That's because it's incremental. Every time a computer takes over a job we never imagined a computer can do, it happens so gradually that by the time it's complete, we're not the slightest bit amazed.
We now have computers that can play chess, read x-rays, drive down the highway at 55 miles an hour, understand our voice, scan documents for errors, do all traditional banking chores, correct our spelling, plot a route on foot or by plane, find the cheapest airfares and pick a face out of a crowd.
At any time since 1970, if you went to live on a desert island for a decade, you would have been blown away by what happened when you got back. Day by day, though, human-only tasks quietly disappear.
After the replacement, computers do some of these jobs better than we ever could, but, as they're evolving, we take each of these perfections and advancements for granted. It's too gradual to be awe-inspiring.
Our job now, isn't to do our job. It's to find new tasks, human tasks, faster than the computer takes the old ones away. Too often, people are displaced and then give up.
We can still add value, but we need to do it differently, more bravely, and with ever more insight.
[IBM recently asked me to do a talk about the future of AI in customer service.]
No comments:
Post a Comment