Year: 2025
Type: editorial
Abstract: The question, as direct as it is provocative, resonates with increasing insistence in university corridors, professional offices, and boardrooms.The rapid and pervasive rise of artificial intelligence (AI) is shaking the foundations of countless sectors, especially those, like medicine and education, that are built on knowledge, experience, and a deep human connection.The echo of this question has reached our editorial team not from a futuristic article, but from a concrete dialogue I had today with an autonomous AI agent.This experience has forced us to confront the future of our own work directly.Recently, I relied on one of these advanced systems on a task as traditional as it is complex: the scientific review of manuscripts submitted for publication.The experience went far beyond simple proofreading.The AI proved to be a faithful "digital assistant," capable not only of analysing and revising scientific content with remarkable precision but also of creating teaching aids like slides and speaker notes, and even designing the architecture of an entire Distance Learning (FAD) program, complete with webinars, learning tests, and automated evaluation systems.This collaboration has highlighted an undeniable truth: AI tools are evolving from simple conversational assistants to powerful executive agents capable of augmenting our professional abilities in previously unimaginable ways, even if they sometimes hallucinate and introduce elements totally out of context.This brings us to the heart of the matter: are we witnessing a transition toward our replacement or an enhancement of our faculties?The answer, as is often the case, is not binary.It is crucial to clearly distinguish which functions can be delegated to AI and which, instead, remain intrinsically human.Artificial intelligence excels at automating standardised and scalable tasks: it can deliver educational content with consistent quality to thousands of users simultaneously, administer and evaluate objective tests with immediate feedback, and make training materials available 24/7.These are the functions of the "content-deliverer," essential but repetitive tasks that consume precious time and energy.On the other hand, the essence of education and medical practice lies in domains that transcend automation.An expert trainer does not just transmit information; he or she reads the room, senses confusion or interest, adjusts the pace, stimulates debate, and answers complex questions with a flexibility that no algorithm can yet replicate.Personalised mentoring, empathetic support, and the ability to inspire and motivate are profoundly human qualities.Similarly, in clinical practice, the qualitative assessment of a complex case, abductive reasoning in the face of ambiguous symptoms, and the transmission of that practical, almost artisanal experience built over years in the field remain the prerogative of the human professional.The most realistic and fruitful path for the future, therefore, is not one of replacement but of synergy.An emblematic application of this paradigm is found in a crucial activity for our scientific community: peer review.The review process, a pillar of knowledge validation, is notoriously slow, burdensome, and subject to bias.Here, AI can act as a powerful accelerator and a rigorous controller.Intelligent systems can perform a preliminary screening of manuscripts to check for compliance with editorial standards, assess content originality through advanced anti-plagiarism checks, and verify methodological consistency, thereby optimising the assignment process.However, the final judgment on the novelty, clinical relevance, and scientific impact of a work remains firmly in the hands of the human reviewer.In this model of augmented peer review, the AI performs the
Source: La Medicina del Lavoro
Author: Antonio Mutti
Language: English
Subfield: Artificial Intelligence
Field: Computer Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
SDG: Quality education
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W4417360291