Week 1 :Task 3 (Understanding AI Capabilities)
AI’s Three Flavors – Straight Talk on Narrow, General & Super AI People love talking about Narrow AI vs General AI vs Super AI, but this often confuses reality with science fiction. Here’s the pragmatic truth: - Narrow AI (Weak AI): This is all the AI we actually have today. It excels at specific tasks – think Siri, chatbots, image recognition, or recommendation engines. Narrow AI can diagnose diseases from medical images, drive cars in controlled settings, or beat us at chess or go – but it only does that one thing. It uses stats and pattern matching, not understanding. These systems are powerful within their limited scope, but they can’t apply what they learned to a completely different problem. Example: a face-recognition AI can identify your friend’s face, but won’t suddenly learn to drive a car. - General AI (Strong AI): This is the “smart computer” from movies – an AI with human-like intelligence. In theory, AGI could learn any intellectual task a human can. It would reason, plan, and adapt broadly. Reality check: We do not have AGI and there’s no evidence it exists today. All progress so far is in narrow domains. Building AGI would require machines with consciousness or self-awareness – something we don’t know how to do. In practical terms, don’t bet your strategy on it. Focus on making today’s AI systems reliable and ethical, rather than chasing a hypothetical super-smart bot. - Super AI (ASI): This is pure science fiction – an AI far beyond human intelligence, with its own consciousness and desires. In stories, ASI enslaves or replaces humanity. In reality, ASI is speculative. No one knows if or when it could happen. Most experts agree it’s not imminent. The only real dangers now come from how we use narrow AI, not from a rogue superintelligence.