▼ Zhejiang University students have developed a quadruped robot that can climb stairs. Photo by She Ying
▲ College students show robot contest’s works. Photo by She Ying
Machines are good at solving problems, but they can’t ask questions and are not good at innovation. Therefore, the most valuable social occupations in the era of machine learning are entrepreneurs, innovators, scientists, creators and other talents who can analyze problems to be solved, opportunities to be explored and fields to be explored.
How awesome is artificial intelligence now? — — Ali’s mother’s artificial intelligence copy can generate 20,000 advertising words in one second, and Ant Financial’s AI has realized that four people serve tens of millions of users of 27 fund companies. After more than ten years of training, ophthalmologists can identify about 40% of keratitis, while Zhejiang University’s artificial intelligence can identify 84% and never get tired. As for translation, it is a piece of cake for Iflytek’s artificial intelligence to communicate in countless languages at the same time.
As early as 2016, based on the artificial intelligence technology at that time, Oxford University professors Carl benedikt Frey and Michael A. Osborne predicted that in the next 20 years, 47% of jobs in the United States, 69% in India and 77% in China are likely to be replaced by automation brought by machine learning.
Don’t panic, machines will not completely replace manpower.
"Artificial intelligence will definitely eliminate some industries and transform some industries." Xi Youmin, executive president of Liverpool University of Xi ‘an Jiaotong University, positively predicted that "many jobs may be lost, and many majors will be lost. Simple accounting will soon be replaced, and many people in the bank will lose their jobs."
But don’t panic, some people in the future are irreplaceable. While replacing and strengthening some industries, artificial intelligence and robots will also breed many new industries. For example, in today’s unmanned aircraft, one aircraft replaces a pilot, but there are 60 big data operators behind it.
Some experts also pointed out that people and intelligent robots are not substitutes, but will form a new division of labor. This new division of labor is reflected in the optimization of work performance by using artificial intelligence and machine learning; Machines are good at solving problems, but they can’t ask questions and are not good at innovation. Therefore, the most valuable social occupations in the era of machine learning are entrepreneurs, innovators, scientists, creators and other talents who can analyze problems to be solved, opportunities to be explored and fields to be explored.
With the deep development of artificial intelligence technology and the wide application of robots, people will be liberated from many traditional production activities, have more leisure time and more powerful support means, and make life more interesting and colorful. Innovation and creativity will become necessities in life and work, and people will have more opportunities to engage in creative work.
But Xi Youmin warned that all new jobs will only become more and more complicated, not simpler. "In the future, you won’t create jobs that you can get as long as you get a few points right.".
The Times of Artificial Intelligence, which was read by Fan Deng, the founder of Fan Deng Reading, set off a listening craze on the Internet. But few people know that Fan Deng majored in metal materials and heat treatment in university. "In college, I actually didn’t learn anything." He joked, "The most important thing my alma mater taught me was to make me feel that I could learn something." What impressed him the most was that he once participated in a debate on behalf of the school. In order to win the championship, he and his classmates browsed the library materials, read countless books and learned a lot.
This self-learning ability has become Fan Deng’s core competitiveness today, and it is also the root that he thinks he will not be replaced by robots.
People who are least like machines are more adaptable to the era of artificial intelligence.
Children in kindergarten can recite two sentences of poetry and speak two sentences of English, so parents are very happy. After school, multiplication tables and problem-solving methods will always be concerned, but these are not important in the era of artificial intelligence. "Because there are search engines and mobile phones now, people can easily find the knowledge they want, and the function of traditional education to eliminate ignorance has disappeared." Xi Youmin believes that it is easy to have knowledge in the future, and it is important to judge the ability to integrate this knowledge.
From the perspective of practitioners, Lv Cheng, general manager of Baidu Smart Home Hardware, has a deeper measure of talents in the era of artificial intelligence. Lv Cheng does not deny that future talents also need to master a lot of professional knowledge. But he put imagination first in the future talents. "The artificial intelligence industry is basically predicting what the future will be like. But my theory is that no one can predict anything, so you need to be very bold. Not from the perspective of landing application, but from the system level and at a higher level, we have a vision and idea for the future society. "
He believes that the most important quality of practitioners in the era of artificial intelligence is to have high moral standards. "Because artificial intelligence has a huge challenge, it is whether human beings can control its boundaries and can’t resist opening Pandora’s Box." In practical research, many application scenarios of artificial intelligence are actually full of temptations. Practitioners need to consider whether a certain technology will have a fatal impact on human society in the future and cannot be controlled by artificial intelligence.
In the final analysis, machines serve people, and how high people stand, how much help robots will have. Just like a smart phone has many functions, but most people only play 30% of its functions. "If we want to make our life more colorful with the help of robots, we must constantly improve ourselves." Xi Youmin believes that general education, literacy education and art education will become more and more important in the future, and schools need to cultivate students’ autonomous learning ability, questioning ability, interpersonal communication ability, innovative thinking ability and future planning ability.
"Who can survive in the future society? The most important thing is that you have to become the person who is least like a machine. " Fan Deng summed it up in one sentence.
But from the most realistic point of view, computer science will become the "main course" in all schools. Now Zhejiang University requires all undergraduates to learn programming, even the department of archaeology is no exception. This is the key for students to enter the era of artificial intelligence.
How to change education? It is still a problem being explored.
In April this year, the Ministry of Education issued the "Action Plan for Artificial Intelligence Innovation in Colleges and Universities", which made major arrangements for the innovative development of a new generation of artificial intelligence from the level of higher education.
Artificial intelligence affects education, not simply by offering artificial intelligence courses in schools, nor by offering artificial intelligence majors in schools. What the educational circles need to study is how the whole education adapts to the social problems after artificial intelligence because artificial intelligence has changed the world.
"For many years, the school has only paid attention to professional planning, curriculum design, syllabus, teaching, etc., and the future study is likely to be that people have laid a certain learning foundation and skills when they are young, and then live and work with their interests and opportunities, and they have to conduct specific studies as needed, thus making lifelong learning a habit and necessity." Xi Youmin believes that in this case, teaching is no longer simply to teach knowledge, but to guide students to cultivate problem awareness, learn to search for knowledge, integrate knowledge and solve problems, and improve their abilities of communication, cooperation, expression and execution in this research process.
This also means that the teaching mode of the school and even the campus form may change. In the future, students don’t necessarily have to spend four years for undergraduate study, two or three years for postgraduate study or three to five years for doctoral study. Instead, they need to make use of resources and technologies such as the Internet and schools to continue their self-learning.
The future university will be a learning center, a resource center, a research and development community, an innovative ecology and a Industry-University-Research social community. Here, teachers interact with classmates when they want to learn, try creativity with resources and experimental environment when they have ideas, seek answers with R&D center when they have doubts and questions, practice through innovative ecology when they have technology or business model, and create and share the value of innovative products or services through Industry-University-Research Community, thus promoting social progress and development.
At present, Tsinghua University, Zhejiang University, Zhejiang University of Technology and other well-known universities have deep cooperation with Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent and other enterprises. Zhongke Shuguang, the leader of supercomputers, is also cooperating with universities to introduce the experience and projects of enterprises into practical courses in universities, so that doctors in research institutes can share their experiences with students. Song Huaiming, chief scientist of Zhongke Shuguang Big Data, believes that the core idea of school-enterprise cooperation is to integrate the advantages of enterprises in artificial intelligence and advanced computing with the educational concept of the school to better cultivate practical talents.
