Human Thinking vs. AI

It all started when…

A client engaged LexPro Research LLC to screen several senior executives, who were previously screened by another firm that found “no records.”

The executives all lived in Connecticut, where no records were found. However, for the past 20 plus years all the executives have worked in New York City. Using their human brains and thinking, LexPro Research’s highly trained and professional staff knew to conduct research in that jurisdiction as well. The additional research revealed one executive had a criminal record in New York.

The previous screening by another firm appears to have been performed with very little care or thought – likely because it was based on an automated screen scraping algorithm that only saw Connecticut addresses thus searches were only conducted there. Moreover, not all public records are available electronically or online. In many cases, manual field record searches are imperative; followed by human analysis, to assess relevance and accuracy.

A year later, the client asked LexPro Research to refresh, or update, the background check. LexPro Research again uncovered the same executive was charged with another offense in New York. Again, the record would not have been found if the search was only conducted in Connecticut, where he still lived.

While computers, the internet, and artificial intelligence (AI) can all be wonderful things, they need to be augmented with actual human thinking. And not to put too fine a point on it, but artificial intelligence (AI) is just that – artificial, false, fake, reproduced, simulated, imitation – and not genuine intelligence.

Searching in only one area – because that is only what the computer algorithm “sees” – can leave blind-spots or gaps in the research.

LexPro Research’s holistic approach is what sets it apart.