Presentation
Artificial Intelligence as a Mediator of Direct Experience
SessionPoster Session 1
DescriptionA quick glimpse of the literature surrounding the prospect of artificial intelligence (AI) in health care and it becomes apparent that research and conversations center on the hope and/or perils of incorporating AI into the delivery of care. Opportunities to improve patient outcomes and reduce the burden on caregivers are balanced by sobering visions of heightened inequalities and general societal disruption . Each side focuses on what could happen if AI was heavily implemented, and how to correct or prevent misadventures of the system that would impact patients and caregivers. However, one aspect of AI that is not mentioned in the dialogue between AI proponents and adversaries, is the impact of AI use on human experience. That is, the effect of AI on the ongoing process of experience that defines who we are and guides who we will become.
Experience as an on-going process
Experience is the ongoing process of direct interaction with the world around us. Through our interactions with the world, our ability is shaped to work more efficiently, safely and enjoyably in carrying-out the means to various ends. As an on-going process, experience habituates and enhances our interactions with the world; we become aware of information that has always existed but was previously unknown to us . Experience is not something that is accrued over time, per se, but is a constant process that results in progressive achievements of ability .
The achievements of experience are numerous and hard-won through hours of practice and engagement; many of which are spent in some type of struggle (tedium, discomfort, frustration, boredom, etc.) The fruits of this labor sharpen our ability to discern and act, and, ultimately, benefit ourselves and society on the whole. After years of reading x-rays, the expert radiologist can naturally detect subtle nuances of disease that were indetectable before. Countless hours of writer’s block produce a novelist whose books are literarily captivating. The novice painter who struggles to apply paint to the canvas in a meaningful way, learns the exact amount of pressure to apply brushstrokes that generate museum-worthy masterpieces. Indeed, America’s first psychologist, William James , may have said it best:
“As we become permanent drunkards by so many separate drinks, so we become saints in the moral and authorities and experts in the practical and scientific spheres by so many separate acts and hours of work.”
AI and the Process of Experience
Now, imagine a scenario where we no longer need to burden ourselves with the effort of a means to achieve an end. Instead, our effort is directed to phrasing a question so a system can tell us the answer, write us a paper, or inform us of patterns in a large data set. On the surface, the removal of struggles to seek answers, structure prose and arguments, and painstakingly plot and analyze data gives us a huge amount of time back so we can do other, potentially more enjoyable things. However, with the loss of the struggle we also lose the potential for achievement , and – if we habituate using AI – we essentially flatline our development in those aspects of life. We will remain clueless to methods that will help us determine if the answer given by AI is sound or not. Our capacity to write will stagnate to the grade-level when we started using AI to write for us. The opportunity for happenstance findings, deep understandings, or innovative insights gained by combing over data are usurped by the patterns detected by AI. In short, AI has the potential to shorten our interactions with the world and limit our achievements, in exchange for a faster means of reaching moderate-quality ends. Cognitive work is no longer a necessary part of conducting the work; we simply ask and will be instructed of what to do.
The concern, long-term use of AI to achieve ends without working through the means can potentially result in the depreciation of human faculties. Rather than encouraging the development of intellect and innovation, AI might create work environments that rob humans of experience , producing individuals that resemble those of factory workers who were subject to the division of labor, as described by Adam Smith:
“The man whose life is spent in performing a few simple operations, of which the effects, too are, perhaps, always the same, or very nearly the same, has no occasion to exert his understanding, or to exercise his invention in finding out expedients for removing difficulties which never occur. He naturally loses, therefore, the habit of such exertion, and generally becomes as stupid and ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become. The torpor of his mind renders him, not only incapable of relishing or bearing a part in any rational conversation, but of conceiving any generous, noble, or tender sentiment, and consequently of forming any just judgement concerning many even of the ordinary duties of private life. His dexterity at his own particular trade seems, in this manner, to be acquired at the expense of his intellectual, social, and martial virtues.”
Consider Human Experience when Implementing AI
When an AI system is proposed for implementation, benefits and concerns should be tested with an emphasis on the impact to human experience. For example, consider systems that passively listen to patient and caregiver conversations, and then transcribe the discussion to create a note of the interaction. These systems are often celebrated as tools that remove the necessity of the physicians to sit at the computer and document while seeing patients. This benefit seems true, but it is unclear how the change in the patient and caregiver interaction affects caregiver achievements in understanding and communicating about the patient to others. Writing is an excellent tool for recording history, but it also serves as a personal sounding board to help us think. This latter function of writing could be diminished in habituated use of passive note taking systems. Some considerations for experience with the implementation of these systems: do the patient and caregiver find the interaction more satisfying and useful? What are the differences in the number of questions asked and the amount of relevant health information collected when using passive or engaged (physician) notetaking during patient encounters? What is the effect of the passive system on the caregiver’ understanding of the patient and their health concern? How does communication (via notes or otherwise) change when the need for the caregiver to document and summarize the patient’s situation is removed? The answers to these questions are not easy to obtain unless the system is pilot-tested and attention is paid to assess acute and chronic differences in experience and achievements wrought from these differing types of interactions.
