Current Issues

Early in my career as a banker, I remember spending a serious amount of time explaining how a fax machine worked to one of my customers. He did not understand the technology. It seemed to make him angry that documents could be delivered so quickly and without filters. Well, he would likely be completely flummoxed if I was to get him to either understand, or utilize, artificial intelligence. The word itself is a bit anxiety producing. Our intelligence, as humans, seems to belong to us as individuals.  None of us can identically replicate the intelligence of another person.  Their skill set and experiences uniquely belong to them.  That’s where creativity blossoms and individual contributions become so meaningful. During the book writing process my book coach kept encouraging me to “find my voice.”  Well, artificial intelligence is the gathering of many voices. And it appears to be driving all forms of new [...]

Can AI Help You Improve Your Life? There's been so much chatter about potential drawbacks of AI like ChatGPT and Google Bard that many people are overlooking how AI might improve our lives. From automating mundane tasks to performing more efficient internet searches, there are almost limitless applications for these services -- if you know how to get the most out of them. What AI does well. AI is very good at summarizing longer text, proofreading, and translating. Another group of AIs, such as Midjourney, can create pictures and songs based on prompts. What AI doesn't do well (yet). While AI is good at searching its available databases, finding patterns, and providing basic answers, it doesn't have the ability to "think" about what you're asking it. Nuance and context can get lost, as can the need for an emotional response such as empathy or humor. Finally, much of the [...]

While artificial intelligence (AI) is making headlines today, the concept of "thinking machines" can be traced back to ancient philosophers and mathematicians. The phrase artificial intelligence was first used in the mid-20th century, at the dawn of the computer age. Like most transformative innovations throughout history, AI's possibilities have been met with a combination of excitement, skepticism, and fear. What is AI? AI is a branch of computer science that focuses on giving machines or computer-controlled robots the ability to execute intelligent tasks. AI aims to create intelligent machines that can replicate human behavior by programming them to think and learn like people. Is AI a new concept? Many AI applications are new, but the theory and some basic technology have existed for years. Innovators have built on their predecessors' work and brought us to the AI inflection point we are at today. Here's a brief history of AI [...]