Artificial Intelligence (AI) is one of the most powerful technologies ever developed, but it’s not nearly as new as you might think. In fact, it’s undergone several evolutions since its inception in the 1950s. The first generation of AI was ‘descriptive analytics,’ which answers the question, “What happened?” The second, ‘diagnostic analytics,’ addresses, “Why did it happen?” The third and current generation is ‘predictive analytics,’ which answers the question, “Based on what has already happened, what could happen in the future?”
While predictive analytics can be very helpful and save time for data scientists, it is still fully dependent on historic data. Data scientists are therefore left helpless when faced with new, unknown scenarios. In order to have true “artificial intelligence,” we need machines that can “think” on their own, especially when faced with an unfamiliar situation. We need AI that can not just analyze the data it is shown, but express a “gut feeling” when something doesn’t add up. In short, we need AI that can mimic human intuition. Thankfully, we have it.
