Kai-Fu Lee is a Taiwanese-born American businessman and writer, considered one of the world’s leading experts on artificial intelligence (AI). Graduated in Computer Science from Columbia University, he obtained his doctorate from Carnegie Mellon University where, as part of his thesis, he developed what is considered the first independent speech recognition system: Sphinx. He has worked for some of the most important companies in the sector such as Apple, SGI, Microsoft or Google, where he developed his career as president of the company’s subsidiary in China. In 2009 he founded Sinovation Ventures, a venture capital fund aimed at developing the next generation of Chinese high-tech companies. He is also the author of seven books that have become bestsellers in China and has more than fifty million followers on social media.
Just a few weeks ago, before COVID-19 erupted with virulence, Lee was in Madrid presenting his book Superpowers of artificial intelligence . Yes, they are not mistaken, those superpowers are the United States and China. In the book, Kai-Fu Lee calls on both countries to accept the great responsibility that comes with holding such significant technological power and warns us that due to these unprecedented progress, great changes will take place much sooner than we all thought. Many experts already say that AI will have devastating effects for manual jobs, but Lee predicts that office jobs will also take a heavy hit. Superpowers of Artificial Intelligence provides a clear description of which jobs will be affected and when, which ones can be improved thanks to AI and, most importantly, how we can bring solutions to some of the most profound changes in human history, which are about to arrive.
The wisdom of cancer
In September 2013, Lee himself was diagnosed with stage IV lymphoma. In an instant, he says, his world of mental algorithms and personal achievements fell apart. None of those things could save him, or provide him with comfort and meaning. Like so many people forced to suddenly face their own mortality, fear for the future and deep regret for the way he had lived his life washed over him. However, the author of the book took advantage of this personal confrontation with death, as he defines it, to reorganize his priorities and change his way of seeing life. And he points out that “I stopped seeing my life as an algorithm that is optimized to influence.” But at the same time he defined that he had to build the future on the thinking capacities of AI and the love of human beings. “If we can create this synergy, we can harness the undeniable power of artificial intelligence to generate prosperity while embracing our essential humanity.”
Is there room for humanity in a world run by intelligent machines? “If robots do everything, what will we do then?” That was the question a preschooler asked renowned artificial intelligence expert Kai-Fu Lee, and the book you are holding is his answer. Because when it comes to understanding the future of artificial intelligence, we are all like curious children: full of questions we cannot answer and continually trying to peer into the future. We all want to know what AI automation will mean for our jobs and how it will affect our goals in life. Artificial Intelligence Superpowers explores these questions and offers solutions to the changes that this new era of technology will bring. The future of artificial intelligence is here and we must learn to adapt if we want to survive.
Some excerpts from the work
“Part of the reason it’s so difficult to predict the end of the AI story is because it’s not just a story about machines. It is also a story about human beings, people with free will that allows them to make their own decisions and shape their own destinies ”.
“I am not an oracle who can perfectly predict our future AI, but by analyzing these questions I can bring my experience as an artificial intelligence researcher, technology executive and now a venture capitalist, both in China and the United States. My hope is that this book sheds some light on how we got here, and also inspires new conversations about where we are going from now on. “
“What the latest advances in AI really represent is the application of the incredible capabilities of pattern recognition and deep learning prediction in different areas, such as diagnosing a disease, issuing an insurance policy, conducting a automobile or the translation of a Chinese phrase into readable English. They do not signify rapid progress towards ‘general AI’ or any other similar advancement at the level of deep learning. This is the era of implementation, and companies that want to benefit from this period of time will need talented entrepreneurs, engineers and production managers. “
“Americans treat search engines like Yellow Pages, a tool to simply find specific information. Chinese users used them as if they were a shopping center, a place where they can take a look at a variety of products, try on each one of them and, finally, choose to buy something ”.
The jobs dilemma and AI
“Beyond the direct loss of jobs, artificial intelligence will exacerbate global economic inequality. By empowering robots with the power of sight and the ability to move autonomously, AI will revolutionize the manufacturing industry, bankrupting third-world sweatshops filled with armies of low-wage workers. By doing so, you will eliminate the bottom rungs of the economic development ladder. It will deprive poor countries of the opportunity to boost their economic growth through low-cost exports, the only proven route that has lifted countries like South Korea, China and Singapore out of poverty. The large populations of young workers that were once the greatest asset of poor countries will become a net and potentially destabilizing liability. Without a way to start the development process, poor countries will stagnate while AI superpowers will take off . “
“In ten or twenty years we will be technically capable of automating between forty and fifty percent of the jobs in the United States […]. This – and I cannot stress it enough – does not mean that the country will face an unemployment rate of 40 to 50 percent. The social frictions, regulatory constraints and inertia of yesteryear will greatly slow down the real rate of job losses. In addition, new jobs will be created on the fly, positions that may offset part of these AI-induced losses. “
“Few quality studies have been carried out on the impact of automation in the Asian giant, but the general opinion holds that the Chinese people will be much more affected, with intelligent robots that will end a golden era for workers in the” factory of the world ”[…]. Experts, such as Martin Ford, author of the book ‘The Rise of Robots’, argue that this large base of routine manual labor could turn China into “ground zero of economic and social disruption caused by the rise of robots.” .
“The winners of this AI economy will marvel at the impressive power of these machines. But the rest of humanity will have to grapple with a much deeper question: When machines can do all the things we do, what will it mean to be human? That’s a question that I had to grapple with personally in the depths of my own crisis of mortality and meaning. That crisis led me to a very dark place, which pushed my body to the limit and challenged my deepest beliefs about what is most important in life. But it was that process – and that pain – that opened my eyes to an alternate ending to the history of human beings and artificial intelligence. “
The coexistence of man with AI
“We are not passive bystanders in the history of AI, we are its authors. This means that the values that underpin our visions for an AI future could well become self-fulfilling prophecies. If we tell ourselves that the value of human beings resides solely in their economic contribution, then we will act accordingly ”.
“ Education is the best long-term solution to the AI-related employment problems we will face. Previous millennia of progress have demonstrated the incredible ability of human beings, both to innovate technically and to adapt to those innovations, empowering us for new types of work. But the scale and speed of the changes ahead will not give us the luxury of relying solely on educational improvements to help us keep up with the changing demands of our own inventions. “
“I foresee the emergence of an entrepreneurial ecosystem that will consider job creation in the humanistic tertiary sector as a good in itself. You will direct the money to human-centered service projects that can grow and hire large numbers of people: lactation consultants for postnatal care, trainers specializing in youth sports, collectors of family oral histories, nature guides in parks nationals or conversation partners for the elderly ”.
“ I don’t want to live in a society divided into tech castes, where the AI elite lives in a cloistered world of almost unimaginable wealth, relying on minimal handouts to keep the unemployed masses sedated in their place. I want to create a system that provides for all members of the community, but also uses the wealth generated by AI to build a more compassionate, loving, and ultimately humane society. Achieving this result will undoubtedly require creative thinking and complex policy formulation, but often the inspiration that drives this process comes from unlikely places. “
