Artificial Intelligence: Is it the Future of Education?

The artificial intelligence is always an exciting and hot topic in the field of education. By looking at the uses of AI in day-to-day life, it is quite smooth to believe that Artificial Intelligence can remodel the classroom ambiance. Some may claim that artificial intelligence will transform and make education way better, while others may be afraid of artificial intelligence will take over education to the detriment of teachers and students.

Let’s think about our classroom itself, we come across numerous time-engrossing tasks such as placing a convenient additional activity for students to differentiate,assisting with more creative and reviewing assessments and fascinating learning skills and finding time to work with each student and conferencing. With the use of artificial intelligence, such tasks can be made simple.

Even though we’re far away from viewing robots within the classroom, AI is building its way into education. Let’s consider the example of Grading,Artificial intelligence could assist instructors with assessing student’s grade and streamline the evaluating procedure, with the additional advantage of having the option to rapidly take the information and give an investigation to educators, so that time can be saved and utilized for more classroom interactions.

Man-made consciousness could be utilized to customize the training experience for students. Projects that utilize man-made  consciousness, can go about as mentor for students by figuring out what every student is battling with and conveying customized mediation, similarly as a teacher would. Robots could some time or another give one-to-one mentoring or training meetings to bring
struggling students up to speed. It can also help with student’s accomplishment,ensuring that every student has the chance to learn and develop, profiting by the quicker responses through AI. This sort of computerized reasoning isn’t sci-fi, either. We can hope for even more artificial intelligence in the classroom soon.

All these considered things will be useful for teachers. Teachers in the near future will be able to bank on artificial intelligence to determine each student’s need and deliver desired embellishment, rather than contributing parcel of time for separate distinctive guidance for each student.

But what will be the teacher’s role in this robotic future classroom?
Nevertheless, there has been concern expressed for what AI could mean for Education: would AI cause the substitution of educators? Numerous educators stress that man-made brainpower will either take their employments or reduce teachers to mere robots themselves. I think Teachers need not worry about robots taking over schools at any point in the near future. Man-made consciousness can teach students the skills or reinforce difficult concepts for battling students, but it can’t supplant a human teacher.
Human educators will be consistently needed to deal with the classroom ambiance and to give students the support they need. A vital part f training for youngsters is teaching them social-passionate abilities. While man-made brainpower programs have proven, that they can instruct the students to read or do the math, teaching social and emotional skills is more complex. That sort of adaptive learning needs the human touch that no one but teachers can provide.

Compiled By:

Prof. Sneha N. Gauns Dessai
(Assistant Professor,SRIEIT)

Artificial Intelligence and Music (AIM)

Artificial intelligence is prevalent in everything from the production of songs and albums to how we listen to our tunes on streaming platforms.Most of the literature on the “Artificial Intelligence” speaks it’s relevance with thefields like medicine,engineering,stock market,robotics,vision, pharmaceuticals, speech processing, natural language processing, etc.Perhaps less popular is the contribution of AI in the field of music.Artificial intelligence and music (AIM) has been commonly used subject in many conferences and workshops like International Computer Music Conference , International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence etc. which begun around in 1970’s. The current research in AIM deals with application of AI in music composition, performance, and digital signal processing.

Many music programs/softwares have been developed that use AI to produce music. These are used in composing music notations i.e. music composition (can refer to an original piece or work of music, either vocal or instrumental, the structure of a musical piece, or to the process of creating or writing a new piece of music.), for digital recording(audio signals picked up by a microphone or other transducer or video signals picked up by a camera or similar device are converted into a stream of discrete numbers. To play back a digital sound recording, the numbers are retrieved and converted back into their original analog waveforms so that they can be heard through a loudspeaker.), to create electronic music (telharmonium, Hammond organ, and the electric guitar), and many other musical applications.

  • How does AI create Music ?

The famous British computer scientist, Alan Turing was the first person to record the computer-generated music which comprised of a machine that covered almost the entire floor of a lab. This AI process of creating music begins by analyzing data from various compositions. Then using reinforcement learning, the algorithm learns the characteristics and patterns in these compositions. Many companies have invested in future projects where AI will assist the musicians in composing musical notations. Google’s Magenta project, an open-source platform, produced songs written and performed by AI and Sony developed Flow Machines, an AI system that’s already released “Daddy’s Car,” a song created by AI.

