IIM Calcutta WAT-PI experience

WAT topic: A lot of scientists think that artificial intelligence has the potential to take over humans. Do you voice the same concern? What are your views?

Started with the fact that the most distinguishing characteristic of Homo Neanderthals, and later us – the Homo Sapiens has been the brain size and the energy consumed by it. We are not the physically strongest species on Earth. What allowed our hunter-gatherer ancestors to tame nature and other animals was the ability to make strategic decisions. Only recently we have started getting competition from the machines we made ourselves.

*Defined artificial intelligence, mentioned how a machine defeated the world champion in Go, also wrote about how AI is replacing even trading jobs, how it has already replaced a large chunk of the manual labour*

Wrote that thinking alone doesn’t set us apart. Even dolphins and elephants can think. What distinguishes us the most is our ability to imagine and talk about things that don’t even exist. This has enable humans to do all innovation. Then explained how AI is taking even that uniqueness from us. Most music experts in USA couldn’t distinguish the original symphonies of Mozart from the one produced by AI.

Concluded that AI is definitely going to take over humans. But instead of being apprehensive about that, we should be eager to experience the new world created synchronously by us and our artificial partners.

Panel:

2 males, 1 female. (M1 in his late forties or early fifties, M2 in his thirties.) F1 had a face that only someone bored of existence can have. M2 looked like someone who was bored of the bullshit interviewees had been telling him.

M1 opened the door and called me in, I went in without saying anything to him. Wished the other panellists good afternoon and took the seat after handing over the documents.

F1 (before I sit properly): Tell me a bad habit of yours.

Me: I am not intuitive at times...

F1: Then how do you make decisions?

Me: This is not something that happens every time. I am not intuitive only in some cases. For example, a friend recently remarked that people in Delhi have very different dressing sense from people of Mumbai. I have stayed in Mumbai for some time. But I never observed this myself before.

Another thing, until recently I used to pronounce the z sound as the j sound. I never got to know that I am pronouncing it differently. It would be ज़ but I would speak it as ज.

M1: Zebra right?

Me: Yes, so I would pronounce Zee News as Jee news. I didn’t even know that these were two different sounds.

F1: I don’t think there is anything bad in it.

M1: I don’t think it’s bad at all. Even Pranab Mukherjee used to pronounce like that.

Me: Sir, maybe not a bad thing but when I found out that during my 22 years of life, I had never even noticed it, I was surpris…

M2 (Going through my certificates of Coursera) to M1: This seems to be an increasing trend.

M1: Do they give proper assignments?

Me: They have assignments, but most of the times they are not necessary. They have quizzes as well at the end of each lecture.

F1: You have taken a pay cut from your previous job. Why is that?

Me: Mam I wanted to have some corporate exposure…

M2: 4 mahine me pata chal gaya corporate me jana h?

Me: I had an ed-tech venture of my own, I took up this job because I wanted to understand the students’ behavior and expectations from a teacher’s perspective. I wanted to understand the ground reality myself. When I felt like I had learned enough I switched to have some corporate exp…

F1: Which specialization do you want to major in?

Me: I haven’t decided on it, I am open towards all, but I am inclined towards Finance due to my Mathematical background.

M2 (hands me over a rough sheet): Write me a formula related to Finance and Mathematics.

Me: [Wrote a formula for present value of money from periodic constant future cash flows, explained the terms]

M2: Draw the curve of Present Value vs the r.

Me: [Drew and explained how]

M2: What if the amount of the constant future cashflows is higher, how will that impact this graph?

Me: [Drew]

M2: How can I find the area under this curve?

Me: Integration. Aise-vaise..

M2: Okay, integrate 1/(1+r)^n

[Done]

M2: For the same future cash flow, will the present value be more for India or for Japan?

Me: Sir Japan has a lower interest rate compared to India, so the rate used for discounting will be less and the present value would be higher.

M2: Why is that? Why is the rate lower for Japan?

