geoff Hinton of Google helped ignite the field of graphics processing unit (GPU) deep learning at the University of Toronto. Then he became chief scientific advisor to the Vector Institute, which in collaboration with the University, aims to produce the largest number of deep learning AI graduates and innovators globally. Meanwhile, Montreal, Quebec prides itself as the birthplace of AI. It’s the home of computer scientist Yoshua Bengio, who is another pioneer of AI technology. Hundreds of AI researchers...
If you've ever been to an expensive restaurant and ordered a familiar dish like, say, lasagna, but received a plate with five different elements arranged in a way that does not at all resemble what you know as lasagna, then you have probably tasted deconstructionism.
This approach to cuisine aims to challenge the way our brain makes associations, to break existing patterns of interpretation and, in so doing, to release unrealized potential. If the different elements work together harmoniously, it should be the best lasagna you've ever tasted.
So it is with 5G.
In principle, the 5th Generation network is deconstructed. Firstly,...
In 1956, at a workshop on the campus of Dartmouth College, in Hanover, New Hampshire, the field of artificial intelligence (AI) was born. Attendants were buoyant. MIT cognitive scientist Marvin Minsky was quoted as saying, "Within a generation the problem of creating 'artificial intelligence' will substantially be solved."
This prediction turned out to be over zealous, but Minsky and his colleagues believed it wholeheartedly. What, then, is different today? What makes the current dialogue about AI more relevant and believable? How do we know that this is not another case of humans over estimating the development of technology?
For one thing,...
In 2013, George F. Young and colleagues completed a fascinating study into the science behind starling murmurations. These breathtaking displays of thousands – sometimes hundreds of thousands – of birds in a single flock swooping and diving around each other, look from a distance like a single organism organically shape-shifting before the viewer’s eyes.
In their research article, Young et al reference the starling’s remarkable ability to “maintain cohesion as a group in highly uncertain environments and with limited, noisy information." The team discovered that the birds’ secret lay in paying attention to a fixed number of their neighbors –...
Recent events have confirmed that the cyber realm can be used to disrupt democracies as surely as it can destabilize dictatorships. Weaponization of information and malicious dissemination through social media pushes citizens into polarized echo chambers and pull at the social fabric of a country. Present technologies enhanced by current and upcoming Artificial Intelligence (AI) capabilities, could greatly exacerbate disinformation and other cyber threats to democracy.
Robert Kagan in his recent Post essay, “The strongmen strike back,” insightfully states:
"What we used to regard as the inevitable progress toward democracy, driven by economics and science, is being turned on its...
Cybersecurity strategies need to change in order to address the new issues that Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) bring into the equation. Although those issues have not yet reached crisis stage, signs are clear that they will need to be addressed – and soon – if cyberattackers are to be prevented from obtaining a decided advantage in the continuing arms race between hackers and those who keep organizations’ systems secure.
ML and AI can magnify existing vulnerabilities and open the door to new attack strategies. At the same time, though, they offer new tools to help organizations secure...
To remain competitive, organizations will increasingly have to innovate. As the speed of innovation increases, disrupting whole sectors, competitive intelligence, market intelligence even a bit of futurism will become essential skills.
Leaders will have to stay informed not only of macro trends in their industry but also in technology in general. And they will have to do more than merely report their findings to appropriate people higher in the organization. AI can easily do that. Instead, they will also have to develop a sense for how those trends could impact their organization, so they can assess how to get the...
It’s almost impossible to turn around nowadays without finding another article predicting the impact that AI and other emerging technologies – the so-called Fourth Industrial Revolution – will have on our future. It’s one of the hottest topics being discussed by forward-thinking business leaders today. And well it should be. The fact that we are on the cusp of dramatic change in how business, workplaces and our very lives are carried out is inescapable.
Some writers picture a utopia where humankind is freed from manual labor, where machines do all the work and all people receive a universal basic income...
Canada’s rankings in innovation has lagged that of other peer nations for decades despite government efforts to address this issue. Considering its success in developing research programs at its universities, its mediocre rankings overall in technology development is disappointing. Those programs alone have not been enough to translate into entrepreneurial innovation.
A 2017 C.D. Howe Institute study points out that, even though Canadians have been at the forefront of breakthroughs in emerging technologies, in many cases, the chief beneficiaries of those breakthroughs have been other nations’ economies. Canada needs to take a stronger role in building an environment in which...
If you’ve read the many predictions about the future of AI, you’ve likely found them to be wildly different. They range from AI spelling doom for humanity, to AI ushering in Golden Age of peace, harmony and culture, to AI producing barely a blip on society’s path toward ever-greater technological achievement.
Those three views – dystopian, utopian and organic – present issues we need to consider as we move deeper toward an AI-integrated future. Yet they also contain exaggerations and false assumptions that we need to separate from reality.
The Dystopian View of the AI Future
Those with a dystopian view of...
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is becoming ever more important, and not just in automating repetitive, manual labor jobs. Increasingly, it also enters the realm of highly trained knowledge workers. New. AI-driven world will require different skills.
Systems like IBM Watson augment the expertise of tax preparers, lawyers, doctors and many other highly trained professionals. Corporate executives use AI’s ability to gather, analyze and run extensive simulations on data to help them make better-informed decisions. The applications for AI appear almost unlimited.
The implications are clear. AI will reshape not just operations, but also all other aspects of the business world. So, how...
AI leaders must adapt to the changing culture as young workers enter the job market with expectations strikingly different from the ones that leaders traditionally have encountered. These changes within their own business culture are not, though, the only culture changes to which leaders will have to adapt.
AI and other emerging technologies are accelerating the process of globalization. For example, as 3D printers become more prevalent, manufacturers will sell designs rather than finished products. Breaking into new markets won’t be a multiyear, investment-heavy effort. Emerging technologies will greatly reduce logistics requirements and expand old, geographically limited markets into one,...
Where AI, robots, IoT and the so-called Fourth Industrial Revolution are taking us, and how we should prepare for it are some of the hottest topics being discussed today. Perhaps the most striking thing about these discussions is how different people’s conclusions are.
Some picture a utopia where machines do all work, where all people receive a universal basic income from the revenues machines generate and where, being freed from a need to work for wages, all people devote their time to altruism, art and culture. Others picture a dystopia where a tiny elite class uses their control of AI...