IBM Explains Buggy Whip to Control Corvettes

January 19, 2017

I love IBM. I enjoy the IBM Watson marketing. I get a kick out of the firm’s saga of declining quarterly revenue. Will IBM make it 19 quarters in a row? I am breathless.

I read “IBM’s Rometty Lays Out AI Considerations, Ethical Principals.” The main idea, as I understand it, is:

artificial intelligence should be used to advance and augment humans not replace them. Transparency of AI development is also necessary.

Since smart software is dependent upon numerical recipes, I am not sure that the many outfits involved in fiddling with procedures, systems, and methods are going to make clear what their wizards are doing. Furthermore, IBM, in my opinion, is a bit of a buggy whip outfit. The idea that a buggy whip can control a bright 18 year old monitoring a drone swarm relying on artificial intelligence to complete a mission. Maybe IBM will equip Watson with telepathy?

The write up explains:

Commonly referred to as artificial intelligence, this new generation of technology and the cognitive systems it helps power will soon touch every facet of work and life – with the potential to radically transform them for the better…As with every prior world-changing technology, this technology carries major implications. Many of the questions it raises are unanswerable today and will require time, research and open discussion to answer.

Okay. What’s DeepMind up to? What about those folks at Facebook, Baidu, Microsoft, MIT, and most of the upscale French universities doing? Are the insights of researchers in Beijing finding their way into the media channel?

Well, IBM is going to take action if the information in the “real” journalistic write up is on the money. Here’s what Big Blue is going to do in its continuing effort to become a plus for stakeholders:

IBM’s systems will augment human intelligence. Sounds good but the direction of some smart software is to make it easy for humans to get a pizza. The digital divide delivers convenience to lots of folks and big paydays to those in the top tier who find a way to sell stuff. Alexa, I need paper towels.
Transparency. Right, that’s a great idea, but how it plays out in the real world is going to be a bit hit and miss. Actually, more miss than hit. The big money folks want to move to “winner take all” plays. Amazon Alexa has partners. Amazon keeps some money as it continues it march to global digital Wal-Mart-ism.
Skills. Yep, the smart software movers and shakers buy promising outfits. Even the allegedly independent folks in Montréal are finding Microsoft a pretty nifty place to work.

Perhaps the folks doing smart software will meet and agree on some rules. Better yet, the US government can legislate rules and then rely on the United Nations or NGOs to promulgate them. Wait. There is a better way. Why not use a Vulcan mind meld?

I understand the IBM has to take the high road, but when a drone swarm makes its own decisions, whipping the rule books may not have much effect. Love those MBA chestnuts like buggy whips.

Stephen E Arnold, January 19, 2017

Written by Stephen E. Arnold · Filed Under AI, Business strategy, IBM Watson

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Stephen E. Arnold monitors search, content processing, text mining and related topics from his high-tech nerve center in rural Kentucky. He tries to winnow the goose feathers from the giblets. He works with colleagues worldwide to make this Web log useful to those who want to go "beyond search". Contact him at sa [at] arnoldit.com. His Web site with additional information about search is arnoldit.com.