Guess what kept me busy this weekend?

The book “Code Dependent: Living in the Shadow of AI” by Madhumita Murgia

From the beginning of my journey in health tech AI, when AI was not even offered as the main course in colleges (Hello electives “Biomedical Engineering” and “Artificial Intelligence”) to date, I have been appreciative of its power in positively impacting lives.

To me personally, it is via developing AI-based wearable breast health monitoring devices, algorithms for several chronic diseases such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and cancers, predictive algorithms for diagnosing several women’s health issues, etc.

With how tools such as generative AI and now agentic AI have been and are continuously changing the landscape of AI and its applications, I (I am sure many of you) must have paused to think about where we are heading with this technology.

Naturally, I gravitate towards books, and boy, was I in for some eye-opening and mind-blowing details and stories on the human and social consequences of AI-powered technology!

🤔 Have you ever wondered who labels all the data generated in the world for the AI algorithms to learn from? And what do these people face?
🤔 How deepfakes are affecting women? How have regulators not prioritized addressing this impact? Perhaps because it is disproportionately hurting women? Another addition to our already existing list of issues that need to be addressed. Really?

The book reports many more stories about how Uber drivers, doctors, researchers, teenagers, mothers, and creators are impacted.

Yes, the book seems to lean more toward revealing the negative aspects, but when most of the world is singing praises, how can an author report the other side of a technology’s impact without “screaming a bit”? Especially, when the stories are real, from real humans?

I felt emotions that I had never felt in a while! And I have no more words to write, but I have a lot more reading and pondering to do.

Scratch that. I do have some words.

✍ Use AI responsibly and mindfully. Not everything needs to be solved by or assistive by AI tools all the time. Give some room for our own creativity and intelligence. Like my 85-year-old professor/mentor says – “We don’t have to complicate things. Simple maths can solve many things.” 🙂
✍ Do our kids have to be on social media? Really?
✍ Regulation. And guardrails.

A recent Deloitte report mentioned that just as how we no longer think about electrons when we switch on a light, AI will eventually follow a similar path and become ubiquitous; we won’t even know it’s there.

So, let us remember to develop and use AI for the common good in a responsible and ethical manner.

Having seen the beautiful side of AI for almost two decades, I still remain cautiously optimistic about how AI can positively impact the world we live in, provided we find the right balance and reclaim some agency over how we use and control AI.

Go to the Shop page to purchase this book for further reading.