  • Will AI beat our musicians ?

Yes ! AI can produce a replica of the sound of an artist. And Yes days are not too far when AI-generated music will become the mainstay on the radio stations.

For years, programs like Pandora and Amazon Music have used mathematical algorithms to predict the songs that are likely to appeal to an individual user. And AI has actually become a part of the songwriting process, using programs like Watson Beat, Amper, that consumes  a “training set” of data, maps the relationships between the songs and then produces new written materials. With all of these techniques still a question remains, that is, “Can AI create better music than human beings can?”.

Of course, any answer to this question relies on what makes music “good.” We might define good music as “music that produces a strong empathetic emotional response (euphoria, nostalgia, sadness) in an individual.” If that’s the case, then there’s actually a strong argument that AI can indeed create better music than human beings can, by leveraging individual user-level preferences in order to manufacture truly personalized music.

  • What is Shazam?

Shazam is one of the first consumer-used AI services. Now apart of the Apple family, The application can identify music, movies, advertising, and television shows, based on a short sample played and using the microphone on the device.Shazam is available on android, macos and many more. In 2013, Shazam did a partnership with Saavn, an Indian online music streaming service. This deal added huge number of songs in Indian languages to Shazam’s database.

The AI revolution is here! Few companies that are leading the charge are AivaTechnologies(Luxembourg), Amper Music (NewYork), ASAII (Berkeley), Brain.FM (Chicago), Landr (Los Angeles) &Melodrive(Berlin).

Although AI is takingover the traditional music procedures, there are many musicians who feel that the onset of AI won’t end human art, but spur a new golden era of creativity.While obstacles like copyright complications and other hurdles have yet to be worked out, musicians working with AI hope that the technology will become a democratizing force and an essential part of everyday musical creation.

 

Compiled By:

Prof. Prajakta Tanksali,

Assistant Professor, Department of Information Technology

How AI Responds To COVID-19 ?

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected the world in rapid and unpredictable ways. The dramatic increase in cases, coupled with alarming death rates in countries like Italy have taken the modern global economy into new and uncharted waters. The AI industry has wasted no time in assembling its resources to help combat the disease and I would like to present a survey of AI use cases and trends that have been exposed by the global COVID-19 response so far.

 

Chatbots

COVID-19 is prompting companies to adopt AI call center solutions and customer service centers are experiencing an unprecedented increase in overall call volume. LivePerson (AI-powered conversational platform) says it has observed “significant” increases in volume on its conversational platform. WeChat, operated by China’s Tencent provides access to free online health consultation services, and Microsoft along with the CDC have built an AI-powered COVID-19 chatbot designed to help you figure out whether you need to go to the hospital.

 

Fever detection

China is using facial recognition technology and temperature detection software from SenseTime to identify people who might have a fever and be more likely to have the virus.An AI system developed by Chinese tech company Baidu uses an infrared sensor and AI to predict people’s temperatures is now in use in Beijing’s Qinghe Railway Station.

 

Traffic monitoring

AI powered image analysis is being used to study how traffic volume and patterns have been affected by COVID-19 containment efforts in the UK. Vivacity Labs, a startup that makes camera-based traffic sensors discovered a 30% decrease in pedestrian traffic before stay-at-home orders were announced. They were also able to also analyze the distance between pedestrians, revealing 28% fewer interactions between pedestrians over 2 meters apart.

 

CT diagnosis speed

Multiple companies are using computer vision AI to improve the speed and accuracy of CT scanning technologies. Imaging departments in healthcare facilities are being taxed with the increased workload created by the virus, and the hope is that AI-powered diagnosis systems can provide accurate virus diagnostics seconds.

 

 Prediction of medications

BenevolentAI is using AI systems to develop drugs to treat COVID-19. They claim to have used their predictive capabilities to propose existing drugs that might be useful within weeks of the outbreak. DeepMind is taking a different path to drug discovery by using AlphaFold. AlphaFold is studying genome sequences ( available for COVID-19) to predict the properties of resulting proteins. These proteins may provide insights into possible therapies.

