Artificial Intelligence and You

What happens when an engineer becomes an angel investor and thought leader in AI? You get Rob May, former co-founder and CEO of Talla, an AI assistant platform, now General Partner at PJC, an early-stage venture capital firm focused on investing in, supporting, and building relationships with entrepreneurs who are creating the future. Rob also writes the world’s most popular newsletter on artificial intelligence – InsideAI.

In part 2, we talk about emotion AI, whether we're in an AI bubble, and what startups should - and shouldn't focus on.

All this plus our usual look at today's AI headlines. 

Transcript and URLs referenced at HumanCusp Blog.

What happens when an engineer becomes an angel investor and thought leader in AI? You get Rob May, former co-founder and CEO of Talla, an AI assistant platform, now General Partner at PJC, an early-stage venture capital firm focused on investing in, supporting, and building relationships with entrepreneurs who are creating the future. Rob also writes the world’s most popular newsletter on artificial intelligence – InsideAI.

We talk about the state of startups in brain-computer interfaces, the role of ethical issues in evaluating startups, and just how Rob made the transition from engineer to investor.

All this plus our usual look at today's AI headlines. 

Transcript and URLs referenced at HumanCusp Blog.

What could it be like inside the mind of an artificial intelligence that has just evolved consciousness? Our guest today has imagined just that.

David Gerrold has written some of the most widely-read and -viewed science fiction of the last 60 years, starting with classic Star Trek's Trouble with Tribbles episode and several other episodes of that and other Star Trek, Babylon 5, Twilight Zone, and other TV series, plus novels such as The Man Who Folded Himself, and series including the War Against the Chtorr and the Dingilliad, winning the Hugo and Nebula awards for the noval The Martian Child.

We focused on his novel When HARLIE Was One, about an AI that became conscious, which develops (more thoughtfully than most such stories) how the interaction with the humans around him changed HARLIE... and them.

All this plus our usual look at today's AI headlines. 

Transcript and URLs referenced at HumanCusp Blog.

What could it be like inside the mind of an artificial intelligence that has just evolved consciousness? Our guest today has imagined just that.

David Gerrold has written some of the most widely-read and -viewed science fiction of the last 60 years, starting with classic Star Trek's Trouble with Tribbles episode and several other episodes of that and other Star Trek, Babylon 5, Twilight Zone, and other TV series, plus novels such as The Man Who Folded Himself, and series including the War Against the Chtorr and the Dingilliad, winning the Hugo and Nebula awards for the noval The Martian Child.

We focused on his novel When HARLIE Was One, about an AI that became conscious, which develops (more thoughtfully than most such stories) how the interaction with the humans around him changed HARLIE... and them.

All this plus our usual look at today's AI headlines. 

Transcript and URLs referenced at HumanCusp Blog.

Lethal autonomous weapons are here, and we're going to see much more of them. What concerns do these raise, and what should we do about them? Those may seem like intractable problems, but Peter Asaro tackles them. He is a professor at the New School in New York, and is a philosopher of science, technology and media. His work examines artificial intelligence and robotics as a form of digital media, the ethical dimensions of algorithms and data, and the ways in which technology mediates social relations and shapes our experience of the world. In the world of autonomous weapons, he works as the co-founder and co-chair of the International Committee for Robot Arms Control.

In part 2 of our interview we talk about that committee and related organizations, what they do to elevate our thinking and governance of autonomous weapons and how they do it, and we discuss the famous Slaughterbots video, plus Peter's documentary, Love Machine.

All this plus our usual look at today's AI headlines. 

Transcript and URLs referenced at HumanCusp Blog.

Lethal autonomous weapons are here, and we're going to see much more of them. What concerns do these raise, and what should we do about them? Those may seem like intractable problems, but Peter Asaro tackles them. He is a professor at the New School in New York, and is a philosopher of science, technology and media. His work examines artificial intelligence and robotics as a form of digital media, the ethical dimensions of algorithms and data, and the ways in which technology mediates social relations and shapes our experience of the world. In the world of autonomous weapons, he works as the co-founder and co-chair of the International Committee for Robot Arms Control.

We talk about just what distinctions are useful when thinking about the regulation of autonomous weapons, seen through the lens of his precise and highly informed thinking.

All this plus our usual look at today's AI headlines. 

Transcript and URLs referenced at HumanCusp Blog.

When you combine anthropologist, filmmaker, and geek, you get Beth Singler, Research Fellow in Artificial Intelligence at the University of Cambridge. Beth explores the social, ethical, philosophical and religious implications of advances in artificial intelligence and robotics and has produced some dramatic documentaries about our relationship with AI: Pain in the Machine and its sequels, Friend in the Machine, Good in the Machine, and Ghost in the Machine.

All this plus our usual look at today's AI headlines. 

Transcript and URLs referenced at HumanCusp Blog.

When you combine anthropologist, filmmaker, and geek, you get Beth Singler, Research Fellow in Artificial Intelligence at the University of Cambridge. Beth explores the social, ethical, philosophical and religious implications of advances in artificial intelligence and robotics and has produced some dramatic documentaries about our relationship with AI: Pain in the Machine and its sequels, Friend in the Machine, Good in the Machine, and Ghost in the Machine.

All this plus our usual look at today's AI headlines. 

Transcript and URLs referenced at HumanCusp Blog.