What will happen with the democratization of AI?

Even today, in the Reiwa era, the misconception that the development of AI will take away human jobs has still not been dispelled from the world. However, in reality, complete automation of AI is still difficult, and AI is only effective in supporting people.

This is because the more modules that are combined in AI, the more errors accumulate, and the reality is that it is not uncommon for the accuracy to end up being only 50-60%. This is probably a big difference between IT and AI.

On the other hand, if we assume co-creation with people, AI will greatly contribute to improving productivity in highly specialized fields. For example, specialized skills that are handled by a limited number of experts, such as lawyers, accountants, doctors, and architects, can be democratized through AI.

Taking lawyers as an example, if AI can import large amounts of case law data, clients will be able to receive the advice they need through devices such as smartphones without having to make an appointment with a real lawyer. Sho.

Experts are generally rare human resources, and therefore appropriate compensation is required when hiring or contracting them. Therefore, although they may be helpful in highly important cases such as divorce, it is difficult to rely on them in minor cases such as ``I lent 10,000 yen to an acquaintance and they will not get it back.'' It was being done.

However, if such specialized knowledge becomes easily available through AI, it will lead to dramatic cost reductions and the number of users will increase dramatically. From a lawyer's perspective, this means a significant increase in productivity, and from a user's perspective, it leads to lower costs and improved convenience.

The virtuous cycle created by the co-creation of such professionals and AI is called "Expert-in-the-Loop."

What are the "six D's" associated with dramatic evolution?

Singularity University, an educational institution in Silicon Valley, proposes a framework using the "Six Ds" to describe the process by which an important innovation spreads around the world.

The six D's are Digitalization, Deception, Disruption, Dematerialization, Demonetization, and Democratization. The last three are especially important, and if we explain them using the introduction of digital cameras as an example, the flow will be as follows.

First, with the advent of digital cameras, film became unnecessary and the cost of shooting became free (non-profitable). As a result, film cameras disappeared from the market, and with smartphones equipped with cameras, digital cameras themselves disappeared (dematerialization). As a result, digital cameras became popular and everyone could use them (democratization).

One example of this benefit is that medical institutions in poor countries that lack funds, technology, and human resources can now easily receive diagnostic imaging.

Butterfly Network, a venture company attracting attention as a unicorn company in the field of digital medicine, has developed the world's first portable whole-body ultrasound device, an image diagnostic solution that can be easily introduced even in the field where funds and specialized skills are lacking. We offer

What is noteworthy is that an algorithm analyzes images taken from a smartphone camera, and if the position of the probe (exploration part) is inappropriate, a mechanism has been established to detect the defect in real time and issue instructions to the user. thing. Thanks to this, we are able to introduce diagnostic imaging at low cost even in areas with limited human resources, and as a result, we are playing a role in protecting the lives and health of many people.

This is truly the realization of "Expert-in-the-Loop" and a great example of how AI has democratized medical technology.

Utilization of AI advancing in various fields

Similarly, digitization is steadily progressing at construction and civil engineering sites. For example, by using drones, surveying can be done much more labor-savingly than before, and 2D architectural blueprints can be easily converted into 3D.

Additionally, automakers are actually conducting virtual crash tests and collecting data by virtually recreating their development vehicles in digital space.

It goes without saying that this is much safer and cheaper than conducting real crash tests. Behind this is the existence of AI, which accumulates learning data with each experiment and uses it for the next experiment.

Recently, AI has been widely used in the field of vaccine development for the new coronavirus. Exscientia, a leading company in AI drug discovery, has succeeded in significantly shortening the time required for clinical trials by repeating virtual experiments digitally. We are proceeding with the development of vaccines at a speed that was previously impossible.

Given the global pandemic, it is no exaggeration to say that the time has come for AI to save the world.

What is the value of humans in the age of AI?

On the other hand, what are the things that AI is not good at and that only humans can do? That is Abduction (hypothetical reasoning).

Only humans can formulate and verify hypotheses regarding new phenomena. Although AI is good at predicting the future from past data and optimizing existing problems, it cannot innovate from scratch to solve problems.

Let's roughly divide the areas where AI is weak and cannot be abducted into five categories.

First, Creativity. Although it is possible to reproduce Picasso's style using AI, it is only possible if we have the original data of Picasso's works. If Picasso himself did not exist in the first place, it would be impossible for AI to create Picasso-like works on its own.

The same goes for innovation; AI cannot create something new from scratch. In addition, AI is far behind humans in management, which reads and processes people's thoughts from their facial expressions and atmosphere, and hospitality, which executes services with a heart of hospitality.

And the last one is Expert. As mentioned above, lawyers can achieve a certain level of success as long as they have data on past precedents, but on the other hand, when new laws are created, it is difficult to respond immediately. Even if "Expert-in-the-Loop" becomes a reality, AI will still require human support at key points.

Since the areas in which AI is weak are clear, in the future the role of humans will be biased towards these five areas. By that time, ideal co-creation between humans and AI will probably have been achieved, and human working hours will no doubt be significantly shorter than they are now.

Looking at it from a different perspective, in the coming era where the use of AI will continue to advance, we may see a world where demand will be concentrated on human resources who are skilled in these five non-abduction fields.

Cinnamon AI President and CEO Mirai Hirano Serial Entrepreneur. Completed graduate school at the University of Tokyo. Engaged in research on recommendation engines, complex networks, clustering, etc. It was twice selected for the IPA Unexplored Software Creation Project in 2005 and 2006. Founded Naked Technology while still in school. We develop and operate middleware that allows you to develop applications on IOS/ANDROID/flip phones. In 2011, the company was sold to Mixi. Received various domestic and international awards such as ST.GALLEN SYMPOSIUM LEADERS OF TOMORROW, FORBES JAPAN “Entrepreneur Ranking 2020” BEST10, Woman of the Year 2019 Innovative Entrepreneur Award, VEUVE CLICQUOT BUSINESS WOMAN AWARD 2019 NEW GENERATION AWARD . He has also given a keynote speech at AWS SUMMIT 2019, Milken Institute Japan Symposium, 45th Japan-ASEAN Management Conference, Bloomberg THE YEAR AHEAD Summit 2019, etc. Since 2020, he has been appointed as a member of the Cabinet Secretariat IT Strategy Office and a special member of the Cabinet Office Tax Investigation Committee. From 2021, he will serve as an expert member of the Cabinet Office's Economic and Fiscal Policy Council. In her private life, she is a mother of two children.

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