...David Golumbia Unfortunately, although this book remains valuable as an overview of one prominent position regarding technology and governance, readers interested in AI or digital technologies and their political affordances would be well advised to consult more detailed and direct explications...

...Caroline E. Schuster; Kristen M. Schuster Abstract This article argues that critical AI studies should make a methodological investment in “thick description” to counteract the tendency both within computational design and business settings to presume (or, in the case of start-ups, hope...

... Gebru announced the launch of her new distributed AI research network DAIR on the one-year anniversary of being forced out of Google's so-called ethical AI research group. There's a really beautiful statement of intentions and approach, which is about working to reduce and minimize the harms of AI...

...Christopher Newfield Abstract Critics have identified a set of operational flaws in the machine language and deep learning systems now discussed under the “AI” banner. Five of the most discussed are social biases, particularly racism; opacity, such that users cannot assess how results were...

...Ewa Plonowska Ziarek [email protected] Economies of Virtue: The Circulation of Ethics in AI . Edited by Thao Phan , Jake Goldenfein , Declan Kuch , and Monique Mann . Amsterdam : Institute of Network Cultures , 2022 . 171 pp. Open access. Copyright © 2024 Ewa...

...Hendrik Kempt; Jan-Christoph Heilinger Abstract The clamor for AI-based applications involving generative models for text and images has fueled wild speculation about the risks and opportunities for society and humanity at large. The potential “existential” threat as a precursor to artificial...

...Sylvie Delacroix Abstract The salient concern, today, is not whether copyright law will “allow robots to learn.” The pressing question is whether the exploitation of the data ecosystem that has made generative AI possible can be made socially sustainable. Just as the human right to water is only...

[email protected] Copyright © 2024 Mél Hogan 2024 extractivism energy techno-fix cloud AI Alongside the recent hype and anxieties surrounding generative artificial intelligence (GenAI), scholars and engineers across the globe have noted that the environmental costs and impacts...

...Roopika Risam [email protected] Responsible AI in Africa: Challenges and Opportunities . Edited by Damian Okaibedi Eke , Kutoma Wakunuma , and Simsola Akintoye . Cham, Switzerland : Palgrave Macmillan , 2023 . 216 pp. Open access. Copyright © 2024 Roopika Risam...

...Ellen P. Goodman Abstract With the release of large language models such as GPT-4, the push for regulation of artificial intelligence has accelerated the world over. Proponents of different regulatory strategies argue that AI systems should be regulated like nuclear weapons posing catastrophic risk...

.... The authors contrast this technical trajectory with other intellectual currents in AI research that aimed to create empowering tools to help users to accomplish explicit goals by augmenting their capabilities to think, act, and communicate, through mechanisms that were transparent and accountable...

... of inegalitarian social arrangements, thereby solidifying them and entrenching the disadvantages they create for marginalized groups like women. One could perhaps draw on MacKinnon to argue a similar dynamic can arise when AI companies aim to remain “neutral” with respect to the hierarchies their algorithms help...

...Lauren M. E. Goodlad; Matthew Stone Abstract This essay introduces the history of the “generative AI” paradigm, including its underlying political economy, key technical developments, and sociocultural and environmental effects. In concert with this framing it discusses the articles, thinkpieces...

...Megan Ward Abstract Part book review, part thinkpiece, this essay explores the possibilities and limitations for critical AI raised by the edited collection The Cultural Life of Machine Learning: An Incursion into Critical AI Studies (2021). It identifies three practices for scholars...

...Kathryn Conrad Abstract In the wake of the introduction of ChatGPT, educators have been faced with pressure to adapt to the disruptive technology of AI chatbots. But these tools were not developed with educational applications in mind, and they come with many potential risks and harms to students...

...Lauren M. E. Goodlad Abstract This editor's introduction welcomes readers to a new interdisciplinary undertaking. The community of practice Critical AI addresses hopes to bring critical thinking of the kind that interpretive disciplines foster into dialogue with work by technologists and others who...

...Annette Vee Abstract Companies such as OpenAI and other tech start-ups often pass on “technical debt” to consumers—that is, they roll out undertested software so that users can discover errors and problems. The breakneck pace of our current AI “arms race” implicitly encourages this practice and has...

...Katherine Bode; Lauren M. E. Goodlad Abstract This introductory article calls attention to the shift from the “big data” discourse of the 2000s to the current focus on “AI” in its supposedly “responsible” and “human-centered” forms. Such rhetoric helps deflect attention from the profitable...

...Emily M. Bender; Ted Chiang; Tom Nissley; Lauren M. E. Goodlad; Kelsey Keyes Abstract This conversation is excerpted and edited from a transcript of a live event, “Wishful Thinking and AI: An Evening with Ted Chiang and Dr. Emily M. Bender,” which took place in Seattle, Washington, on November 10...

... in the pursuit of statistical truth. The article concludes with a reflection on how the latent photographic theory of machine vision we have advanced relates to the large image models built for generative AI today. computer vision data curation photography digital image machine learning In 2015...