 

Prediction of survival rates

Initial results using clinical data from Tongji hospital in Wuhan, have used AI to predict survival rates with more than 90% accuracy. The work was done by researchers from the School of Artificial Intelligence and Automation, as well as other departments from Huazhong University of Science and Technology in China.

 

 

 

                                                                                            By:Prof. Melancy Mascarenhas

                                                                                             Assistant Professor,

Department of Information technology

                                                                                             

Secrets of Mobile Photography

Before smartphones came into existence, people is to buy a fancy camera and editing software for desktop computer, and invest some serious time and energy into learning how to use them.

Today, we have different smartphones coming from different brands having different camera setup. Smartphone companies are focusing on building a good smartphone with better camera. It is easier for us to take high quality photos and edit them using different editing apps available from google play easily through smartphones apart from making calls, chatting and surfing.

If you are passionate about photography then here are some ways in which you can improve your mobile photography.

  1. Use gridlines to balance your shot.

One of the easiest and best ways to improve your mobile photos is to turn on the camera’s gridlines. If you place points of interest in these intersections or along the lines, your photo will be more balanced.

  1. Set the focus and focus on one subject.

Today’s smartphones automatically focus on the foreground of your frame. To adjust where you want your camera lens to focus, tap the screen where you want to sharpen the view. Subject should not fill the entire frame and two-thirds of photo should be negative space.

  1. Find different perspectives.

Try taking photos from unique and different angle which will make them memorable. Also try taking a photo directly upward and playing with the sky as negative space.

  1. Play with reflections.

Seeing the sky reflected in a body of water. There is a reason why we love seeing that because our eyes are drawn to reflections. So look for opportunities to play with them in photos.

  1. Use leading lines.

There is a line that draws the viewer’s eye toward a certain part of the frame. Those are called leading lines. Leading lines are great for creating a sense of depth in an image.

  1. Look for symmetry.

In photography, symmetry usually means creating an image that can be divided into two equal parts that are mirror images of each other.

  1.  Avoid zooming in.

Zooming in makes the photo appear grainy, blurry or pixelated. Avoid zooming. Instead, try to get closer to your subject. But, if you are taking a photo of wild animal take the photo from a default distance and crop it later.

  1. Use natural light.

Take advantage of the sources of natural light whenever and where you can.

  1. Take candid.

Candid photos are better able to effectively capture the emotion and essence of a moment. Candid shots of people doing things, or people with people, can be far more interesting.

  1. Keep practicing and learn from your mistakes.

If you want to improve your photography skills, take as many photos as possible. Experiment with different aperture, shutter speed and ISO settings. Learn from your mistakes and keep clicking.

 

Compiled By: Prof. Saiesh Prabhu Verlekar

Asst. Professor

Department of Information Technology

SRIEIT, Shiroda

Fitness and Living

Fitness is a state of health and well-being and, more specifically, the ability to perform aspects of sports, occupations and daily activities. Physical fitness is generally achieved through proper nutrition, moderate-vigorous physical exercise, and sufficient rest.

Before the industrial revolution, fitness was not considered essential as most of the activity was done physically without undue fatigue. However, with advances in technology and changes in lifestyles physical fitness is now considered a measure of the body’s ability to function efficiently and effectively in work and leisure activities, to be healthy, to resist hypo-kinetic diseases, and to meet emergency situations.

There are so many reasons why regular activity boosts your health. We know that staying active is one of the best ways to keep our bodies healthy. But did you know it can also improve your overall well-being and quality of life?

Here are just a few of the ways physical activity can help you feel better, look better and live better. Because, why not?

It’s a natural mood lifter.

Regular physical activity can relieve stress, anxiety, depression and anger. You know that “feel good sensation” you get after doing something physical? Think of it as a happy pill with no side effects! Most people notice they feel better over time as physical activity becomes a regular part of their lives.

It keeps you physically fit and able.

Without regular activity, your body slowly loses its strength, stamina and ability to function properly. It’s like the old saying: you don’t stop moving from growing old, you grow old from stopping moving. Exercise increases muscle strength, which in turn increases your ability to do other physical activities.

It helps keep the doctor away.

Stand up when you eat your apple a day! Too much sitting and other sedentary activities can increase your risk of heart disease and stroke. One study showed that adults who watch more than 4 hours of television a day had an 80% higher risk of death from cardiovascular disease.

