Artificial intelligence and the future of our work UNDP

Marking the coming of the fourth industrial revolution, the use of artificial intelligence (AI) is permeating every major industry from healthcare to transportation, education, finance and insurance. The McKinsey Global Institute (pdf) says that AI is contributing to a transformation of society "happening ten times faster and at 300 times the scale or at roughly 3,000 times the impact" of the Industrial Revolution. In the healthcare industry, AI's ability to help clinicians make diagnoses is one major way in which patients are benefiting directly. Technology giant IBM brought AI into the mainstream of healthcare, when it offered its AI platform Watson to cancer centres in 13 countries to aid oncologists in identifying evidence-based treatment options for patients. The promise of AI is not limited to commercial applications.