We've collectively talked about the potential negative outcomes of an AI-powered era. Ranging from speculated job losses to physical bodily threats from weaponized AI.
And while objectively speaking, these are valid “concerns,” I do also think that we may be leaning too heavily on the bad effects that could ensue as AI dominates major fields through continual developments.
AI is a piece of tech, and historically, most products of technological developments often have associated risks of being used for harm or generally to carry out tasks not originally intended or designed for. At the end of the day, what matters most is quite frankly determining if the ratio between usefulness and harm of a certain tech reveals the former to be the larger outcome, in which case, makes the tech out to be worth investing in.
If artificial intelligence has potential to bring more value than harm to our world, then it's essentially worth enabling. Just as we see a future in crypto and blockchain technology, despite current times revealing the ecosystem to be mostly grift infested.
What Is The Knowledge Gap?
A knowledge gap is the difference between what is known and what needs to be known in a particular subject, field, or situation. It can exist at an individual level (a person lacking information), an organizational level (a company needing expertise), or a societal level (public understanding lagging behind scientific advancements). Identifying knowledge gaps helps guide research, education, and decision-making.
On the surface, a knowledge gap sounds like a simple measure of who knows that stars exist and who doesn't, but what it really is, is who truly understands the stars and who doesn't.
One could be walking down the street and overhears a conversation about a certain topic and suddenly, they are aware of something that was said. This, most of the time, is not valuable knowledge. It's factually just a rumour, initially, that could be lies or simply misrepresentated or delivered.
Being truly knowledgeable is about knowing beyond the surface area of anything or what's otherwise referred to as “common knowledge” of things.
If we look at fields like Quantum Biology, it will interest you to know that speculatively speaking, only 1 in 8 million people posses deep expertise in said field. This essentially means that less than 1,500 people are conversant with the subject on the ranks of expertise.
Certainly many things could play a role in this vast uninformed population, for instance, generally not having an interest, but, that is not exactly the point.
The point is, AI offers an opportunity to be able to actually access “knowledge” with minimal cost at that.
The Age of Widespread Productivity
I think a lot of jobs will be lost to AI but I also imagine a lot of fresh human talents will ensue because of the very same AI.
Search has been a great tool for humans to gather information on specific topics for years, but it's slow and sometimes hard to navigate.
The integration of AI as an information platform changes the game completely. People can go from surfing the entire web to learn something to getting a personalized learning guide and schedule cutting through major direct sources.
We save time, attension, and cost in the process and effective improve productivity. With the amount of knowledge one can access at a much faster rate, we're bound to experience new levels of creativity because as humans, we are bound to build atop past works, plus the economic environment will not really support otherwise.
With AI replacing workers, people will have to pivot, fast! and the same technology that will put them out of work, will be what they need to find fresh markets to insert themselves.
The age of abundance awaits?