Promise of AI transforming everything overblown? Here’s what scientists say

Artificial intelligence is going to boost human productivity in a thousand ways, transforming everything from transportation to health care to agriculture. Some enthusiastic computer scientists even think we will find a “master algorithm” that will fix our politics and make lives “longer, happier and more productive.” In the grandest of these visions, smart computing machines could automate all of scientific discovery.

But many scientists think such promises are overblown, and even a little dangerous, naively creating false confidence in highly fallible technologies. And quite a few researchers now applying AI — in physics, biology, chemistry and finance — think machines will continue to depend on human intelligence for a very long time. They see AI’s greatest potential not in replacing humans, but in enhancing their capabilities, enabling people to achieve things no one has before.