Detect hoaxes and fake news that alarm the population or promote risky behaviors. Identify, track and forecast pandemic outbreaks through large amounts of data from social networks and search engines. Warn each individual of the risk of infection based on their travel, time spent in places where there has been greater exhibition to the virus and possible contact with carriers of the virus. Control the movement of citizens through the geolocation of cell phones to avoid crowds or movements that put others at risk. Accelerate the development of a vaccine. 

These are just a few examples of how artificial intelligence has proven to be a great ally of traditional scientific disciplines, such as epidemiology, in tackling the Covid-19 pandemic we are facing globally. And it also lends a hand in more trivial matters that help us cope with confinement, such as discovering new books, movies and series on entertainment platforms that match our tastes and preferences.

Javier Sánchez Cañizares, PhD in Physics and Theology, director of group of research 'Ciencia, Razón y Fe' (CRYF) and researcher of group 'Mente-cerebro' del Institute for Culture and Society (ICS) of the University of Navarra, explains that the functioning of artificial intelligence has certain similarities with the human mind, and in some aspects it even goes beyond it. 

"There is a variation in the strategies that machines use until they find the most optimized one to solve a problem. They have a greater ability to process data, structure them and find relationships. At final, they can detect solutions that a person would not have thought of." However, one of the differences in our favor "is that there is no proper internalization of the learning process, which humans cando". 

But he warns that, although algorithms are a financial aid, we cannot let ourselves be dazzled by their possibilities, as if it were possible to delegate to them the resolution of all the problems of our societies: "Our supervision is essential. An interaction between human and artificial intelligence and verifications is always needed for the latter to be reliable and truly useful". 

This requires, from agreement with the professor, the presence of expert scientists who know how to interpret those data and ask the appropriate questions to the machines. "We can ask them for predictions on concrete or technical data , but not to decide on what it means to live as people; ethical or moral decisions that belong to us humans."

The challenges of Big Data

As sample, he mentions that a machine could not be asked what is the fastest way to kill the coronavirus, because, in terms of efficiency, its most logical answer could be "to kill humans, since we are the hosts of the virus". 

In addition to the limitation in the subject of questions that artificial intelligence can solve, its use also entails ethical challenges. One of them is the use of large amounts of data (big data) that correspond to individuals. "One seeks to randomize them so that it is not possible to identify who is behind them, but there is always some data that would make it possible to connect all the information to specific people," points out the researcher.

Professor Sánchez Cañizares reminds us that the balance between individual rights and the common good is challenge present in many spheres, not only in artificial intelligence, although this provides a new opportunity for us to reflect as a society on how to combine them. "There are no easy solutions that will work forever; the answers change according to the context," he warns. Thus, he assumes that necessarily "partial solutions must be found, adapted to each case". And we can't find them in machines.

What they can do for us, he emphasizes, is "save us resources and efforts to focus on what is worthwhile, on what distinguishes us as humans: empathize, be grateful, take care of others, learn new things more efficiently...", issues of great relevance at this time. 

By way of example, he reasons that it would be unthinkable that artificial intelligence would have suggested to us the importance of thanking healthcare professionals for their work with the 8 p.m. applause initiative, or the many solidarity proposals that have arisen to help those most in need during confinement. The many solidarity proposals that have arisen to help those who need it most during confinement.

"Artificial intelligence," he concludes, "offers us a financial aid on partial issues that we can raise to a higher level, which is the level of what it means to be people.