Boons and Banes of Artificial Intelligence

In an era of science and technology, people nowadays have been accustomed to living with modern technologies which makes life more convenient.  Few examples are those machines that have a special function built in called artificial intelligence (AI). What is artificial intelligence really? How does this function  affect people? What is its advantages and disadvantages?

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the intelligence of machines that react and respond like how an actual human being would. It relieves and helps alleviate the difficulties faced by man. Like other modern technologies, AI has its own advantages and disadvantages that can affect the lives of everyone. Below is the list of advantages and disadvantages of artificial intelligence. 

Advantages:

• Machines that are built with artificial intelligence create less errors than those made by humans since they have a certain algorithm that is more systematic and predictable. Some applications guide humans in their mistakes to achieve fewer errors. For example, a writer application, such as Microsoft Word, has built-in spelling and grammar checking tools that check the content by highlighting or automatically correcting them.
• Difficult and nearly impossible jobs for humans, such as exploring space, digging fuels, and exploring ocean depths, can now be done using robots. Machines are rigid and can adapt to any hostile environments in such a way that their state and functioning can’t be affected while enduring them.
• They can be our personal assistants. Applications, like Google Maps, aid us in locating present location and give us the best and shortest route towards any location. There are other organizations that use avatars to interact with users and give assistance to them. Other computer games also have a computer-controlled bot, with the help of AI, that moves and responds to our plays. 
• They are rational thinkers that have no emotional side; thus, they can think logically and yield the right decision always.
• Since they are machines, they don’t have the vocabulary “break”. They can function and endlessly perform the same work without stopping.

Disadvantages:

• Due to the intricate processes, creating complex machines with artificial intelligence requires huge costs. Repairing them also demands high costs since it requires hefty troubleshooting in dealing with complicated algorithms on software programs. 
• Machines act programmed and can’t adapt to change on their own. They are only machines, so they can’t alter their responses by themselves in every changing circumstance. Therefore, they have to be frequently updated to adapt to every situation.
• As machines can do nearly everything that human beings can, they can potentially replace humans with their tasks leading to unemployment. It also makes humans highly dependent on machines that could affect their mental capabilities and could lead them to laziness.
• With machines having no emotional side, this can also be a disadvantage since having emotions is also essential in upholding moral values and creativity. They can always take the right decision based on their program, but they can’t judge if it is conventionally right or wrong. 

It should be understood that artificial intelligence has benefits and risks, as well. Their beneficial effects are what most people look for, but we must weigh first its risks before deploying it in a massive scale. Machines can be used to overcome the limitations of human beings. We can see that they indeed have made our lives a lot easier. But we have to bear in mind that we are the ones that create them;  we must strive not to be enslaved by them. Everything is always okay when used appropriately.

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