Being more active can help you:

  • lower your blood pressure
  • boost your levels of good cholesterol
  • improve blood flow (circulation)
  • keep your weight under control
  • prevent bone loss that can lead to osteoporosis

All of this can add up to fewer medical expenses, interventions and medications later in life!

It can help you live longer.

It’s true, 70 is the new 60… but only if you’re healthy. People who are physically active and at a healthy weight live about seven years longer than those who are not active and are obese. And the important part is that those extra years are generally healthier years! Staying active helps delay or prevent chronic illnesses and diseases associated with aging. So active adults maintain their quality of life and independence longer as they age.

Here are some other benefits you may get with regular physical activity:

  • Helps you quit smoking and stay tobacco-free.
  • Boosts your energy level so you can get more done.
  • Helps you manage stress and tension.
  • Promotes a positive attitude and outlook.
  • Helps you fall asleep faster and sleep more soundly.
  • Improves your self-image and self-confidence.
  • Helps you spend more time outdoors.

So, this is easy! Just move more, with more intensity, and sit less. You don’t have to make big life changes to see the benefits. Just start building more activity into your day, one step at a time.

 

 Compiled By: Prof. Bipin Naik

Assistant Professor

(IT Department)

 

Out-bursting Fear

Using subconscious mind to remove fear

It has been said that people’s greatest enemy is fear. Fear is behind failure, sickness, and poor human relations. Millions of people are afraid of the past, future, old age, insanity and death. But fear is a thought in your mind. This means that, you are afraid of your own thoughts.

A small child can be paralyzed with the fear when a playmate says there is a monster under the bed who will grab him in the night. But when the parent turns on the light and shows him there is no monster, he is freed from the fear. The fear in the mind of the child was every bit as real as if there was really a monster there. He was healed of a false thought in his mind. The thing he feared does not exist. In the same way, most of your fears have no reality, they are merely a conglomeration of shadows and shadows have no reality.

When one affirms positively, that I am going to master my fears, and you come to a decision in your conscious mind, you release the power of subconscious mind, which flows in response to the nature of your thought.

In this article we will deal with the fear of stage fright.

To understand how to use power of subconscious mind for banishing stage fear we will go through the case study of Janet R., a young opera singer whose career has been side-tracked by a terrible case of stage fright. When she was invited in the auditorium for a major role in opera production, she realized that it might be well a last chance at success. Yet her stage fear was as powerful as ever. Unless she managed to deal with it. She knew she would fail once again.

The way she overcame her fear was to isolate herself in a room and to do her best to relax both her body and mind. To counteract the fear suggestion that dominated her subconscious mind, she repeated slowly, quietly, and with feeling the words, “I sing beautifully, I am poised, serene, confident, and calm.” She repeated these words from five to ten times at each sitting. By the end of one week she felt poised and confident. When the time came, she gave an outstanding audition. If you adapt this procedure to your situation and carry it out sincerely and confidently, the death of fear is certain.

This article is written as a appreciation for one of our first year student who is my mentee who took the courage to discuss her fear of stage fright got guidance and method and she then participated in presenting vote of thanks for event and now bumming with new found confidence innate in her.

 

REFRENCE: THE POWER OF YOUR SUBCONSCIUOS MIND BY Dr. Joseph Murphy.

 

 

Compiled By: Prof.Veda Kamat Mhamai

Assistant Professor,

Department of Science & Humanities 

 

Robotics: Shaping Our Future

It’s easy to get an impression of the way robots are changing our daily lives for instance, Amazon’s Vision of Drone Deliveries Now Involves medicines. In a catastrophic situation like COVID-19 such drones assist humans in many ways delivering food, medicines also in surveillance.

1. Robots in home-automation:

Cloud-connected home robots are already becoming part of our lives. We can set up the vacuum robotic cookers are able to fry, steam, bake, slow cook, and perform any other action without our intervention. We just set them up. These cloud-connected robots (ie alexa) are likely to evolve into more advanced version. We expect to see speech in the upcoming years. These developments may end up changing the entire look and feel of our homes!

2. Robots as Co workers:

In a manufacturing sector robot play a vital role in assisting humans and reducing man power also give precise work. Jobs like painting a car assembling sorting can be done at a high rate.

