What does the future have in store for artificial intelligence and data science—not only for the world of investing, but for society more broadly?
Speaking at Bloomberg Invest New York conference on June 5, 2018, Two Sigma co-chairman David Siegel shared his views on some of the key challenges and opportunities these and related technologies present.
Toward human-like reasoning
AI is still in its infancy, Siegel argues, but with digital information proliferating exponentially and raw computing power becoming cheaper and easier to access, progress continues apace. Going forward, he says, “I believe that AI technology will allow far more human-like comprehension and reasoning than we’ve achieved today.”
Still, he cautions that because AI remains so new and experimental, researchers don’t always fully understand why it works so well. And while deep learning algorithms and other forms of AI are extraordinary at finding patterns in data, they still lack a critical element: common sense.
As the science evolves, however, Siegel anticipates AI incorporating something closer to natural reasoning abilities—a step that would help researchers tackle entirely new categories of problems, in investing and well beyond.
AI’s growing reach
The promise—and limitations—of AI and the growing power of data science will have a deep impact on vast swaths of society globally, he says. Clearly, its influence will be felt in domains like self-driving cars and cryptocurrencies. But even sectors like infrastructure and education, where innovation severely lags the state of the art, could see major efficiency gains through the application of AI and data science.
“We’re still in the early days,” says Siegel, “of what these methods can do.”
