You have most probably heard of AI or artificial intelligence. You hear it being used as a theme in movies like "The Terminator" and other stories set in a technologically-advanced world, you read it on books and you even see it on the branding of several products such as smartphones. There is what is called "AI photography," "AI gaming," and a lot of other things branded as "AI."

Even in gaming, AI is plastered all over, In the world of online gambling, the top online betting apps such as Betway India make use of "AI" to run their betting apps without the need to be manually controlled by a human. However, are the things that people call AI nowadays really what AI is? Are these things really what makes AI intelligent? What is AI, and how does it work?

Here are the things you need to know about AI, and what makes it the same or different from what the world has right now.

What is AI?

AI or artificial intelligence, by its technical definition, is machine intelligence that is artificially created, unlike human intelligence that comes with life itself. In the shortest definition, AI happens when a man-made machine starts to acquire the ability to "think" and act like a human with intelligence.

Outside of how fiction depicts AI, what people call "AI" is now being used in several industries such as in the smartphone industry, in robotics, in various tech devices, in cybersecurity, and a lot more.

However, scientists and experts believe that what people call "AI" today is not AI. For them, artificial intelligence is not as intelligent as we believe. As they put it, we are still far from realizing the real AI.

What do we have, if not AI?

If what we have right now called "AI" is not the real deal, what is it then? Scientists and technology experts all agree that the "AI" that most people know right now is simply a matter of automation.

Rather than a self-thinking and self-evolving artificial entity, what we have now are just groups of programmed processes that are set to be executed upon a given trigger, condition, or command. It automates tasks and does the work for humans, but the program cannot learn nor "think" for itself. It still needs to be programmed and coded to respond accordingly.

However, the good news is that automation is the foundation of artificial intelligence. This means that although AI is still not within our hands right now, we have something that is the core of AI–all it needs now is a building and improving to eventually become the real thing.

Thus, rather than being called "artificial" intelligence, what exists today can be more appropriately called "augmented intelligence." The question, then, would be…

Will real AI be a thing in the future?

The short answer to this question is yes, real AI would be a thing in the future. However, the right question should not be a matter of if it would come but rather, a matter of when it would come. Although all of the developments of science and technology point to the eventual birth of real AI, no one knows for sure when human intelligence can create artificial intelligence.

Only time can tell. It can be in a few years, several years, a decade, several decades, or it could be as fast as next year. No matter what, when AI comes–and it will come–it will revolutionize the way modern life is lived and change the way people see technology forever.