Lingo Bingo at the India AI Summit w/ Karen Hao, Joan Kinyua, Chenai Chair, and Rafael Grohmann
Computer Says MaybeShow Notes
The AI Impact Summit in India is just a couple of days away and we are ready to drown in vague terms that kinda describe AI, and definitely obscure power. Let’s talk about how to reframe those terms… More like this: The Vaporstate: All Hail Scale at the AI India Summit
We’ve partnered with the AI Now Institute and Aapti Institute to conduct twelve interviews based around the biggest and baddest terms we feel have been co-opted by global summits such as this one. This week we have Karen Hao discussing what it means to be ‘data rich’; Rafael Grohmann on the word ‘sovereignty’ and how it has a hundred definitions; Joan Kinyua on ‘human capital’, a key part of any AI development supply chain; and Chenai Chair, who will discuss ‘linguistic diversity’ — what it is, and what it isn’t. These are just the best parts of the interviews — if you want to go deep and see each of these interviews in full, head to our Youtube channel now. Further reading & resources: More about Rafael Grohmann — Assistant Professor of Media Studies with focus on Critical Platform and Data Studies at the University of Toronto More about Karen Hao — investigative journalist and author of Empire of AI More about Chenai Chair — director of the Masakhane African Languages Hub More about Joan Kinyua — president of the Data Labellers Association More on the Due Diligence Act More about the amendment to the Business Laws Act 2024 What does the notion of “sovereignty” mean when referring to the digital? — Stephane Couture and Sophie Toupin Buy The Oracle for Transfeminist Technologies by Sasha Costanza-Chock, Joana Varon, and Clara Juliano Watch this week’s interviews in full on Youtube (link to playlist of interviews) **Subscribe to our newsletter to get more stuff than just a podcast — we run events and do other work that you will definitely be interested in!** Post Production by Sarah Myles | Pre Production by Georgia Iacovou
More from Computer Says Maybe
The AI industry is so unpopular that it has started paying for the support it can’t earn. So what does it take for people to turn that mistrust into power that the industry can’t just buy off? More like this: Flock Shock: How Local Fights Over Surveillance Are Reshaping American Politics w/ Sarah Hamid & Anthony Ralphs
You may have seen the viral clip of a man in a full Darth Vader costume protesting Flock at a San Diego City Council meeting. The man behind the mask was Anthony Ralphs, who spent months trying to get the city to reconsider its contract with the surveillance tech company. After repeatedly raising concerns with the council, he turned to political theater - and got national attention. His protest is part of a growing backlash against Flock, bringing people across the political spectrum together to challenge surveillance tech and demand more say in how it’s used.
Tech companies keep telling us that the answer to solving climate change lies in AI. Meanwhile, the data centers required to power AI are keeping coal plants open longer, bringing in gas turbines, and driving plans for power stations bigger than anything we’ve built before. More like this: The Colossus Crossroads: Fighting for the Future of Memphis w/ KeShaun Pearson
When a tech executive says AI will be doing your job next year, it sounds like a forecast. Dr. Carissa Véliz argues it's something else: a command, delivered in advance, that works only if enough of us obey it. If you believe the prediction, you buy the product, reorganize your company, and bet the economy on it, and the prediction comes true because you made it so. So who gets to make predictions that stick? And what would it take to stop treating them as news and start hearing them as orders? More like this: AGI is Scientifically Impossible w/ Adam Becker In this episode, Alix Dunn talks with Carissa Véliz, associate professor at Oxford's Institute for Ethics in AI and author of Prophecy: Prediction, Power, and the Fight for the Future, From Ancient Oracles to AI. Carissa explains why a prediction is a command disguised as a description, how powerful people use algorithms to fulfill their own forecasts, and why the alternative just might be being relying on preparation over prediction. Further reading & resources: Prophecy: Prediction, Power, and the Fight for the Future, From Ancient Oracles to AI — Carissa Véliz Beware the Power of Prediction — Carissa Véliz, TED Talk The Origins of Totalitarianism — Hannah Arendt The Dangerous Ideas of “Longtermism” and “Existential Risk” — Émile P. Torres, Current Affairs
Almost everyone studying kids’ safety online agrees that a blanket social media ban won't work. And nearly every government moving on the issue is passing one anyway. This week, a researcher and a policy lawyer dig into why - and what could actually work instead. More like this: When Kids Can’t Consent: The Case Against Tech in the Classroom w/ Andrew Liddell