What is AI?
Artificial intelligence has been around for a long time. So has the hype and the fear mongering. Should we be scared? No, but I think it deserves a serious look because there are some incredible benefits too. I am starting a series specifically so that we can get down to what it really was built for, and that is to help us improve efficiency, automate tedious tasks and optimize productivity.
So let’s start with what AI is. You can google this and with Gemini’s help you can find the following definition:
“AI, or Artificial Intelligence, refers to computer systems that can perform tasks typically requiring human intelligence, such as learning, reasoning, problem-solving, and decision-making. It's a field that uses algorithms, data, and computational power to simulate human intelligence and enable machines to perform tasks that would otherwise require a human.”
Was that helpful? Well sort of. Essentially AI has always been a massive amount of information that we can access to help us learn and make decisions. In more recent times, it has become even more effective and useful as we have been able to parse that data using Natural Language Processing (NLP), meaning we can use our everyday language to ask it questions, like, “What is AI?” In addition, technology advances like Deep Learning help to hunt through this data to get at the core of questions quickly, to get answers in seconds rather than days.
So AI has been around for a long time, but now new advancements are making it more accessible. In addition there are several companies that have invested billions of dollars to bring that technology to the everyday user, speeding up how well it works. However, not all AI models are the same. Each AI model is trained and has access to different data. So which one is the best? I would say that this changes on an almost daily basis. Here is where I am going to assign you a piece of work. Open up google/gemini, or of your other favorite AI companions like ChatGPT, Gemini, Co-Pilot or Claud. Type in: “What are the top 5 AI programs? List each program’s benefits and drawbacks, their cost, and any sources you used to get this information.”
One thing you will always notice with my queries, is that I always want to know where the AI generated this information from. This will always tell me where it is pulling information and I can see if it is favoring a certain type of information or source or even go back to the original source to learn more. The other thing you will notice is that it will give you a caveat. You have not defined anything about the AI program you are looking for. Top 5 used programs, or Dental specific programs, or anything else allows you to shift how it is evaluating “Top”, which is a highly subjective term. AI will always struggle with subjectivity, and grey areas. This is something that I think will change in the future, but you will have to wait until later in this series before we discuss that!
So what’s next in this series? Now that you know what AI is and how it’s evolving, we will look at types of AI models and tools! Don’t even know where to start, reach out to us to get a quick AI consult. How are you using AI and what could your business be doing with it?
