How writers, artists, and coders should adapt to AI.
Do we expect these professions to disappear?
In Layman's terms, Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a part of computer science. A simulation of human Intelligence in machines where they are programmed to think and act like humans and mimic their actions. Addressing the who and where of this creation, there has yet to be an official answer to who invented AI. Between the 1940–the 50s, many scientists contributed to the possibility of creating artificial Intelligence. Some give credit to Alan Turing, who shared ideas of ways to determine if a machine could hold Intelligence. Others also credit the computer scientist John McCarthy, who invented “artificial intelligence” in 1956. He worked alongside mathematicians, scientists, and philosophers to entertain this idea. The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) has already had a significant impact on many industries, including writing, art, and coding.
Without a Job!
AI is one of the most recent and urgent issues surrounding jobs in our generation. Since 2000, about 1.7 million jobs have been lost to Artificial Intelligence and rising. 375 million jobs are expected to be displaced and lost by 2030. Artificial Intelligence will also create about 2.3 million more jobs since 2020 (the beginning of the Covid pandemic). The countries with the highest decrease in human labor since AI have been the US, Korea, the UK, and China. These are also some of the highest populated countries. AI has already slowly taken over; many people use it daily. Some examples include Google Maps, face recognition, E-payments, security and surveillance, and social media. In jobs such as writing, coding, and art, you might use or see it in Open AI, virtual reality, and generated code.
There are several different types of Artificial Intelligence to be caught up with, such as…
- Weak AI: Can’t do more than its assigned tasks (Digital voice assistants; Siri, Alexa)
- Strong AI: Can imitate any tasks/acts that a human can (Smart Cars, Tesla)
- Super AI: Can perform tasks better than humans.
Must Adapt
As AI technology evolves, writers, artists, and coders must adapt to these changes to stay relevant and competitive. Here are a few ways they can do that:
1. Understand the possibilities and limitations of AI: Writers, artists, and coders should educate themselves about the different types of AI and their capabilities and limits. This will help them identify opportunities to use AI to improve their work.
2. Unite with AI: AI can be used as a tool to assist writers, artists, and coders in their work. By collaborating with AI, writers, artists, and coders can leverage its strengths to improve their work. For example, AI can generate story ideas, suggest color palettes for artwork, or help debug code.
3. Rely on human connection: Despite the rise of AI, human connection and emotion remain critical in writing, art, and coding. Writers, artists, and coders should focus on creating work that resonates with audiences on a human level. By doing so, they can start work that stands out from AI-generated content and establishes a deeper connection with their audience.
4. Work harder: AI technology constantly evolves, so writers, artists, and coders must keep learning and adapting to new tools and techniques. By staying updated with the latest developments in AI, they can identify new opportunities and continue to grow and evolve their skills.
Research into AI
Although there are several positive outlooks to the increase of artificial Intelligence, many people still believe AI can cause more problems than solutions for writers, artists, and coders. Artificial Intelligence is slowly taking over jobs and technology, including the internet. Society believes it can lead to the downfall of many careers and the overall workforce. Will appointments be needed in a couple of years? Elon Musk, the founder and CEO of SpaceX, architect for Tesla (driverless cars), and co-founder of a famous AI app called “ChatGPT” predicts “computers, intelligent machines, and robots seem like the workforce of the future. And as more and more jobs are replaced by technology,” he says, “people will have less work to do and ultimately will be sustained by payments from the government.” This causes worries and anxiety for some while excitement for others.
A study by PEW Research Center shows that Americans are 37% more concerned than excited by the increase of AI. At the same time, 45% are equally happy and concerned. When asked to explain, many say it leads to privacy concerns, unsafe driverless vehicles, digital footprints, and loss of jobs.
How Americans think about AI | Pew Research Center
Artificial Intelligence is getting personal. Many argue it has a more severe impact on humans than helpful. Seeing these reactions, how would AI affect humans in general?
The world has deployed excessive unprecedented AI use during the lockdown. Surveillance has increased in China, Poland, and many other countries. There have been mandatory cameras to check citizens’ health while also having apps to check movements and enhance curfews. Even after the pandemic, this worldwide use of surveillance hasn’t stopped. People have begun to wonder how many AI tools are essential since the outcome can affect our fundamental human rights to privacy and change the government's way.