Looking ahead
There is still much work needed to better define methods, measures, and instances or situations that enrich experience and sharpen our abilities. For now, we must start by paying closer attention to the possibility that implementation of AI changes our interactions with the world and can affect what we learn – or fail to learn. With careful study, it is our hope that AI systems are designed to favor experience, and provide opportunities for the development of curiosity, intellect, skill, expertise, and fulfillment. It is our peril that the design of AI systems will supplant experience, leaving us with a dull, automated, numb, and hollow existence.
Experience as an on-going process
Experience is the ongoing process of direct interaction with the world around us. Through our interactions with the world, our ability is shaped to work more efficiently, safely and enjoyably in carrying-out the means to various ends. As an on-going process, experience habituates and enhances our interactions with the world; we become aware of information that has always existed but was previously unknown to us . Experience is not something that is accrued over time, per se, but is a constant process that results in progressive achievements of ability .
The achievements of experience are numerous and hard-won through hours of practice and engagement; many of which are spent in some type of struggle (tedium, discomfort, frustration, boredom, etc.) The fruits of this labor sharpen our ability to discern and act, and, ultimately, benefit ourselves and society on the whole. After years of reading x-rays, the expert radiologist can naturally detect subtle nuances of disease that were indetectable before. Countless hours of writer’s block produce a novelist whose books are literarily captivating. The novice painter who struggles to apply paint to the canvas in a meaningful way, learns the exact amount of pressure to apply brushstrokes that generate museum-worthy masterpieces. Indeed, America’s first psychologist, William James , may have said it best:
“As we become permanent drunkards by so many separate drinks, so we become saints in the moral and authorities and experts in the practical and scientific spheres by so many separate acts and hours of work.”
AI and the Process of Experience
Now, imagine a scenario where we no longer need to burden ourselves with the effort of a means to achieve an end. Instead, our effort is directed to phrasing a question so a system can tell us the answer, write us a paper, or inform us of patterns in a large data set. On the surface, the removal of struggles to seek answers, structure prose and arguments, and painstakingly plot and analyze data gives us a huge amount of time back so we can do other, potentially more enjoyable things. However, with the loss of the struggle we also lose the potential for achievement , and – if we habituate using AI – we essentially flatline our development in those aspects of life. We will remain clueless to methods that will help us determine if the answer given by AI is sound or not. Our capacity to write will stagnate to the grade-level when we started using AI to write for us. The opportunity for happenstance findings, deep understandings, or innovative insights gained by combing over data are usurped by the patterns detected by AI. In short, AI has the potential to shorten our interactions with the world and limit our achievements, in exchange for a faster means of reaching moderate-quality ends. Cognitive work is no longer a necessary part of conducting the work; we simply ask and will be instructed of what to do.
The concern, long-term use of AI to achieve ends without working through the means can potentially result in the depreciation of human faculties. Rather than encouraging the development of intellect and innovation, AI might create work environments that rob humans of experience , producing individuals that resemble those of factory workers who were subject to the division of labor, as described by Adam Smith:
“The man whose life is spent in performing a few simple operations, of which the effects, too are, perhaps, always the same, or very nearly the same, has no occasion to exert his understanding, or to exercise his invention in finding out expedients for removing difficulties which never occur. He naturally loses, therefore, the habit of such exertion, and generally becomes as stupid and ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become. The torpor of his mind renders him, not only incapable of relishing or bearing a part in any rational conversation, but of conceiving any generous, noble, or tender sentiment, and consequently of forming any just judgement concerning many even of the ordinary duties of private life. His dexterity at his own particular trade seems, in this manner, to be acquired at the expense of his intellectual, social, and martial virtues.”
Consider Human Experience when Implementing AI
When an AI system is proposed for implementation, benefits and concerns should be tested with an emphasis on the impact to human experience. For example, consider systems that passively listen to patient and caregiver conversations, and then transcribe the discussion to create a note of the interaction. These systems are often celebrated as tools that remove the necessity of the physicians to sit at the computer and document while seeing patients. This benefit seems true, but it is unclear how the change in the patient and caregiver interaction affects caregiver achievements in understanding and communicating about the patient to others. Writing is an excellent tool for recording history, but it also serves as a personal sounding board to help us think. This latter function of writing could be diminished in habituated use of passive note taking systems. Some considerations for experience with the implementation of these systems: do the patient and caregiver find the interaction more satisfying and useful? What are the differences in the number of questions asked and the amount of relevant health information collected when using passive or engaged (physician) notetaking during patient encounters? What is the effect of the passive system on the caregiver’ understanding of the patient and their health concern? How does communication (via notes or otherwise) change when the need for the caregiver to document and summarize the patient’s situation is removed? The answers to these questions are not easy to obtain unless the system is pilot-tested and attention is paid to assess acute and chronic differences in experience and achievements wrought from these differing types of interactions.
Looking ahead
There is still much work needed to better define methods, measures, and instances or situations that enrich experience and sharpen our abilities. For now, we must start by paying closer attention to the possibility that implementation of AI changes our interactions with the world and can affect what we learn – or fail to learn. With careful study, it is our hope that AI systems are designed to favor experience, and provide opportunities for the development of curiosity, intellect, skill, expertise, and fulfillment. It is our peril that the design of AI systems will supplant experience, leaving us with a dull, automated, numb, and hollow existence.
Event Type
Poster Presentation
TimeMonday, March 234:45pm - 6:15pm EDT
LocationRhinelander Gallery
Hospital Environments