3. Robots in Warfare:

Robotics with machine vision has lead to development of war bots which assist the army navy and air force for military tactical operations. UGVs (Unmanned Ground Vehicle) help in assisting the army for hazardous operations like bomb defusing surveillance in a area of high radiation also giving a cover fire. Organization’s like DRDO are working towards developing such bots for defense system.

4. Robots in Healthcare:

We’re looking into a different future for healthcare, too. Instead of visiting a primary care physician who will give us a check-up with a simple stethoscope, we’ll have
intelligent robots performing these tasks. They will interact with patients, check on their conditions, and evaluate the need for further appointments. ECG scans X-ray reports could be more precise in detection with artificial intelligence. Robots also assist surgeons in carrying out risky surgeries.

So the question is will robots take our jobs?

The answer is “NO”, Robots are made only to assist humans and reduce human labor. They won’t take over human employment totally instead it will generate employment many robotics start-ups are emerging. Thus i can conclude that Robotics is a way to bright future!

By:Prof.  Diksha Gaonkar

Assistant Professor, ETC Dept,
S.R.I.E.I.T

HIGH IMPACT TEACHING SKILLS

Impacting student’s life is a major goal of a good teacher in the society. Effective Teaching doesn’t depend only the delivery during the lecture but also the time utilized by a teacher in doing a thorough preparation of the study material. There are various things which we need to follow in order to have a high impact on students learning and teachers teaching, The three key areas that make the required impact are

Creating high Impact Teaching involves

  • Creating a positive first impression.

In today’s high paced professional world creating first impression are vital to gain trust of our audience and establishing professional credibility. It is critical that our audience sees us as real, believable, and trustworthy. The guidelines to be followed are

  • Be Ourselves and show our uniqueness
  • Capitalize on our strengths
  • Relax and the audience will relax
  • Focus on our training goals.

 

  • Presenting Complex information clearly.

A good presentation to clearly explain a technical or complicated subject. Always consider the topic from the audience ‘s point of view. The guidelines to be followed are

  • Determine the method of organisation to be used.
  • Narrow the subject to key points or steps.
  • Consider the level of expertise of the audience
  • Keep Language simple
  • Use analogies or illustrations to simplify concepts.

 

  • Communicating with greater impact.

Presenting material allows full expression and lets the audience hear and see emotional concept of the message. Presentation of message becomes even more important way to deliver a message with impact. The guidelines to be followed are

  • Deliver with ownership and feeling- word emphasis, Pauses, Pacing, Voice modulation, Phrasing
  • Maintain eye contact with audience
  • Avoid being tied to a script or lecture
  • Use expressions and gestures.

 

  • Responding to Difficult classroom situations.

One of the greatest mistakes we can make is to lose composure when in pressure situations. As individuals in positions of influence, what we say, how we say, and how we respond to what we deem difficult situations can have an effect on how others see our technical competence and ability to teach.

The guidelines to be followed are

  • Decide on key positive communication messages
  • Anticipate possible questions
  • Prepare supporting evidence
  • Avoid appearing defensive
  • Pay particular attention to grooming

 

  • Motivating others to Action.

The purpose of most professional presentations is to get action of some kind: a commitment from a student to learn, a clear next step in the midst of a long project, a team decision to change direction and so on. Even presentations that seem to be simple updates call for some decision or action from someone. The guidelines to be followed are

  • Identify the action the audience is to take.
  • Determine how this action will benefit them.
  • Write out key points of the message.
  • Select a personal incident to substantiate the key points.
  • Use convincing language.

 

Compiled By: Prof. Sweta Kamat

Assistant professor, Computer Engineering

S.R.I.E.I.T.

Women safety in India

Not a single day goes without the news of a crime  against women in India being heard. Watching the    state of women’s protection in India, a country where women get the reputation of goddesses, is  particularly painful. The sum of violence against women has risen by several times, owing to the increased presence of women in every field of life.  Every day and every minute some women of all walks of life (a mother, a sister, a wife, young girls, and girl baby children) are getting harassed, molested, assaulted, and violated at various places all over the country.

This is a positive indication that the society’s patriarchal mind set has changed to some extent but not to the extent it was supposed to. It is the same set of minds that restricts women to go out and work making them a domesticating tool. It is the same group of minds that views males as superior than females and always try to dominate the women folk.

