AI in Social Studies

The work of the humble weatherman is often not appreciated enough.

To give a 5-minute weather report he and his team often have to work
for hours, analyzing truckloads of data represented in all sorts of maps
and readings. Even so, the weather forecast is more often wrong that
right. This may be okay with mundane weather forecasts being wrong,
but the inability to predict and detect storm surges, tornadoes,
cyclones, etc. in time may lead to devastating loss of life and property.
Part of the problem is that most of the data on which weather forecasts
are based is collected by satellites. While that is an advantage most of
the times, sometimes relying only on satellite data may be a
disadvantage. For example, satellite images are not always capable of
capturing wave formations. These wave formations may be tell-tale
signs of thunderstorms and may be completely missed in weather
forecasts leading to a massive disaster. The sorrowful part here is that
the disaster might have been avoided had the weathermen been aware
of these specific wave formations.
Here, I have presented you with a single example of a type of data that
needs to be collected and examined more frequently. But in reality,
there are many of these, and the tell-tale signs of disasters they
advertise become more prominent once they are combined with other
types of meteorological data. Note also that I am not saying these
procedures are not already in use, but I am saying that their use must
be increased exponentially to see drastic impact. Data needs to be
plentiful.
The solution I have come up with is this: Develop a mobile application
capable of capturing and sending video and photo files to a central
database. Promote people visiting beaches and other seaside
destinations to take a few images and videos through the software and
send it to the database. Also develop seaside modules that contain all
the necessary meteorological equipment to gather relevant data. Beam
this data back to the central database as well. Develop a piece of AI
software that can efficiently and effectively sort through the incoming
data and identify points of interest that may be signs of upcoming
storms. These points of interest then may be thoroughly examined by
human experts and if a storm is found to be approaching, a warning
may immediately be sent to residents of the area.
The advantage of having such a system using AI instead of human
analysts is that the sorting of data can be much more efficient. It would
take humans a long time to sort through all the data only to find a few
measly points of interest. Human bandwidth is put to a much better use
in the detailed investigation of the aforementioned points of interest,
which may actually turn out to be disasters worth preventing. Such a
system of AI and data science combined may end up saving billions of
dollars’ worth in property and uncountable priceless souls every year.