What we talk about when we talk about AI [Wendy Grossman]

What we talk about when we talk about AI
Wendy Grossman

We talk about “artificial intelligence” as if it were a single thing, but in reality it’s an umbrella term that can mean anything from a computer program that generates an image from a prompt composed of a few words or automates keeping meetings notes to a non-biological superhuman consciousness to which we seem as dumb as a computer program that prints “Hello, world” seems to us. The issue is exacerbated by a number of factors: the hype “AI” companies’ marketing people sprinkle on everything; the depictions in science fiction books, movies, and TV shows; and, not least, our eternal desire for companions and superhuman guardians and our ability to anthropomorphize absolutely anything. This talk will tease apart some of these threads, and provide some guidelines in deciding how to navigate the difference between the state of the art and fantasy.

Wendy M. Grossman is the founder and former editor of The Skeptic magazine. For 35 years, she has focused on computers, freedom, and privacy in books and for publications such as the Guardian, the Daily Telegraph, New Scientist, Scientific American, and Wired. Since 2001 she has published a weekly blog, net.wars. She is also a sometimes folksinger.