Chris Rolfs
When I was a child I loved building with Lego. With my parents, they tought me how to put all the different blocks together (I am sure that when I started I just wanted to knock over the walls….). However, I was then soon learning, I was playing and inventing my own buildings each more individual than the last. Now there is no way that back then they could have predicted where that learning would take me or how I would apply it.
Artificial Intelligence isn’t a new concept, throughout the course of history we have taught systems to perform tasks, to have a level of intelligence that allows them to operate and exceed that of the user. Taking the history of calculation, when the abacus was invented it provided an Artificial Intelligence that was greater than the user. When the electronic calculator came along, that enable complex calculations to be performed instantly in the palm of your hand, providing intelligence that could be applied in multiple fields. However, both only provide a level of Artificial Intelligence that is very focussed on calculations, if you asked either of these how is the weather then they wouldn’t know. Intelligence is multifaceted where systems may be brilliant at certain tasks and have not intelligence in others. When considering Artificial Intelligence, we need to consider what part of intelligence it is bringing to the party. So, as we embrace AI that can learn then we need to not constrain it by just replicating human intelligence but encourage it to be different.
We are now entering an era of where systems can learn by adding AI, that they are not just taught to perform a task but that they are given the ability to learn and the freedom to discover new ways. Unfortunately, this doesn’t mean that we can sit back and let the machines do everything, innovation and learning only works where there is interaction. I learnt to use Lego because I had a team with me on my journey testing my ideas along with their own. Without that collaborative approach then I suspect that had I been left to my own devices then I would have soon become bored of the task of building walls.
So, as we embrace the use of learning Artificial Intelligence going forward then it is only when it is embedded as part of a team where it will truly transform our ways of working and innovate our thinking.
Here at Cervus, working as part of a team is key to how we innovate and transform our ways of working both internally and with our customers. We are looking forward to bring Artificial Intelligence as part of the team and seeing where it will take us.
