Understanding AI Better
We can only speculate about AI’s future capability.
There are doomsday scenarios where AI gets smarter and smarter, transcends human intervention, and causes catastrophes. There are other theories about how quickly it could accelerate scientific research to benefit humans. We know that it will continue to develop (hopefully at a slower rate than it has since November 2022), but the topic is far too nuanced for any extreme prognosis.
Since AI is driven by tech companies, the energy behind its growth will always be market-driven. Markets are ultimately controlled by people, and those people need AI to be safe along with performing rudimentary tasks such as writing emails and doing specific research (which may have errors). People have created these systems as well as the information they can access. It’s up to us to intervene–or at least to be able to interpret–what AI is telling us and where the information it uses comes from in order to validate it. Until then, we can’t really trust everything it says.
Where is this going and what does it have to do with college applicants? Many students will go beyond using AI for simple tasks like writing high school papers but need to grapple with it at a higher level in college. Even students taking high school Computer Science courses learn little about it. Those inclined to learn more can take advantage of online courses and summer programs.
Two highly-regarded programs are Inspirit AI and Veritas AI, both of which offer mentored research projects. Free courses offered by Coursera or Great Learning offer fewer hands-on opportunities but are a smart way to gain better knowledge.
At the moment, humans control AI–let’s not check our brains to it!
Below are links to some programs and a podcast that delves more deeply into what I’ve discussed here.
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