Me: Sir Japan is a developed country, so their growth rate is less. That’s why the rate is lower. Japan even had a negative interest rate some times back. So if the rate is around 10 percent for India, it hovers around 2-3% for a developed economy.

M2: Why does this happen? Why does a developed country have 
lower growth rate?

Me: Sir, as a country is developing, after a stage there is a saturation point. They will need intensive capital and much more innovation to continue growing at the same rate.

M2: Is the graph of this saturation concave or convex?

Me: Sir it will be concave downwards like this [Drew]

M2: You are working as a Decision Analyst…F1: What does a decision analyst mean? M2: Kuchh stats vats karte ho?

Me: I haven’t done it till now, but other in ZS do.

F1: You have worked here for only one month.

Me: I am currently working here.

M2: Oh, achha

M2: What is the capital of Cambodia?

Me: I can’t recall.

M2: Where does Cambodia lie?

Me: Sir I can’t recall its geographical location right now. Cambodia has a lot of Hindu temples, it’s famous for this.

F2: You started Edurik Learning Solutions, who is handling it right now?

Me: Spoke for about 2 minutes on it. The idea, my role, market etc..

M1: So it’s your own company?

Me: Yes Sir, I even got it registered as an LLP a while back. (Some more on it)

(M1 and M2 look towards each other)

M2: You didn’t a job from campus?

Me: It was through campus.

M1: Besides it helped him in CAT.

Me: Told him how CAT and JEE are largely unrelated.

M1: Something about Edurik

Me: It was not for CAT. There are already huge players there. I wanted to enter a market which had low competition and low entry barriers.

M2: How many Vedas do we have?

Me: 4

M2: Name all of them.

Me: Rigveda – the name Edurik is actually derived from Rigveda. I took rik from it…

M2: I know, that’s why I asked you.

F1: Continue with the names.

Me: Yajurveda, Samveda, Atharav Veda

M2: What about Ayurveda?

.

.

F1: What kind of books do you like to read?

Me: I like reading things which are mind stimulating and challenge conventional wisdom…

F1: Write the names of five books you have read.

Me: Thinking Fast and Slow..

M2: Who wrote it?

Me: Daniel Kahnmen

M2: Okay, continue

Me: I read 100 years of Solitude some months ago

M2: Who is its author?

Me: I can’t recall the name, it’s Gabriel something. He is Spanish, and the book was also originally written in Spanish. He is a famous author.

M2: He is a famous author.. what is he doing now?

Me: Sir, he died long ago.

M2: Continue with the next book.

Me: The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini.

M2: Where is it set in?

Me: Afganistan

M2: What’s the capital of Afganistan?

Me: Kabul

M2: Continue with the next book.

Me: I have read Think and Grow Rich by Napolean Hill

M2: Where was Napolean from?

Me: USA

M2: No, the original Napolean.

Me: Can’t recall.

M2: What was his last name?

Me: Bonaparte, and Napolean was from France

Wrote and Spoke “Atlas Shrugged”

F1: Who wrote Atlas Shrugged?

Me: Ayn Rand

F1: What is the philosophy of Ayn Rand called?

Me: Objectivism.

F1: Explain Objectivism to me in one line.

Me: I can’t explain it in…

F1: Okay, take two.

Me: [Explained. Also told something thing my takeaways from Atlas Shrugged, the character of Hank Rearden and rational-egoism of Ayn Rand]

M2: Is it a he or a she [for Ayn]?

Me: It’s a she.

M2: Are you sure?

Me: Yes.

M2: When was the book Atlas Shrugged written?

Me: In the 1960s

M2: Tell me some events that happened in the 60s

Me: Jawahar Lal Nehru was no longer the Prime Minister. Indira Gandhi took over. India was having war with China, and Pakistan. Lal Bahadur Shastri died while returning from Tashkand

M2: Okay, that will be all.

M1: Just one thing. Does Rao Edusolutions visit your campus?

Me: Yes Sir.

M1: They recruit engineers, and people take up the job?

M2: Better than digging coal in mines.

I smiled and got out as fast as I could.