PIXEL PROPHET
PIXEL PROPHET
IN THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER
Martin Christie reflected on last month’s column on Artificial Intelligence and the nature of machine learning upon which it is based. Prompted by a couple of things that caught his attention, it further encouraged his train of thought.
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n light of the increasing use of AI in all manner of processes, the point I was making was that it should be considered an invaluable aid, rather than an absolute direction — a guide and not a dictator of facts. Like any tool, unless you understand how it works and what it does, you may not end up with the results you want, and, moreover, not even realise it. What drew my attention was a particularly irritating advert for Alexa — that little talking pillbox of wisdom that so many people have adopted like it was an amusing pet rather than a substitute for thinking. A witless father is harassed by his precocious child for historical facts and resorts to Amazon’s soothing vocal database to save his educational reputation, and worse still, smugly pretends he knew the facts all along. I have nothing in particular against Alexa or any other smart device, rather the marketing promotion that it will make you more intelligent, more creative and more successful than you would be without it. The logical progression is that you will gradually be unable to do anything without electronic assistance. Of course, we do so many things every day that are done better, quicker and safer, with the aid of computers. The whole pace of life, social and economic now depends upon them. But the potential flaw lies in the very nature of machine learning itself. In simple terms, it is basically linear in nature: because there is A, there is B, therefore C and so on. It can get to XYZ, and probably very quickly, but it has to flash through the alphabet to get there. Until the binary system upon which it is based is made redundant by an alternative, it will continue to be the pattern, albeit a highly advanced one. The process is not able to make the exceptional lateral jumps intelligent organisms have evolved to do by a mixture of experience, intuition and perception through their various senses. But they are trying to fill in the gaps of electronic education. Enter Deep Learning — not a new idea but an extension of it. It’s an attempt to mimic the workings of the human brain by learning from its mistakes as well as its successes and copy all the intricate internal actions of the human brain. You may not have heard of it, but you are already living and working with it; in fact may already be suffering from it as it is lurking in the background of your computer, smartphone and many other modern devices. It may be a well-intentioned invasion, desperate to make itself more useful anticipating what you like, what you may want to do next. Still, the demands on the memory banks and computing power of your machine are considerable. Deep learning is an intrinsic part of almost all current software, so if you have updated anything in the last few years, you are running with it. You don’t have a choice — there was no tick box to check that you wanted or needed it. In last month’s column, my contention was that however smart the technology still needed human intelligence to cast 14
an eye over its results to check its efficacy. The intention of deep learning in the longer term is to perfect machines that require no human supervision at all. The device will, in effect, be marking its own exam paper. Replacing human judgement in roles that are dangerous or tedious is nothing new and largely commendable. It has generally made the workplace safer and less arduous, and the speed of complex calculations has made previously insurmountable tasks possible. But a device that, in effect, has its own agenda is one that needs to be viewed with caution. It is not the stuff of science fiction, with robots intent on dominating the human race with evil intent. Quite the reverse, they are being developed to serve us and be content to do so. But relying on binary logic to determine our best interests and desires has a potential flaw. When a machine decides what we want, even what we need, it is a time when we stop having any choice at all. If you are new to this column, you may already be wondering what all this has to do with digital imaging; regular readers will indulge me as they know I will eventually get round to my point of reference. The simple fact is that we no longer work in an isolated bubble if we ever did. Work has invaded our home environment and vice versa, and the lifestyle of ourselves, as well as our customers, has changed forever. Their choices and expectations are very much dominated by a small piece of apparently intelligent metal and plastic they carry in their hands and consult at all times. That reality has more relevance in the overall activities of on-demand print than the precise detail of a particularly useful tool in Photoshop.
PHOTOSHOP’S AI GUIDE
In fact, Photoshop has very much taken over the functionality of this column by using its own AI to guide you on how to do things and how to use its options specifically rather than search for tips and tutorials online. It is a much faster alternative to trawling through links that more frequently now direct you to things they think you ought to know or like, rather than things you actually want, for all the reasons previously discussed. There was always a help option hiding mostly unnoticed and unused in the top toolbar. Not only has the reference library of this choice been expanded, but there is a more intuitive guide on hand by pressing Control (Command on Mac)>F for Find, and that will help source the right tool and how to use it. Somewhat ironically, this provides
Using Control F
JUNE 2021 • QUICK PRINT PRO
