In looking forward and embracing our future yet to come, I often find benefit in looking back.
One of my favorite quotes by author/humorist Mark Twain speaks to, with more than a bit of tongue in cheek, the American fear of innovation and new things: “I am all for progress. It’s the damn change that I am against.” – Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens, 1835-1910)
In my lifetime and career, I began with news operations, shooting film, using equipment weighing hundreds of pounds, dot-matrix printers, and MS-Dos-based computers before the Internet, email, and texting.
The early adopters had pagers and mobile phones that looked like monstrous walkie-talkies long before discussing sharing files and protocols on the Internet, originally designed and intended primarily for academic research and advancing science.
The U.S. Industrial Revolution and factories moved a predominantly male workforce away from farms, mines, foundries, forges, and repair shops onto the assembly lines.
The fear of business and job losses was followed by the creation of labor unions, various workplace benefits, and the many positive aspects of modern big business.
Later, as automation and robotics came on the scene, or as the Internet became part of the fabric of American life and business, we again feared the loss of jobs and the need for skills training but saw the most robust period of year-over-year economic growth in modern American history, including a handful of balanced(!) federal budgets coming from Congress and the White House, despite divided government in the mid-1990s.
Now, we smile and, in some cases, tremble a bit as the advent of artificial intelligence (AI) and sentience is becoming a reality for computers and much of the world around us, including the workplace. As someone who still says Please and Thank You to Alexa in my kitchen and at the office, I am admittedly not a technology pioneer. I was self-taught on MS-Dos and, later, the various iterations of Microsoft Windows. Still missing my beloved Blackberry, I have finally become reasonably adept at the multiple functions on my Android Smartphone.
But also, as a fan of the “Terminator” film series, there is a corner of my brain awaiting the word that Skynet has gone live and the age of man is about to be replaced by computers.
Thankfully, engineers, academics, and others are leading the way to ensure that not only does not happen but that AI, like texting, email, the internet, Wi-Fi, and so many now-expected amenities of modern living, continues to free up and serve humanity — and not serve up humans.
In late 2022, the Georgia Institute of Technology received a $65-million federal grant to develop teaching partnerships and models across Georgia. This will expose middle and high school students to the benefits (smart robots, drones, and AR gaming) and the hard work involved (coding, system design, system security) in turning AI and various applications into reality.
The federal Economic Development Administration grant connects and funds 16 projects across Georgia, each working to develop a future workforce skilled in the intelligent technologies needed to deploy AI innovation within the manufacturing sector.
During the first week of October, including National Manufacturing Day, Georgia Artificial Intelligence in Manufacturing (Georgia AIM) Week touched manufacturers, educators, and thousands of students as a Georgia AIM Mobile Studio rolled across the state, only days after Hurricane Helene's devastation.
In an environment where a dose of hope helped lift many spirits, the Georgia AIM Mobile Studio brought smiles, inspiration, and bright aspirations into classrooms and educators from Moultrie to Atlanta and Fort Valley to Athens.
“Georgia AIM Week allowed us to showcase the incredible partnerships with various organizations over the last two years. Artificial Intelligence and smart technologies will be game changes for small to medium-size manufacturers, and learning these technologies now opens doors for our workforce.” Georgia AIM Co-Director Donna Ennis said it is based within the Enterprise Innovation Institute at Georgia Tech.
On a sunny Homecoming Friday last week in Athens, at the University of Georgia, Ennis and others beamed on the STEM program lawn at UGA’s East Campus, demonstrating their wares. At the same time, students interacted with AI technologies available in the mobile studio.
I will have to put my favored Twain quote aside for the moment as I witness my favorite North Atlanta Trade School, located near the world-famous Varsity, and my alma mater, UGA, and its much more nascent engineering school, working collaboratively and voluntarily together on a successful project.
In that world ... anything is possible.