Limits and Risks of Digital Transformation

Currently, the process of digital transformation is actively going on in the economy, science, education, and society as a whole. This process has a number of restrictions and risks we consider. The mathematical theory of complexity reveals a large class of the restrictions. The exact solution of a number of simple-looking problems with a small amount of input data requires resources many times greater than the capabilities of all available computers.On the "border" between natural and artificial intelligence lies the "cognitive barrier". This, as a rule, makes it impossible to use the results of a number of artificial intelligence systems to adjust our strategies. We and computers "think" differently. They have to be considered as "black boxes". It is very likely that the tester of artificial intelligence systems will become one of the mass professions in the close future.We give examples to show that the "translation" from "continuous" to "discrete" language can lead to qualitatively different behavior of mathematical models. In a number of problems associated with a computational experiment this can be quite significant.Great risks arise when passing to the "fast world", approaching the "Lem's barrier". It happens when artificial intelligence systems are assigned strategically important tasks that they must solve at a speed inaccessible to humans.The analysis shows that managing the risks of digital transformation and its limitations requires the attention of the scientific and expert community, as well as active participants in this process.