Experts: Education needs to catch up with high-tech era, emphasize humanities

As artificial intelligence is increasingly used in a wide range of sectors to upgrade services, including education, mounting efforts are needed to reshape the training and employment market to make the most use of the cutting-edge technology, experts said on the sidelines of the Fifth World Internet Conference.

Harry Shum, executive vice-president of AI and research at Microsoft Corp, said AI is going to enable amazing breakthroughs in areas such as healthcare, agriculture, education and transportation.

"But as we've seen over the past 20 years, new technologies also raise complex questions and important societal concerns. As we look toward a future that will see increasing partnership and cooperation between computers and humans, it is important that we address these challenges head on," Shum said.