Every once in a while, breakthrough technology emerges that promises to change the normal way of doing things. We saw this with the emergence of the Internet, MP3s, search engines, smartphones, and online streaming. Filipinos, being known worldwide as the most socially active internet users, are aware real-time of emerging trends; it is our government that always fails to adapt to the fast-changing times. We are glad to have a dynamic President right now.
President Bongbong Marcos Jr., with his numerous state visits and his most recent attendance at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, surely learned how foreign countries can be first-movers and capitalize on technology. Luckily, we did not ride on the crypto bandwagon, considering how terrible these coins have fared lately. However, the President may not need to go far for government to make use of artificial intelligence or AI since it is still free online.
You might have heard of ChatGPT, a chatbot that is highly intelligent, nearly as intelligent as a person. It can be accessed through a website where you will be required to enter log-in credentials, then you can ask it anything by typing a question. Moreover, you can ask it to type code for websites, draft legal documents, compose song lyrics, and reply to your messages as if it were your closest confidant.
Think of it as an advanced Siri. ChatGPT can even write this column if I asked it to, sans the humor and Filipino references. But the best part about it is it can learn.
I have been trying out ChatGPT while it is still free. Its developers have already announced a premium service that may be availed of for $20 per month. I am amazed by the intelligence of the software.
Instead of fearing technology, I thought we can capitalize on it for our use. It is as if you have your own writing assistant, whom you can ask to draft memos and perform research. With this, however, some industries need to watch out. For example, the education sector must be prepared since students can easily ask ChatGPT to write essays for them.
I typed on ChatGPT and asked how it can help the government. It replied: (1) Decision Making; (2) Customer Service; (3) Document Generation; (4) Research; and (5) Language Translation. Note that I deleted the explanation for each point since it would make this column too long, but you can imagine how smart this technology is. Imagine if government offices were relieved of the job of having to type long memos, their officers could focus on critical thinking and relationship building.
In the US, a congressman delivered a speech entirely written by AI. It was in support of an AI research center. Although the speech came out to be typical and quite boring, ChatGPT was able to perform an initial draft as if a humorless intern had prepared it. The congressman could have spent time revising it, although he was clearly proving a point by not doing so — that AI can make legislation and governance more efficient.
As someone who keenly follows the Philippine Congress, I am quite aware of the amount of writing done in drafting bills from the initial discussions before the committees until they are sent to Malacañang for its approval. Government can make use of this free technology, or better yet, coordinate with its developers so we can introduce Philippine knowledge and information into AI.
This would translate to better research materials to aid proper decision-making processes for our public officials.
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For comments, email him at darren.dejesus@gmail.com.