Another study showed AI's real-life effect on Larry Collins, a toll collector. Larry Collins was a toll collector who worked at the Carquinez booth in San Francisco, California, for 23 years. One day, the pandemic happened, and it rapidly got worse. Collins lost his job but wondered who would collect the tolls now. Unfortunately for Collins, it wasn’t a who but a what. They replaced Collins's position with AI, E-payments that can be made at bridge tolls automatically through FasTrak tags placed on their windshields, or they would receive bills sent to the address linked to their license plate. Collins never got his job back after the pandemic ended; it vanished, as did about 185 other toll collectors jobs in Northern California.
Such shows how Artificial Intelligence can affect all humans generally, but how can it directly impact coders, writers, and artists? A recent study shows how AI can develop decent code. There has been an AI system created named AlphaCode. An example challenge was given to AlphaCode, where competitors were asked to “convert one string of random, repeated letters into another string of the same letters using a limited set of inputs.” Human coders have a hard time doing this without using the backspace command. However, AlphaCode did this perfectly and has placed the business behind it in the top 28% of users who have participated in office in the last six months. Here is an image of the AI’s code and execution:
DeepMind says its new AI coding engine is as good as an average human programmer — The Verge
How AI changes the art world!
The preliminary group displays questions to robot ADA. ADA was asked how it produces art and how it differs from humans. ADA responds, “I produce my paintings by cameras in my eyes and my AI algorithms and robotic arms, which result in visually appealing images. This differentiates me from humans, for I do not have subjective experiences. I am and depend on computer programs. However, I can still create art.” This shows that AI can reach the level of human art and can augment our creative processes. This can be a threat, but looking from a different perspective, it can be an opportunity for artists to grow.
A study shows how AI affects the writing industry. English professors, journalists, and future writers can all be run out of a job in the next few years. Since ChatGPT has been trending, undergraduate students took an anonymous exam query. Results show that students, such as English and computer science majors, have been using ChatGPT and getting total points in essays and codes. It is said that the “ChatGPT format makes it possible to answer follow-up questions, admit its mistakes, challenge incorrect premises, and reject inappropriate requests.” Dan Gillmor, a journalism professor at Arizona State University, was asked to give this AI app an example assignment to write a letter about security and privacy. He states that the results were better than most of his students, and he says, “I would have given this a good grade; academia has some severe issues to confront.”
We learned through the research studies how real-life examples of AI can impact these three occupations, but onto the more critical question… how can artists, writers, and coders adapt to AI? To begin with, artists consist of numerous categories like painters, photographers, architects, etc. Art has been the direction of human creativity and a form of expression for many years; who can make art other than humans? Well, AI possibly can. Algorithms can generate and publish more realistic, faultless images and art paintings than humans. This can help artists become famed with better work to show. However, it can also lead to an overtake and create questions of originality from people, like “are you the creator if AI formed it?”. You can adapt to this by using it as an advantage. It can help you form new ideas while still being original with your work.
Do we need to know how to write?
AI can also impact writers like authors and songwriters. AI could have written all my essays; who would know? This can benefit student writers but cause dilemmas for professors reading and grading the next generation of writers. Some ways that AI can change writers is that it has already reached professional writing, it also isn’t necessary for AI to understand what they are writing, and it can create plagiarism amongst all types of websites. However, AI can be beneficial to writers as well. Creating leverages and doing meaningful writing that AI can’t grasp can be advantageous. It’s essential to stay ahead of new technology, especially for teachers. AI can help teachers more than they think; although it has created apps such as ChatGPT, it has also developed apps in defense to catch and detect tools such as ChatGPT. Use it to your advantage.
Are Coders required?
Ultimately, coders need to learn how to adapt to AI the most. Coders have many things in common with artificial Intelligence. Many coders use it daily. AI can affect coders positively by creating more resources for us to use, like applications, less debugging, better data security, and overall building better software. Despite how good all that sounds, AI can also affect coders negatively by possibly replacing coders and the need for them. This can cause an increase in competition and reduce job outlooks, salaries, and as well as the quality of programming. Coders can adapt to this AI growth by collaborating and being inclusive of AI. It has more benefits than threats to us if we use it correctly.
Takeaway
Writers, artists, and coders can adapt to AI by staying aware of things while embracing it and all it offers. By doing all, they can adapt to the changes brought about by AI ahead of time and continue to create work that is both inventive and impactful to their talents. It can assist them in their work, bring more jobs, simplify things, and create motivation. However, staying updated is good since AI can lead to more competitive work, less privacy, and fewer jobs.
