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Artificial Intelligence

Introduction to AI

Welcome to the DACC Library guide on artificial intelligence. The purpose of this guide is to help students understand and explore AI. Browse the tabs to the left to investigate some common questions about AI, such as:

  • What concerns about AI should I be aware of?
  • How will AI affect my career field?
  • How can I use generative AI responsibly?

Disclaimer: Always check with your professor before using AI for an academic assignment. If you are allowed to use it for coursework, be sure to use proper attribution and citation. 

A quick explainer video

Terms in This Guide

  • Artificial intelligence (AI) is a broad term for technology that simulates human intelligence.
  • Bias is a type of error that can occur in a large language model if its output is skewed by the model’s training data. See the Concerns & Considerations tab.
  • Generative AI, which we focus on in this guide, is technology that creates content—including text, images, video and computer code—by identifying patterns in large quantities of training data, and then creating original material that has similar characteristics.
 
Infographic Text

Infographic Title: "Defining Generative AI."

"To understand generative AI (GenAI), we first need to understand how the technology builds from each of the AI subcategories listed below."

Graphic of four blue circles of decreasing size, nested within one another. Each of the four circles provides information about different AI subcategories.

  • Largest circle: "Artificial Intelligence: The theory and methods to build machines that think and act like humans."
  • Third smallest circle: "Machine Learning: The ability for computers to learn from experience or data without human programming."
  • Second smallest circle: "Deep Learning: Mimics the human brain using artificial neural networks such as transformers to allow computers to perform complex tasks."
  • Smallest circle: "Generative AI: Generates new text, audio, images, video, or code based on content it has been pre-trained on."

To the side of the largest blue circle is a small, separate beige circle with supplementary information: "Expert System AI: Programmers teach AI exactly how to solve specific problems by providing precise instructions and steps."

Attribution

Portions of this guide are adapted from a guide at Montgomery College Library, wtih permission.