Artificial Intelligence and You

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.

Steve Shwartz is a serial software entrepreneur and investor, with a PhD from Johns Hopkins university in cognitive science and did postdoc research in AI at Yale. He is the author of the new book Evil Robots, Killer Computers, and Other Myths: The Truth About AI and the Future of Humanity, published by Fast Company Press on February 9. In part 2 of our interview, we talk about "artificial intelligence and natural stupidity" (we had to get that one in eventually, didn't we?), impacts on employment and Steve's take on the Oxford Martin study, and... common sense.

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

Transcript and URLs referenced at HumanCusp Blog.

Steve Shwartz is a serial software entrepreneur and investor, with a PhD from Johns Hopkins university in cognitive science and did postdoc research in AI at Yale. He is the author of the new book Evil Robots, Killer Computers, and Other Myths: The Truth About AI and the Future of Humanity, published by Fast Company Press on February 9. We talk about bias, explainability, and other current problems with machine learning, plus... horse racing.

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

Transcript and URLs referenced at HumanCusp Blog.

We continue the interview with Michael Wooldridge, head of the Oxford University Computer Science department and author of A Brief History of Artificial Intelligence, an introductory look at AI, published Jan 2021 by Flatiron Books. He's been working on AI for 30 years and specializes in multi-agent systems, which we talk about. He's written over 400 articles and nine books, including the Ladybird Expert Guide to Artificial Intelligence. We cover a huge amount of ground, from autonomous weapons and self-driving cars, to Michael's work on multi-agent systems and the potential for my Siri to talk to your Alexa.

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

Transcript and URLs referenced at HumanCusp Blog.