[WATCH] Alexiei Dingli: ‘AI is not just doom and gloom, but beware’

I grew up reading science fiction and I remain to this day a sci-fi addict, so the concept of artificial intelligence is not new to me. So, I was very pleased when Alexiei confessed that he actually got into AI because of science fiction. Like me he was fascinated and mesmerised by the worlds created by the likes of Isaac Asimov and Robert Heinlein. But, unlike me, he decided to do something about it. 

“I read or see something amazing, and I think, ‘Can I do it?’ Probably I don’t, but if I manage to do 20% or 30%, it’s already better than nothing,” he says. “Science fiction allows us to dream of what’s possible and what’s coming.” 

Alexiei admits that sci-fi might have given many people a wrong impression of AI. It’s not only about robots gaining awareness and taking over the world, he says. But he does acknowledge that AI will eventually progress to a point where machines gain self-awareness. That is on the cards, he says, although he remains sceptical about machines gaining full sentience any time soon. 

“We still do not fully understand the human brain,” he says. “We might be able to simulate it, but we will not see full machine sentience any time soon.” 

As to his pitch on Shark Tank, Alexiei explains that the aim is to get a machine to process and analyse the data from traffic sensors on our roads, like cameras and tidal lanes, and recommend immediate solutions for a human to approve or discard. He got €1 million on Shark Tank but he will be seeking more investment from the private sector as the project progresses. 

He admits that he had been in talks with the government to obtain funding but says the process was so long, with no guarantee that he would obtain the funding. 

“There was and is no time to waste, and that is why I had to seek private investment,” he says. 

The following is an excerpt from the interview.  

The full interview is also available on maltatoday.com.mt, Facebook and Spotify.  

A question for you that might sound simple, but I reckon is difficult to answer. What is Artificial Intelligence? 

First of all, let me say that AI is not something we have discovered recently, because some people might think that we woke up a few months ago and created AI. Not so. AI has been around since 1957. That is when the term was coined and since then, there has been a lot of research going on worldwide, most of it in labs and universities. But now, it seems to have started to have a heavy impact in our day-to-day life. So, what is AI? The term is made up of two words. ‘Artificial’ means it’s made by humans, something that is not normally found in nature. ‘Intelligence’ is a little bit trickier, because we do not have a definition of intelligence, and this had been haunting those early proponents of AI. So, they decided to define it by association, and they agreed that the foremost entity that exhibits intelligence is the human being, although there are others like ants, social insects, some mammals... we said, if we can get machines – which are artificial beings – to do tasks that are considered to need intelligence, to replicate what a human does, or what an ant colony does, that is considered to be artificial intelligence. However, I must point out that AI is not just one technology, it is a spectrum of technologies. From the dumbest form of AI, the tiny robot opening the blinds in the morning, to the most complex form of AI like self-driving cars. 

I grew up reading science fiction by some of the most famous authors, like Isaac Asimov and Robert Heinlein... 

Me too. 

So, AI is not something new to me, because it has been part of science fiction as far as I can remember. I mean, it seemed like magic to me when I was young. But even in those books, many were afraid of AI, of machines becoming self-aware. Is that where we’re heading? 

I got into AI because of that: I am a fan of science fiction; I read or see something amazing, and I think, ‘Can I do it?’ Probably I don’t, but if I manage to do 20% or 30%, it’s already better than nothing. Science fiction allows us to dream of what’s possible and what’s coming. But it also causes a big problem. Because much of people’s knowledge of AI comes from the movies or books, and as you correctly pointed out, those stories mostly ended up badly for humans. I can think of Teminator and i-Robot to mention but a few. So that skews people’s perception of AI. But, back to your question, you asked me if that’s where we’re heading, I would say, probably yes. I would not go into the issue of sentience, because we still do not fully understand the human brain. We might be able to simulate it, but we will not see full machine sentience any time soon. 

You’ve recently secured a €1 million investment on Shark Tank, a record investment for Malta but also one of the highest investments in Shark Tank worldwide. Your project has to do with traffic management and of course, at its heart, is AI. Can you tell us about it? 

The idea is to utilise the existing infrastructure. If you look at Malta and other countries, many today already use various sensors like cameras, maybe tidal lanes, but these are controlled by humans. Now, there’s nothing wrong with that, but when you have 500 or more these sensors, it becomes a headache. What we’re proposing, and this is what I pitched on Shark Tank, is to replace that part with a digital brain – that’s the AI – which could look at those 500-plus sensors and make decisions. But the decisions are then sent to a human and that person validates the AI’s decisions before implementing them. Because I believe in putting the ‘human in the loop’, so the human will serve as gatekeeper. This will be a collaboration between machines and humans... 

Going by the latest MaltaToday surveys, traffic has been a major concern for quite some time now. The government too acknowledges this and has spent millions in mitigating efforts to ease traffic congestion. And still, it remains a huge problem. So why did you need to seek private investment for your project? 

I went to the authorities, and we were going to start a collaboration. But given the investment needed to see the project through, it was much quicker to seek private investment. Because otherwise we would have needed to apply for funding, which you might not get, then have to look elsewhere, and in the meantime, you’re losing time. And I think that is the one thing we cannot afford to lose. We’re currently assembling a team and aiming to have a demo in six months’ time. 

Traffic aside, how is Malta facing up to this new AI reality? 

We have been one of the leaders in recognising the importance of AI. In 2019, we launched the malta.ai strategy, one of the first worldwide, but one of the most pressing issues we face is the lack of human capital. We are not finding enough people with the right skills, and I fear this problem is only going to get bigger. The National Education Strategy is currently being mapped out and our message to them was that we need to change our education system because of these jobs of the future. Bold decisions are needed. 

Such as? 

Well, for example, digital is still not a subject taught in primary schools. So, we have children born with a pacifier and a tablet, but we are not teaching them how to use those digital tools effectively. And these are the workers of tomorrow and we need to start teaching them now.