Those with their finger on the pulse of developments in AI will often say that we are living in a ‘second machine age’ – a phrase which evokes the classic Sci-Fi setting in which robots live and work amongst us.
This conception of the future is so rooted in popular culture that the best-known applications of AI are nearly always film scenes made manifest. Think self-driving cars, burger-flipping automatons, and shelf-stacking humanoids.
Yet, this perception of machine learning as a series of robotic gimmicks belies a hugely exciting reality which will come to impact our lives in a more pedestrian sense.
Basically defined as technology that can mimic and augment human functions, AI is on course to transform our societies to the overwhelming benefit of us all.
This transformation will only continue to gain pace - the UK Government and private sector must be ready to seize the opportunity and turn the country’s economic tide.
In my view, the potential of AI to strengthen our education sector, upskill the British workforce, and give people back the gift of time are some of its most promising benefits, a position shared by many of those at the field’s cutting-edge.
Starting with our education and training systems - where bureaucracy often holds back learning - we can leverage AI to inculcate excellence in both.
There are already a number of machine learning tools that identify how students best learn and address gaps in their knowledge, alongside others which streamline marking and feedback.
A broader use of these tools would allow teachers to focus on teaching and provide a tailored learning experience to individual students, regardless of class size.
Though largely untested in our classrooms, AI has already proven its worth to UK manufacturing.
Rolls-Royce, for example, has created an automated tool that can reduce inspection times by 75% and save £100 million in maintenance costs over five years.
Its engineers, having banked these efficiencies, are fully focused on breaking through the next frontier in aerospace technology.
The UK has already established a global reputation for itself in this sphere, producing AI heavyweights such as DeepMind, which was acquired by Google, and Manchester-based Peak AI, which is helping corporations all over the globe to augment and simplify their supply chains. We have the potential to become an AI superpower – but must ensure we harness this potential to the benefit our own workforce.
On a more macro scale, automated, data-driven systems are helping to unravel tangles in global supply chains and enhance the research and development (R&D) processes that they themselves resulted from.
This may all sound like an Elon Musk PR soundbite - a virtuous circle of scientific research driving technological progress which in turn fuels human flourishing. It is, however, the best trodden route to economic development and prosperity. When we have seen rapid growth in standards of living throughout history, technological advancement has been the foundation.
And yet, there are understandable fears in this country and others that AI might put us all out of a job.
The recent excitement about ChatGPT – a programme that requires just a single sentence prompt to write accurate and compelling text or code – quickly morphed into widespread existential angst.
Such pessimism is irrational, for the simple reason that our relationship with AI is and will largely continue to be a symbiotic one.
The potential of AI to strengthen our education sector, upskill the British workforce, and give people back the gift of time are some of its most promising benefits, a position shared by many of those at the field’s cutting-edge.
As Rolls-Royce’s tool, Chat GPT, and educational tech demonstrate, machines need us to prompt and validate them and then bring their findings to life.
An automated programme isn’t going to stand up and present the company’s annual report and then field questions on why the HR team is spending so much money on paper clips.
Instead, AI-driven tools will be at the disposal of the team putting the report together – formatting data, generating summaries, and cross-checking findings against external documents.
If we get this right, the average worker will be saved time and spared the most mundane of tasks.
To be clear, the case study of the annual report does demonstrate that numerous back-office functions will be made obsolete by machine learning. But that does not have to result in a surge in joblessness.
Researchers point out that even as AI adoption has increased at pace over the past ten years, unemployment has not jumped with it. Quite the opposite, as employers in Britain and the US chase workers, rather than the other way round.
But it isn’t just job losses that AI-sceptics point to as an inevitable side effect. History teaches us that paradigm-shifting technological innovation, from the 18th century spinning jenny to the personal computers of the 20th, always provokes fears about a degradation in the quality of work. When Johannes Gutenburg invented the printing press in 1450, the scribes’ guild of Paris lobbied to delay its introduction in the city for twenty years. When it was eventually introduced, the naysayers were silenced by the thousands of new jobs and new efficiencies that it unleashed
So we need to take advantage of this AI revolution – but how?
While Britain may struggle to compete with the world’s superpowers on funding, UK plc. should take encouragement from Rishi Sunak’s support for AI development on these shores. We should, as we so often do, focus on providing a world-class research environment, focused on quality rather than quantity.
The Advanced Research and Invention Agency (ARIA) and AI Council are advising on implementing pro-innovation reforms and investments, but we need to redouble our efforts and make this a significant governmental priority.
The next step is for these efforts to be combined with a rollout of best-in-class AI in our schools, hospitals, and on government-backed training programmes. Yes – we need to force the public sector to innovate and use this new technology to help manage the problems in our public services. Carefully considered, of course, and rigorously tested, but given the space to flourish and change how we work, plan, and think.
For my part, I am chairing the new Regulatory Reform Group, which will advise the government on creating a pro-innovation, pro-investment regulatory framework – an essential step in bolstering the UK’s AI industry. Regulation lies at the heart of this puzzle, setting the terms of how developed our public sector AI systems need to be and steering private sector brilliance towards our national aims.
With Britain buffeted by global challenges and rising protectionism in the US and EU, our economy simply cannot afford to miss out.
Bim Afolami is the Member of Parliament for Hitchin and Harpenden and chair of the Regulatory Reform Group.
