As technology continues to evolve at an astonishingly fast clip, there is some growing concerns about the potential of AI or artificial intelligence to completely replace humans in the workforce. While some believe that AIs will eventually be able to perform all tasks currently done by humans, others argue that there are certain areas where AI will never be able to fully replace humans.
20 years ago, we were doing encoding work for images that were manually scanned, then the OCR technology came in and instead of doing the pretty laborious task of manually keying-in textual data, we let technology do the work. It literally saved hundreds of hours of work, improved turnaround times and quality of life, and in the process help saved people's fingers. The concerns people have with the emerging technology back then was that it would replace workers who were all doing the encoding task. Yes, the encoding task disappeared but new tasks, roles and opportunities surfaced, and processes became much more efficient. This did not lead to the massive displacement of workers. The workforce was, in fact, even augmented.
That's the same with AI and future technologies. Roles will eventually change but not at the expense of human workers. We have AIs now that act like your own personal assistant. AIs can write an article for you, blog, write music, sitcom/movie scripts, even compose a poem or tell a joke (I'm not joking). Some can even write a whole novel utilizing various AIs in combination with another. AIs can also write code in any language, act as your math tutor and help solve multiple mathematical equations, and create a marketing plan. Some AIs can even help you pass the Bar Exams! (there will come a time when AIs will probably be implanted directly to our brains that will allow us to process information better than Einstein, Galileo, Rene Descartes, Johann Goethe, Isaac Newton and all the smartest people combined)
Yes, these AIs are quite powerful but they will never be able to replace the work of humans. Tasks such as problem-solving, decision-making, and creative thinking will be difficult for AI systems to perform. This kind of tasks require the special ability to understand and interpret complex situations, which is something that AI systems are not currently capable of (they will probably be able to do this later on but I hope they do not). AIs are also pretty emotionless, which means if you're looking for a virtual companion whom you expect to fully understand you, play possum or gossip behind your back, gobble all your pulutan (sorry I do not know how to translate this) while ordering stacks of beer that they couldn't pay, then AIs cannot help you with that.
Another reason why AI will never be able to fully replace humans is that AI systems are limited by the data they are trained on. This means that they may not be able to adapt to new situations as easily as humans can. In many cases, AI systems need to be retrained in order to perform well in new environments, which can be time-consuming and costly. For that you need new inputs from humans for this to work.
In a nutshell, while AI has the potential to drastically improve the quality of our lives and work, it is unlikely that it will ever be able to fully replace us. While AI may be able to perform certain tasks more efficiently than humans, there are many areas where human intuition and creativity are still essential. As such, it is important that we continue to invest in AI technology, educate and learn new skills that will help prepare us for the future and then get a good night sleep.
