But what's really pretentious is the author of this article, who cites their silly anecdote to "prove" that AI can't possibly be as good as a doctor's intuition.
"""The basic defect of artificial intelligence follows from this principle. Using descriptive sketches of mental status drawn from reference books, journal articles, and tests, AI would have got my elderly Lebanese patient all wrong. She knew the French kings and their mistresses, something she learned decades ago perusing her family’s library, but not the name of the recently elected American president. Since knowing the president’s name is standard on most tests of mental status, AI would have mistakenly judged her to have an “intact long-term memory with a loss of short-term memory,” and awarded her the ridiculous diagnosis of “altered mental status,” or even senile dementia. It is why AI cannot replace doctors or other professionals who rely to some degree on intuition. Doing so courts ridiculous outcomes. Indeed, AI is becoming known for its stupid mistakes as much as for its triumphs. Even researchers admit that AI lacks “common sense.”"""
My guess is any true machine learning model for mental status would not make a classification based on a single, absolute data point (inability to state the current, or past president). I would also say that a patient who is unable to state the current president but can list all the French kings and their mistresses is not drawn from a typical distribution- and that may indeed indicate something about their mental status.
But what's really pretentious is the author of this article, who cites their silly anecdote to "prove" that AI can't possibly be as good as a doctor's intuition.
"""The basic defect of artificial intelligence follows from this principle. Using descriptive sketches of mental status drawn from reference books, journal articles, and tests, AI would have got my elderly Lebanese patient all wrong. She knew the French kings and their mistresses, something she learned decades ago perusing her family’s library, but not the name of the recently elected American president. Since knowing the president’s name is standard on most tests of mental status, AI would have mistakenly judged her to have an “intact long-term memory with a loss of short-term memory,” and awarded her the ridiculous diagnosis of “altered mental status,” or even senile dementia. It is why AI cannot replace doctors or other professionals who rely to some degree on intuition. Doing so courts ridiculous outcomes. Indeed, AI is becoming known for its stupid mistakes as much as for its triumphs. Even researchers admit that AI lacks “common sense.”"""
My guess is any true machine learning model for mental status would not make a classification based on a single, absolute data point (inability to state the current, or past president). I would also say that a patient who is unable to state the current president but can list all the French kings and their mistresses is not drawn from a typical distribution- and that may indeed indicate something about their mental status.