"AI will cure cancer" misunderstands both AI and medicine

Post by Spooky23 » Sun, Mar 03, 2024, 8:39 PM UTC

daniel_reetz wrote: post #56

Spooky23 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cancer isn’t one thing and AI is an important tool that will accelerate treatment and drug development. My late wife detected a mole that was melanoma in 2019. She was within months of being cleared for observation in 2023 when two brain tumors were detected. Despite the best of care, she was gone in 6 months. If her initial treatment had been in 2024 instead of 2019, it’s 80% likely she would be around for another d…

Can you elaborate a little on what's new? Someone close to me had a melanoma scare on almost the same time frame, and had a lot of difficulty finding doctors who would take her seriously.

Post by ben_w » Sun, Mar 03, 2024, 8:42 PM UTC

patrickhogan1 wrote: post #3

Saying you'll cure cancer with AI without specifying the type of cancer is like declaring you'll solve crime with Batman. Way too broad to be useful, but makes a good headline.

Post by xetplan » Sun, Mar 03, 2024, 8:44 PM UTC

bugglebeetle wrote: post #29

sxp wrote: post #5

Saying "AI will cure cancer" is like saying "science will cure cancer" or "doctors will cure cancer". In general, all three statements are true about technological progress. > Second, AI is used to disproportionately benefit the privileged while worsening inequality. That's bullshit. Computers and other gadgets always start out as toys of the rich, but they quickly trickle down to everyone else. Compare the multi-tho…

Technology is an amoral form of power that accrues to those who have access to it, as well as have the most access to it. In unequal societies, this accrual is to those who already have wealth, political power, etc. If the opposite was true, as you claim, the most technologically advanced countries would have seen decreasingly inequality in the period you fit. In reality, they’ve only seen the opposite.

Post by dale_glass » Sun, Mar 03, 2024, 8:46 PM UTC

RandomLensman wrote: post #104

yashap wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah that’s wild! I do think proactive medical screening is something most medical systems have mostly given up on, other than in very targeted ways, for very specific diseases in very specific high risk populations. But I don’t think this is because it’s a fundamentally bad idea, I think it’s more that it’s impractical right now. It does seem to me that AI has a chance to make it practical.

If you screen a lot of people for a lot of things, you will find a lot of things, but not all the findings will mean something or require action. The initial ramp up of huge "unwarranted" screenings will create a lot of pain until we/AI figures out when something warrants attention.

Post by ben_w » Sun, Mar 03, 2024, 8:48 PM UTC

bratwurst3000 wrote: post #88

frognumber wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I kind of feel like that's exactly why AI is helpful here: - Grab a cancer (or virus, bacteria, etc.) - Sequence it - AI will develop a custom therapy for that cancer In broad strokes, it's not hard to develop a therapy for any specific cancer or other disease in a specific individual. There are several broad strategies: - A targeted, custom phage to kill a bacteria (or extrapolate to killing a type of cells) - A cus…

It sounds so easy maybe you could be so kind and write a few lines of codes and finally cure cancer