EPISODE

Generative AI’s proliferation presents new issues for society, but explaining those issues is incredibly complex. Can those issues be resolved without clear public understanding of how AI works? On this Hearsay Culture Radio episode, we invited University of Arizona computer science professor Mihai Surdeanu, co-author of the book Deep Learning for Natural Language Processing, A Gentle Introduction, published by Cambridge (with Marco Antonio Valenzuela-Escárcega). This exceptionally readable book explains the structure and intricacies of natural language processing and the neural networks that guide AI in a way that non-computer scientists can comprehend (to be sure, if the reader has a computer science background, one’s understanding would increase exponentially). Mihai and Dave define these processes clearly and go deep into the threats it presents with hallucinations (read: made up stuff), corporate control, and language disappearance.

“We have now turned AI development into an arms race.”

-Mihai Surdeanu

“He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying.”

-Friedrich Nietzsche 

Lead Photo by Olav Ahrens Røtne on Unsplash