“Empower the people, Train the people, Raise the awareness so we always consider a machine as a machine.” – Frère Eric Salobir
• Is there potential for AI to challenge God in the future of our society?
Three experts, each looking at AI through a slightly different lens, joined LHoFT’s Head of Ecosystem and Partnerships, Alex Panican, on stage at the European AI for Finance summit to discuss these questions:
Bibi Ndiaye, Innovation Director and Data Intelligence, BPCE – on AI’s bias in recruitment:
“In the case of Amazon, I’m not sure that the AI is not the problem. The AI used a training set to make those decisions. So if in that training set the human working in HR used to recruit mostly men, you cannot ask the AI to do other things – because the training set uses these examples
If the human makes a discrimination, the AI will do the same.
The risks are very limited in banks, because all AI models being developed are towards the goal of helping humans in making decisions. So in that case we limit the risk.”
Jean-Marc Bonnefous, Co-Founder & Board member, Bonseyes – on AI’s use in sentencing:
“This illustrates all of the risks of deploying AI in a not human-centric way:
It lacks fairness – there’s a bias – and it lacks transparency and explainability; how did you arrive at the decision?
This is typical of what we should watch for when developing an AI application, to ensure we have the right amount of governance in a data driven system so we do not let the system dictate the ethics.”
“Artificial Intelligence is neither artificial nor is it an intelligence. It is a process, and it follows the rules of a process: garbage in, garbage out.”
Frère Eric Salobir, President, Optic Technology – on AI replacing God:
“We see that each technology which is sophisticated enough can appear as being quite magical. We see that there is also a temptation for human beings is to build something and start to worship it – and to expect a kind of salvation from it.
What we have to do is to empower and train people to ensure that they will always consider a machine as a tool. We also pay a lot of attention to situations where human beings are under the control of a machine. More and more we have two kinds of people: People who have machines working for them, and ones who work for machines.
If you work in the warhouse of some of these companies, and all day long you just do what these machines tell you to do, is it good for your dignity? Is it good for your self-esteem? I am not so sure.”
Bonus question: Frère Eric Salobir, on the potential for humans reaching a ‘singularity’ with computers, where we upload our consciousness:
“For the human being could be good, for the species it could be the worst.
There are two ways to extend your life. One is reproduction, which is what we – and the animals and plants – do. The second one is to extend forever your own life, but you remain who you are. So if we decide now that we continue to live instead of having children, instead of having another generation, it also means it would be the end of evolution.
So what some people say “Oh this is so magic”, this kind of post-humanity, but this post humanity would just be standing all the time at the same place, and probably it would not be evolving anymore. And that is not the best for the species.”
Will AI replace God? To see more of what was discussed during the panel, check out the video of our panel at the European AI for Finance conference by startupinside on 3rd of september with the best insights of Bibi NDIAYE, Innovation Director and Data Intelligence, BPCE /Jean-Marc BONNEFOUS, Co-Founder and Board member, Bonseyes / Frère Eric SALOBIR, President, Optic Technology /Alex PANICAN, Head of Partnerships and Ecosystem, The LHoFT
