Generative AI is a branch of artificial intelligence that enables machines to generate new and original content like text and images by learning from huge amounts of data. Although traditional AI systems used rules-based programming, Generative AI employs algorithms and deep learning models to analyze data and produce new content.
By
Dr Amir Ghapanchi
Senior Lecturer, Victoria University, Research Fellow, Institute for Sustainable Industries & Liveable Cities (ISILC)
ChatGPT is a Generative AI platform which was launched on 30th Nov 2022 by Open AI, and has received huge popularity in the past 3 months. ChatGPT attracted One million users in only 5 days. ChatGPT is a large language model which uses machine learning algorithms for understanding and responding to the questions asked by users in a way that mimics human conversations.
According to Kathryn Van Kuyk, ChatGPT “has been trained with a massive set of data and about 175 billion parameters”, and “has learned by reading about 300 billion words”. Gary Vaynerchuk, the chairman of New York-based communications company VaynerX, compares the advent of generative AI to how Internet transformed work.
In a recent interview, Billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates, a co-founder of Microsoft, regarded improvements in AI as “the most important” innovation at the current time. He also mentioned that “This will change our world”. Bill thinks that ChatGPT and its counterparts can help with things like enhancing office efficiency, drafting invoices and writing letters. Microsoft has recently announced that its search engine called Bing will be powered by ChatGPT.
With a very wide applications, Generative AI platforms like ChatGPT have potential to revolutionize any industry. It also raises concerns about the potential of Generative AI for job displacement and calls for the need to upskill and retraining the workforce to adjust to the emerging demands.
Some of the applications of Generative AI for a number of industries (as generated by ChatGPT) are listed below. Higher Education industry for example is predicted to undergo huge challenges in terms of academic integrity with Generative AIs like ChatGPT allowing students to answer a wide range of traditional assessments like assignments, online exams, quizzes and essays.
Customer service as another example has potential to be powered by Generative AI through Chatbots and virtual assistants which can help offer more personalized and efficient customer service. E-commerce is expected to go through transformations with Generative AI allowing to tailor product suggestions and generating compelling product descriptions. In Healthcare, Generative AI has potential to help with several processes like medical diagnosis and drug discovery, medical imaging, clinical description support, and health risk assessment.
In Finance sector, Generative AI seems to have various applications such as analysing financial data, detecting investment opportunities, and aiding in the detection of fraudulent activity. In construction sector, Generative AI can be used for various applications such as building design, material selection, planning for safety and evaluating environmental impacts.
The question “What transformation it is making on industry?” was asked from ChatGPT, a large language model trained by OpenAI (February 27, 2023), and here is what it responded “As an AI language model, my capabilities are primarily focused on generating text based on the input I receive. I am not capable of directly transforming industries on my own. However, I am part of a broader ecosystem of Generative AI tools and technologies that have the potential to transform industries in a number of ways”.
Although ChatGPT and other Generative AI platforms have significant potential to revolutionise industries, they will present several challenges such as legal and ethical. According to ChatGPT, a large language model trained by OpenAI (February 27, 2023), Generative AIs also have several limitations, for example content provided by Generative AI are normally not verifiable. Data quality is another limitation. Generative AI tools learn from massive amounts of data, and the quality of that data plays a significant role in its output quality. In specific industries such as finance and healthcare, where legal and regulatory compliance is of high importance, it is essential to ensure that Generative AI models are built and deployed in accordance with the relevant standards and regulations.
Overall, while Generative AI platforms such as ChatGPT have significant potential to transform industries, it is imperative to carefully address several challenges they bring about in order to maximize their benefits and minimize the corresponding risks.
