Preserving Journalism in the Dawning Age of AI

Guest: Courtney C. Radsch A revolution is afoot in media and by extension, journalism.  Economic factors have caused the decline of local media to the point where in the US two newspapers are forced to shut down every week.  Another

Scientists Confronting the Disinformation Ecosystem

Guest: Sheldon Himelfarb With the advances in AI and increasing sophistication in creating misleading content such as deepfakes, there is growing concern especially amongst academics and researchers about the threat mis- and dis-information pose not only for the 2024 election

Measuring social media impacts on mental health

Guest: Nathaniel Lubin In the fall of 2021, Whistleblower Frances Haugen—a former member of the Civic Integrity team at Meta—shared a cache of more than 1,300 documents that would come to be known collectively as the Facebook Papers.  A key

Can AI Help Us Go Green?

Guest: Jef Caers The EU is requiring all cars sold in the European Union by 2035 to be zero-emission vehicles, and the US has set a target of 67% by 2032.  But there is a catch. Transition to Electric vehicles

Building Trust in AI Systems

Guest: Jane Pinelis A new movie called “The Creator” paints a vivid picture of humanity at war with AI in a dystopian future. Although the movie is science fiction, it highlights a major issue: How can we reliably assess and

A Realists’s Guide to AI Risks

Guest: Alex Engler ChatGPT has highlighted the excitement and fear about the potential consequences of AI for humanity, and in doing so has pushed forth the need to examine if and how to regulate AI. However, we currently lack a

Are Algorithms Threatening Your Freedom of Thought?

Guest: Susie Alegre Freedom of thought — the right to form your own thoughts, keep them private and to not be persecuted for your thoughts alone — is one of the most fundamental human rights. This right, recognized in the

Connecting the Unconnected: the Promise of Low Earth Orbit Satellites

Guest: Dan York Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites such as Starlink have been credited with helping Ukraine in the Russo-Ukrainian conflict. Their promise extends beyond military reconnaissance to everything from in-flight Internet access to disaster recovery, but challenges remain. Even

Reality Checking the Metaverse

Guest: Enza Iannopollo The metaverse is already here.  Companies like Meta, Alphabet, Apple, Microsoft, Nike, Nvidia, Epic Games and even SK Telecom have invested heavily. Thus far, even with 400 million users, the metaverse is still in its infancy.  The

Everyday Chaos

For centuries, humans sought to control their future, by anticipating the possibilities and planning accordingly. This model, conditioned on observations and experience – does not work as well in a chaotic and unpredictable world dotted with Black Swan events. How