There is a relatively long list of violence against women. Acid attack in different parts of the nation is becoming very frequent. The attacker throws acid onto the victim’s face to completely ruin their lives. The wife stays in an abusive relationship because of the fear of society. In the name of honor the family kills its daughters to keep up with their family’s image. Likewise, one more extreme crime is female foeticide. Men destroy daughters before they are conceived, because of the regressive mindset.

Other crimes also include child marriages, rape, dowry deaths, eve assault, sexual abuse, rape, violence against women at home. The list continues with the rise in crimes against women. This is one of the key reasons why violence in India is growing and women’s safety in India is a problem.

Indian judiciary’s sluggish speed of service is another big explanation for the increased offences against women in India. India’s police are in some cases inefficient and impartial and that is why the investigation process takes a long time to deal with cases of violence against women. Most women do not come forward in the name of social pressure and embarrassment, and report the matter to the police. It is one of the many reasons that the number of recorded cases is smaller than the real amount of violence against women occurring.

To improve the protection of women in India the first challenge is to increase the number of women in all spheres of society. Along with that, people’s changing mind set is very important to women’s safety. Men should be taught about respecting females from family to educational institutions. In addition, there should be fast-track courts to hear the cases and the cases should be investigated in a time bound manner. Only strict laws cannot solve the issue of women’s safety in India, but they can solve the issue to a large extent by enforcing these laws in a time-bound manner.

To conclude, crimes against women are halting our country’s progress. We must not put the blame on women and ask them to be extra careful. Instead, we must ask the men to change their thinking and work to make the world a safer place for women.

 

 

 By: Prof. Veena Gaonkar

Assistant Professor (ETC Department)

SRIEIT -Shiroda

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and consciousness

Today Artificial intelligence (AI) has got many applications in society. The form of AI known as “weak AI” consists of programs which carry out tasks in fields like robot control, medical diagnosis, e-commerce, remote sensing etc. Self-driven cars, translation machines, chatbots etc. also make use of AI. One question that may be raised is: Can AI in the future become actually conscious or self aware? Is it possible that after reaching a high level of sophistication, the AI system could attain self-awareness?

Although the AI may be able to simulate conscious behaviour or self awareness, it is highly unlikely that it can actually become conscious at any time. This means that an AI system can only pretend to be conscious, but it cannot actually be conscious in the way human beings (or even other living beings) are. Currently there are robots that interact with human beings and are very intelligent in their behaviour, and appear to be almost conscious. The current viewpoint of modern science is that the human mind involves nothing more than the biophysical functioning of the brain. The terms that are normally applied to human personality eg. consciousness, perception, meaning, purpose, and intelligence are defined in entirely mechanistic terms. Current science assumes that a living being is just a highly complex machine made up of molecular components.

But, there is huge difference in a highly advanced machine (AI) and a human being performing the same activities. For example, when a person reads a book, he becomes aware of various thoughts and ideas in the book, and is consciously aware of the plot of the story. They can also experience emotions like thrill, sadness, joy etc. All these are corresponding to the higher-order abstract properties of ink patterns on the paper. But actually, these abstract properties do not exist in the book itself, and the book itself is not conscious of its contents. When a robot equipped with a camera and image processing units “reads” the book, it only analyses the patterns of ink on paper and can carry out many tasks which are only mechanistic in nature: e.g. OCR output, count the words, translate the content, correct spelling and grammar etc.

This is a sign of intelligence, but the machine does not possess conscious behaviour as it cannot experience thrill, or joy or sadness in the way a human being can, because there is no actual understanding of the “plot” or storyline in the true sense. Hence to establish a correlation between the ink patterns and the conscious awareness of its contents, there must be a conscious entity with intelligence and senses who can actually read the book. But a machine which is an is made of entirely mechanistic construction cannot have this correlation, no matter what the level of sophistication. Then what is that conscious entity within the human being which makes that correlation possible? A mechanistic explanation of consciousness will lead to infinite regress. Hopefully, more research into a new realm of science, which is non-mechanistic in nature may provide us with answers in the future.

 

By: Prof. Mayur V. Gambhir

Assistant Professor, Electronics and Telecommunications