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The phrase artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare is used to define the application of machine learning (ML) technologies or algorithms to replicate human cognitive abilities regarding the understanding, presentation, and analysis of sophisticated medical procedures and healthcare information. AI was primarily introduced in the healthcare industry to enable clinicians and other healthcare practitioners to accurately and efficiently analyze the association between patient outcomes and clinical techniques and help improve those techniques. Various studies demonstrate that AI has considerably affected the healthcare industry and the QoL in several positive and negative ways. Its impacts on the healthcare industry are evident in cardiovascular, telemedicine, telehealth, electronic health records, dermatology, gastroenterology, infectious diseases, primary care, psychiatry, and pathology (Davenport & Kalakota, 2019). The significance of AI in humanity’s QoL is witnessed in such areas as music and streaming services, banking, credit fraud elimination, navigation and travel, transportation, social media, chatbots, education, digital assistants, and security and surveillance.
Nonetheless, various studies demonstrate the negative impacts of AI on the healthcare industry, QoL, and current and future generations (Bohr & Memarzadeh, 2020). This article discusses AI technology and the mechanisms underlying its workability. We employ quantitative and qualitative research techniques to identify various themes evident in different studies regarding the impact of AI on QoL and the healthcare industry.
The Concept of AI
AI has received enormous attention from various disciplines and stakeholders, including healthcare, engineering, manufacturing, philosophy, economy, and politics. AI is a science of human intelligence that aims to study the understanding, knowledge, and nature of human intelligence. AI strives to make machines similar to human beings by enabling them to comprehend complex mental processes during the thinking process and perform complex calculations. As a result, machines can simulate human behavior and carry out various tasks that could have been performed only by human beings in the past (Davenport & Kalakota, 2019). To understand the concept of AI and its impact on healthcare and QoL, it is essential first to know the types or stages of AI and the mechanisms underlying each type or stage.
Artificial Narrow Intelligence (ANI)
ANI is also known as weak AI. This type of AI involves computerized machines that can carry out only a narrowly defined set of particular activities. At this stage, the AI enabled-machine cannot process any activity that requires thinking and can perform only a set of predefined actions. Numerous examples of weak AI include Google Assistant, self-driving automobiles, Alexa, and Alpha-Go.
Artificial General Intelligence (AGI)
AGI is also known as strong AI. It is the stage in the development of AI where computerized machines are predicted to possess the capacity to think like humans and make informed decisions. Currently, there are no examples of AGI, but various stakeholders believe that humanity will soon develop machines that are intelligent as humans. However, some researchers, such as McLean et al. (2021), believe that strong AI will pose a substantial threat to the existence of humanity. According to Cellan-Jones (2014), Stephen Hawking stated that the development of AGI could mean the distinction of society because strong AI might take off on its own and reprogram and reproduce itself at an alarming rate. Their population would surpass humanity’s because humans are limited by slow biological evolution and would not match AGI.