Jacob's A.I. Journal is a collection of articles on A.I. topics from Impower.ai's Principal ML/AI Architect, Jacob Haning
A.I. in Business
[Gated] The invasion of Ukraine has prompted militaries to update their arsenals—and Silicon Valley stands to capitalize
The war is acting as a catalyst to many developed nations, signaling they are ready to spend a lot of money in non-traditional places. NATO is spending $1B, Germany plans to spend half a billion, and the UK is launching a new AI strategy for defense. All announced since the invasion of Ukraine. I find the most interesting part of these strategies is that they each have a startup or investment focus. Governments typically turn to familiar firms who have massive contracts and relationships spanning decades when awarding this type of funding. However, they are noticing the difficulties of implementing AI at enterprise scale outside of the realm of big tech and like the market are realizing that a few motivated individuals, focused on a single outcome are capable of disrupting entrenched technologies. If this trend continues, we can expect to see more venture capital funds from the state driving advances in AI. A primary discussion in this MIT article, however, is whether or not that will benefit society or push it further into chaos. Startups are notorious for choosing speed over ethical introspection and when working on potential lethal military AI the stakes couldn't be higher.
A.I. in Art and Science
Sudowrite is helping fiction author's write their stories causing a lot of controversy
As AI continues to aid in the creation of art, or in some cases generate it itself, we continue to wrestle with our feelings as a society about sharing what was believed to be a uniquely human characteristic. Sudowrite differs from other AI writing tools that help with business copy and emails in that it is designed to aid fiction writers. Novelists paste in a portion of their work and the tool suggests edits and rewrites as well as possible plot twists or character conflicts. If you're reading this newsletter then you are one of the readers, I try to keep coming back each month. As this article describes, it can be grueling to generate enough content at a pace that keeps fans loyal when so many other choices are available. For writers this can be an unsustainable task. This may be a question we never collectively answer, but we will need to wrestle with our insatiable love of content overload and our prideful need to be the only entity capable of creating it.
This conversation continues to be top of mind in the world of art. For more on that topic check out this article. Is DALL-E's art borrowed or stolen
A.I. in Healthcare
Doctors using AI catch breast cancer more often
I've been sharing my thoughts on advances in AI and Healthcare for a while now and a few themes have emerged. First: Data Privacy. This continues to be a growing concern in every aspect of AI growth, but healthcare data seems to have more importance to everyday users. Second: Fear. Fear over lost jobs and fear over missed diagnoses among others. Fear is a significant driver and can often lead to difficult situations but should not be mistaken for caution which is a necessary counterbalance to speed. Third: Optimism. The opportunity to improve people's lives is a powerful draw and this article describes just how effective AI can be in that fight. When implemented as a tool under the direction of physicians AI systems can improve and accelerate patient outcomes beyond what was previously possible. We need more practitioners that place outcomes over profits and more physicians who embrace the technology.
Ethics
Computer vision researchers disregard for ethical implications - Not my job
A growing divide between the excitement around mathematical breakthroughs and the way those advances are put into practice is causing growing concern. Recently there was a decision in New Orleans to move forward with an ordinance that would allow currently banned technologies like facial recognition and predictive policing. The city has a vast and rapidly expanding network of surveillance cameras feeding a real-time law enforcement crime center. More than any other, I believe computer vision technology will have the biggest impact on everyday life. We must, as a society, demand, at the very least, an introspective approach from the research community on the possible implications of their advances.
The mere existence of deepfakes erodes our ability believe in any digital content.
As AI generated synthetic media continues to evolve and expand, the public reaction to it changes as well. However, in this article from MIT Technology Review, they take on the idea that it isn't just the synthetic media that's a threat but its effect on our ability to believe in any digital content. Our skepticism as a society continues to rise and has been shown to deepen our cognitive bias. For example, we're more likely to believe the digital content that supports our position is real and think content of an opposing view has been faked. Eroding public trust is a trend that continues to plague our advancement as a society and it is my sincere hope that AI technologies will help to restore it rather than aid in its demise.
Random
As autonomous cars slowly gain traction autonomous boats may take the reigns.
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