Everything Effects Everything

Everything Effects Everything

 - The weight of Artificial Intelligence (AI) is growing everyday even if we do not see it. The use of AI goes back years before most had ever heard the term AI. Slowly AI has been ingrained into our lives. It has become our helper, guide or unseen force that pushes us without us noticing that we are being pushed. AI is a dependence that we do not feel we are dependent upon. It is such an unseen force in our lives that if lost we would not be able to recover without it.

In short, AI is a heavy part of our day and of our life and we don’t realize it. So, how did this happen and when?

Let’s look back in history to see where the first seeds of AI were planted. For me, I can think of several television shows and movies that first start the direction for AI. There were the shows Lost in Space with the Robinson Robot and Star Trek with Mr. Spock, who seemed to have been born with AI. These shows started the imagination of what to expect in the future. Then there was the movie, 2001 a Space Odyssey with HAL 9000 computer who was able to react faster and smarter than the two astronauts. HAL 9000 was an early example of evil AI on film. HAL calmly murmurs the classic “I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that,” to Commander David Bowman who is locked out of the spacecraft. This was a watershed moment. Suddenly, homicidal computers were within our grasp, no longer confined to the imaginations of science fiction writers.

Fast forward to present times. According to Harvard, we make 35,000+ decisions per day. An increasing number of those decisions are made through AI. Just like IBM Big Blue playing Chess, we let Amazon AI pick our clothes and match them for us. Sometimes it is hard to notice. On Amazon, they found that using AI to make additional recommendations has increased their sales of those recommendations by 37%. When you pick out a shirt to buy and right away you see the pants, belt, shoes, and tie that goes with your shirt, it makes it simple for the online retailer to upsell to us.

When you go to Netflix to watch a movie or show at the end, they are using AI to select the next show for you. This makes it so easy that you do it without searching for anything else. TV and movies are picked out for you. It won’t be long before they will be able to personally select the commercials and ads you see by using AI to target you directly. This will be based on your choices and compared against people with similarities to have you see and buy without thinking about it.

AI has made taking your vacations and trips much easier. Buy a plane ticket and see hotels, rental cars, and other opportunities to spend money plus suggestions to start planning your next trip. All of this is based on your past choices, what similar people choose and the predictive reasoning of AI. As you fly, Air Traffic Controllers use AI for predicting outcomes of the planes in the air. If you’re travelling and want to find a restaurant, leave it to AI. In fact, AI can even pair the food and wine for each course that you dine on.

If you want to eat at home, then you can do so with your kitchen connected to the Internet of Things (IOT). Your refrigerator will use sensors for checking what you are out of and ordering it for you. Your order can be delivered with Smart Locks on your door. This will allow only the delivery person to bring in and put away the items that your refrigerator has ordered for you. Are you not sure of what to make? AI can select recipes for you based on your likes, time of day, day of the week, special occasion, dietary needs, and how many people. Through IOT, a search can be done of what ingredients are in the kitchen. Then AI can select your recipe based on what’s on hand.

Already on the roads are self-driving cars that use AI. Soon your car will be able to start up with the heater or A/C on, depending on the weather, before you even walk out to the garage. Your AI driven car will then drop you at work and self-drive, self-park, self-fuel, self-fund as an Uber, while at work or at home. Thinking ahead, there is no reason for your car to waste time in the garage. AI can have it self-driving as an Uber throughout the night. What car could you have if your car pays for your car loan?

In the Metaverse there are no boundaries to what great things can be done by AI. We’re talking about things that can only be done in the virtual world, with no physical world restrictions: sports, travel, contests, living beyond our means, meeting others, Space adventures and historic reliving. I am getting goosebumps with the infinite possibilities of AI in the Metaverse.

In other words, AI is in everything. Perhaps it is everything. It affects everything. Indeed, it effects everything.

The question that I will leave you with is simple. How will AI enhance our lives so that we are able to experience more? The danger is more of us may become hopeless couch potatoes!