Artificial intelligence (AI) refers to computer programs able to carry out tasks that, until recently, required human intelligence: understanding language, recognising images, summarising a text, answering a question.
One myth to clear up straight away
AI is not a brain and it has no consciousness. It is a statistical system: it has analysed enormous quantities of text and images in order to predict what is most likely to come next. When ChatGPT writes a sentence, it picks, word after word, the most plausible continuation. Nothing magical — but spectacular results.
Three families worth knowing
- “Classic” AI: spam filters, Netflix recommendations, satnav. It has been around for decades.
- Generative AI: it creates brand-new content — text, images, audio, code. This is the revolution of the past few years (ChatGPT, Midjourney and others).
- AI agents: systems that chain actions together to achieve a goal (booking, researching, organising).
Why this matters to you
As a trainer in the making, your first job will be to reassure and clarify. Many people are afraid of AI because they misunderstand it. Being able to explain simply “what it is” and “what it is not” is your first skill.
Key takeaway: generative AI predicts plausible content from examples. Powerful, but fallible — hence the critical thinking we will cultivate throughout this course.