Why is A.I. So Scary?

When we think of artificial intelligence, a lot of us think of what we see coming from Hollywood. Movies like the Terminator, War Games and the Matrix color our imaginations to see A.I. as a villain and something to be feared. But it shouldn’t be so scary.

“AI is everywhere in tech right now, said to be powering everything from your TV to your toothbrush. In short, it’s making decisions that affect your life whether you like it or not.” 1

Today we all walk around with A.I. in our pockets (Siri), running our homes (Alexa), giving us directions (Waze), how we watch TV (Netflix) and soon in all of our cars (Waymo). So why the disconnect? What is about the way we use A.I. in our personal lives makes it so easy to use and not nightmare inducing?

At this point in time, we’ve only scratched the surface of examples of A.I. in day-to-day life. Specific industries and hobbies have habitual interaction with A.I. far beyond what’s explored in this book. For example, casual chess players regularly use A.I. powered chess engines to analyze their games and practice tactics, and bloggers often use mailing-list services that use a machine to optimize reader engagement and open-rates. 2

In fact, the applications of artificial intelligence is already so ingrained in what we do every day, it’s just mostly out of sight or at least not staring us in the face. We just have this double standard between what we see as harmless and what we see as a menace.

How will A.I. affect daily life on a grand scale in the near future? Futurist and Wired magazine co-founder Kevin Kelly predicts that, as AI becomes more deeply integrated in our lives, it will become the new infrastructure powering a second industrial revolution. ”The actual path of a raindrop as it goes down the valley is unpredictable, but the general direction is inevitable,” says Kelly — and technology is much the same, driven by patterns that are surprising but inevitable.

This genie is not going back in the bottle. Over the next 20 years, he says, “our penchant for making things smarter and smarter will have a profound impact on nearly everything we do. “Kelly explores three trends in AI we need to understand in order to embrace it and steer its development. “The most popular AI product 20 years from now that everyone uses has not been invented yet,” Kelly says. “That means that you’re not late.” 3

With this in mind, I want to bring things back to ground level and share with you my story about how I got started with artificial intelligence. The idea behind my next book is really to explain to you my path, from where I started with data and technology to where I am at now. As I share my story I will also explain what I’ve seen across hundreds of businesses, and highlight the importance of starting to think about how to use artificial intelligence for massive success.

Daniel Meyer heads Sonic Analytics, an analytics firm with offices in Manila, the San Francisco Bay Area and Ocala, FL. With over 20 years in Big Data, Dan is one of the most sought-after public speakers in Asia and offers big data coaching and analytics training seminars on both sides of the Pacific. Dan has also recently joined the Powerteam International family as a small business analytics resource speaker.

Sonic Analytics(www.sonicanalytics.com) brings big data analytics solutions like business intelligence, business dashboards and data storytelling to small and medium sized organizations looking to enhance their data-driven decision-making capabilities. We also advocate the use of analytics for civic responsibility through training, consulting and education.

As citizens of this great democracy, we need to look at the data (analytics), plan a course of action (strategy) and share our data-driven viewpoints (presentation). This approach to a data savvy work force starts in school. So, we started an internship program to empower our youth to use Analytics, plan Strategy and Present their insights… ASP!

When not training current and future analysts, you can find Dan championing the use of analytics to empower data-driven citizenship by volunteering his expertise with schools and non-profits dedicated to evidence-based social progress like Saint Leo University’s Women in STEAM 2020 Conference.