The Noetic Convergence is a term relating to parallel developments in the study of human cognition and research into Artificial Intelligence. While these two fields may seem only peripherally related, the pattern of breakthroughs seems to indicate a trend of deeper significance. The possibility of self-consciousness emerging from an AI remains a hotly debated topic, but it seems somewhat unlikely that a recognizably "human" form of self-awareness will emerge from AI research for at least the next 20 years.
While humanity may have to wrestle with the consequences of sentient AI life forms over the course of the 21st century, there are even more pressing issues emerging from AI research that we are going to have to deal with as a society in the short term. In the short term, it may very well be Expert Systems that will cause the greatest consternation. Already there have been reports of Expert Systems diagnosing Pap smears with greater accuracy than human operators, voice recognition expert systems that work better and faster than humans, and even behavior modeling programs that can than simultaneously track and analyze suspicious human behavior. These technologies are just beginning to come off the shelf, and over the next 20 years we should see an increasing penetration of these expert systems in every corner of life.
Automating Patterned Thought
The most direct application of the technologies of expert systems seems to be in areas where what we consider to be high level intellectual tasks are in actuality forms of pattern recognition or rule-based thought processes. Take for example medical diagnosis - one of the most prestigious and lucrative professional fields in our society. Physician disease diagnosis is a matter of identifying patient symptoms, comparing these symptoms against the knowledge base of human disease, and then using experience and judgment to assess the relevance of contradictory indications and come to a final judgment. An expert system can be hooked to sophisticated diagnostic equipment to capture symptom information, access a medical knowledge bases, and go through a process of neural net training that "trains" an expert system how to weight the relevance of the information. In the majority of routine cases, expert stems could very well achieve the same results - 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and without the chance of human error.
Other rule and pattern based modes of intellectual production may very well be overtaken by the rise of expert systems. General Interactive has already developed a crude implementation of automated consumer complaint response e-mails. This is just the tip of the iceberg - there are a great variety of language tasks that involve formulaic responses and conventional language patterns. Press Releases, marketing verbiage, business correspondence, even speeches and screenplays usually follow standard conventions - patterns that increasingly sophisticated expert systems will be able to identify and mimic. This would seem to be the next stage in the automation of production - while during the industrial era machines removed much of the brute force and drudgery from the process of production - expert systems will increasingly take over the "mental drudgery."
Impact on elite symbolic analysts
This transition will no doubt be a rather wrenching change for the elite class of symbolic analysts that are currently occupying the highest strata of society. Educators, engineers, commercial writers, businessmen, doctors, lawyers, and other professionals derive pride and prestige from their work, and will fight against the idea that a computer program could do their job better. While there are certain regulatory obstacles that could be utilized to prevent the spread of expert systems - such as the existing licensure system - the benefits that expert systems will bring to a wide cross-section of society should prove to be a strong counter-balancing force to whatever roadblocks get erected. At the end of this process, a wide variety of intellectual tasks will have been taken over by expert systems, changing the very notion of what we consider to be brain work.
Reproductive and Productive thought
Pattern and rule based thinking is essentially a *reproductive* mode of thought - the application of an existing mental model to generate a specific outcome - whether it be a diagnosis, analysis, or even flowery rhetoric. Increasingly, expert systems may supplant human skill when it comes to tasks that require reproductive mental labor, but this doesn't necessarily imply that the cliché future vision of our machines doing all the work will come to pass. Instead, the value-added for human intellectual workers will come from *productive* modes of thought - the creation of new ideas, new approaches, and new patterns. Research into human creativity isn't particularly new, but given the competition posed by expert systems, it seems likely that this field of research will become particularly important in the years to come.
There is already quite a body of work with established techniques for unlocking creativity and tapping into the higher levels of human thought. Lateral thinking exercises generate new connections though the application of metaphors. Mismatch exercises generate new connections by pairing unrelated ideas and forcing a connection between them. Peak mental states of Flow are increasingly being researched, moving us closer towards bringing these states under volitional control. And judging from the informercials on late night TV, accelerated learning techniques for memory and reading continue to have popular appeal. Currently these techniques are generally regarded as a form of professional development or as an interesting activity for personal enhancement - not as a core function of professional life.
Teaching Creativity
We emphasize the acquisition, application, and dissemination of knowledge as fundamental skills for education and the workplace. While ability levels may vary - there is a certain level of basic competency from schooling that is expected for those among the cognitive elite. But our attitudes towards creativity are different - we don't consider it a topic that can be taught in school, and label those with natural creative skills as "gifted" or "talented" or even "genius" - without any expectation that the "untalented" could ever learn these skills. This general perception might change dramatically as expert systems place a premium on productive thinking, and researchers in the field begin to develop concrete ways to teach these techniques to a much wider audience. Eventually, techniques of productive thinking may become one of the fundamental building blocks of education although it seems that we will only begin to move in that direction in a twenty year time frame.
One implication of this shift away from reproductive thinking is that there will be increasing emphasis on the social interaction as a core feature of future professions. For doctors, bedside manner could become much more important than diagnostic ability. Lawyers would be valued more for their ability to deal with clients and witnesses, rather than their facility with legal arcana. For professional activities that are not heavily reliant on innovation, the value of a professional interaction will come from the personal relationship that is established, instead of mastery of a body of a specialized field of knowledge. In a world where reproductive thinking is on the decline - it is those with high creativity and Emotional Intelligence that will prosper, while those with pure analytical IQ type mental skills may find themselves struggling to fit into the new workforce.
Written by Mark Justman Copyright 2000 Posted 03/02/00 http://go.to/futureplex
