Algonquin College hosts conference on Artificial Intelligence
Posted on Thursday, May 24th, 2018
Welcome to the 4th Industrial Revolution.
That, in a nutshell, was the overarching theme at a day-long conference on Artificial Intelligence held Thursday at Algonquin College. The conference, entitled Impact AI, was hosted by MindBridge.
More than 500 people attended to hear a series of panel speakers – including Navdeep Bains, Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development – offer differing perspectives on how AI will affect everything from health care and education to government, legal, and banking services.
“We are now facing the 4th Industrial Revolution,” said Eli Fahti, the chair of Impact AI and the CEO of MindBridge, setting the tone for the event in a speech emphasizing need for Canada to be a leader in AI, and Ottawa as a key centre in the research, development, and application of artificial intelligence.
College President Cheryl Jensen touched on that theme in her remarks opening the conference, observing that there is no better place to gather for a discussion of AI and its impact than Ottawa. “We have a tremendously supportive ecosystem for AI here in Ottawa and that extends right across our country, with Canada leading the way in AI,” she said.
“Our capital is a thriving and internationally recognized technology hub that is anchored by multinational giants, home-grown successes and so many high-growth start-ups that it is impossible to mention them all. We’re also one of the world’s top sites for R&D, particularly in software and telecommunications. Most of our post-secondaries, hospitals, libraries, research institutes, and municipal facilities are wired for high-speed Internet, giving us a level of connectivity that would be the envy of so many other cities.”
Mayor Jim Watson echoed this view, observing how Ottawa is well-positioned to take advantage of emerging technologies like AI because of its existing high-tech sector and its various post-secondary institutions such as Algonquin College.
“Impact AI is a chance to shine a light on the capital’s AI potential,” he said, noting that the Ottawa area has more scientists and PhD per capita than any other Canadian city. “We continue to welcome the leaders of tomorrow at our great post-secondary institutions.”
The mayor noted that AI is already affecting Canada’s workforce – in industries ranging from health care to education – and noted that Ottawa is poised to be a major player in that change.
The changes – social, economic, and technological – that will come from AI were the focus of various panel discussions over the course of the conference. Speaker after speaker noted that the impact of artificial intelligence converting large amounts of available data to useful information will affect everything from transportation and the delivery of health care to the provision of government services and how young people are educated.
“The challenge for education is really to give Canada the advantage (in AI ) by providing that highly-skilled, innovative, entrepreneurial workforce,” said Chris Janzen, Dean of Algonquin’s Faculty of Technology and Trades, said during a panel discussion on artificial intelligence and higher education. “We need to start thinking about how we’re going to apply AI across all sectors of the economy and society.” Achieving this, he added, requires a “partnership” of educational institutions, business, industry, and government that can “bring us all together.”
Bains told the audience that successive federal governments, Liberal and Conservative, have invested $500 million in AI research over the last decade to ensure that Canada remains a leader in this field. “We’re really, really good at research,” he said, with more than 1,000 researchers across the country involved in AI. And now, the country is increasingly focused on the commercialization of this research with more than 650 different AI-related companies in Canada – a 28 per cent increase over the last year.
“Every conceivable area of our lives is being affected by artificial intelligence,” the minister said, noting area from finance and technology to more traditions areas like mining and agriculture.
“We have a revolution taking place in terms of the role AI, big data and (digital) sensors (are) going to play in the future,” said Rafik Goubran, Vice President (Research and International) at Carleton University. “This will affect each and every way of our life. We have to be ready for this, and we have to prepare the next generation to understand this reality.”
Jacques Beauvais, Dean of Engineering at the University of Ottawa, observed that AI will not only affect what educators teach, but how they teach. One requirement is to “robot-proof” young people, he said, citing Joseph Aoun’s recent book, Robot-Proof: Higher Education in the Age of Artificial Intelligence.
Students, he said, need to be digitally and technologically literate, but they also need “human literacy.” They need to be able to analyze and interpret data to make sense of it and they need to understand how the AI machinery and data gathering works, but “we also need to train them in the humanities, in communication skills, and in design skills.”
“We bear a lot of responsibility for generations we are training now and the ones that are coming,” Beauvais said, arguing that “human literacy” is not being emphasized in the current educational environment to the degree it needs to be.
Fahti, who received Algonquin’s Alumnus of the Year award in 2016, also touched on the educational angle in his earlier speech, saying the AI “revolution” needs a lot more women. He pointed out that women make up only 22 per cent of the workers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEMS) even though they make up 52 per cent of the population, and only 12 per cent in high-tech.
“We want to change that,” he said. “We want to get more women into STEMS.”
Leon Katsnelson, IBM’s director and chief technology officer for strategic partnerships and data science ecosystem, offered a keynote speech saying that while Canada has “done an amazing job of fostering AI,” the rest of the world is catching up.
Canada can’t outspend competitors like China and the United States, so it needs to “outsmart” them, he said, arguing for the need to do more to encourage AI start-ups – “our start-ups are second to none” — and pay less attention to multinationals.
“Today, data is largely controlled by huge Internet companies,” Katsnelson said, noting that without data there is no AI. “We need to figure how to free up more data so that AI can thrive.” He suggested that Blockchain and the spread of digital sensors will provide sources of data that can challenge the Internet giants.
In a panel on AI and healthcare, panelists explored the potential of using artificial intelligence to help people with dementia, monitor physical problems, or even provide diagnoses.
Milos Popovic, Director of Research at the Toronto Rehabilitation Institute, pointed that AI will be able to help families with a member suffering from dementia, including even guiding the person to do things they no longer remember how to do like making a sandwich or even dressing themselves.
Already AI allows for the monitoring of peoples’ physiology and psychology to give a warning about the potential for a heart attack or even a spell of severe anxiety, he said. Even better, through the use of sensors attached to the person’s clothing, AI technologies will allow doctors to “modulate” that person’s condition to possibly prevent something like a stroke or a heart attack.
Other panellists pointed out that AI may well help sustain Canada’s health care system by improving data management, boosting diagnostic research, and monitoring people’s health so that they can stay home rather than take up space in a hospital.
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