Human factor: notes from an intersection of artificial, emotional, and cultural intelligences

Abstract

As Artificial Intelligence and Automation are becoming an integral part of our reality, the sociotechnological aspect of the process calls for immediate and sustainable attention. This presentation is about a Human Factor in various aspects of working with and working on Artificial Intelligence. It will examine the role and place of Emotional Intelligence and Cultural Intelligence for working teams engaged in the development and/or utilization of AI. AI is still in its infancy stage if we consider its perspective lifetime. More than anything, infants need good parenting. We cannot afford garbage in, garbage out approach here if an expectation is that AI will be making complex and sophisticated decisions consequential for our lives. As of now, there are plenty of examples of human biases being transferred from humans into algorithms. As human beings, we can identify, reexamine, and consciously let go of certain norms and beliefs that were put into our “default programming” by our flawed human parents and societies we grew up in. Freedom of choice, freedom of overwriting our internal algorithms is very hard but possible to exercise. Machines cannot do that. It takes a village to bring up a human child. It definitely takes a village (and often – a global village) to develop and teach AI and to make it capable of ongoing learning while interacting with human users and customers. Collaboration, skills for leveraging a wide variety of perspectives, empathetic understanding of those we work with and those we create for, and ability to communicate effectively in fast-paced diverse environments are of paramount importance.