AI-Curious with Jeff Wilser

The health care system in the US is a mess. Few will argue this. Can AI make it better?

That's the thesis of Rajeev (Raj) Ronanki, CEO of Lyric, which is working to build AI that will simplify and streamline the health care experience. What can AI make better? How will you, as a patient, have a dramatically different experience in the world of AI-assisted health care? And what are the challenges that need to be overcome to make this a reality?

Raj and I get deep into the current problems with the health care system, how AI can help, and what it will take -- as a society -- to pull this off.

Lyric.AI:
https://www.lyric.ai/

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Petra Molnar is a Harvard Faculty Associate, lawyer, human rights activist, and author of the just-released book The Walls Have Eyes: Surviving Migration in the Age of Artificial Intelligence.

Publisher’s Weekly gave the book a glowing review and called it a “a grave wake-up call."

To research this book, Petra spent *six years* studying what she called the “sharp edges” of surveillance tech, focusing on how it’s impacting real people.  She spent considerable time at the border and in refugee camps. And she emerged from this research with chilling, dystopian tales of how AI-infused surveillance is being used at the border. Things like…“robot dogs,” which are exactly what they sound like.

We get into what her research has uncovered, what she thinks caused the current state of play, the often over-looked role of defense tech, and what she sees as possible solution.

Whatever your take on this issue, it’s an important conversation she’s raising. Hope you enjoy the episode. 

The Walls Have Eyes:
https://thenewpress.com/books/walls-have-eyes

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Before launching the AI-Curious podcast, I spent a bunch of years writing about bitcoin, blockchain, crypto, and web3, often for CoinDesk, the space’s main publication. I still write about it. So I’m in a relatively unique position to see the intersection of these two techs. Is there a connection? Can crypto really help develop better AI? There’s now an explosion of interest in “Decentralized AI,” which — in theory — could help minimize risks from Big Tech, reduce bias, fight censorship, solve the problem of deepfakes and even make AI more inclusive. 

And this episode is sneaky-timely. There are over 15,000 people converging in Austin, Texas, for the annual “Consensus” conference — presented by CoinDesk — which focuses on the wider world of crypto. There’s now an “AI Summit” at this conference… and I’m hosting the AI Summit. So this episode is very much a conversation, in a sense, of the themes discussed at Consensus. 

(And if you found this podcast from Consensus itself, welcome! This is an excellent intro episode for you.)

Consensus 2024:
https://consensus2024.coindesk.com

Piece I wrote last year:

“10 Ways Crypto and AI Can Make Each Other Better (or Maybe Worse)”

https://www.coindesk.com/consensus-magazine/2023/06/12/10-ways-crypto-and-ai-can-make-each-other-better-or-maybe-worse/

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I'm going to guess that most people listening to this podcast are not lawyers. Fair. I'm not either!

But there are *massive* questions about how AI impacts the law -- new questions about IP, copyrights, patents -- and also how AI impacts the legal profession itself.

Here to guide us through all these questions is Robert Plotkin, a 25-year-veteran patent attorney and the author of the 2009 patent-and-AI book "The Genie in the Machine: How Computer-Automated Inventing Is Revolutionizing Law and Business" and the new book "AI Armor: Securing the Future of Your AI Company With Strategic Intellectual Property."

Because even if you're not a lawyer... if you like things like movies, books, and tech - this will impact you in sneaky and surprising ways.

AI Armor:
https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0D15MMHWZ?ref_=cm_sw_r_cp_ud_dp_J34MV0C4EQF2GM6S28BT_2

Robert Plotkin:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/robertplotkin/

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Many have been worried about AI safety. But the stakes were just raised: OpenAI and Google just announced new capabilities that look likely to usher in the new era of “AI agents,” meaning tools that will automatically accomplish tasks for you like buying plane tickets or even how to invest your 401k. What could go wrong?

It’s Bo Li’s job to figure out what could go wrong. Li is an Associate Professor at the University of Chicago, where she conducts research and experiments on AI safety. Her team does “red team” analysis to try and hack and jail-break AI to sniff out problems. She already uncovered flaws in the AI that powers self-driving cars, and the systems then improved as a response to her work. 

We get into the tricky problem of AI agents, the AI safety risks that keep her up at night, the possible dystopia of AI-injected deep fakes — and tools that could fight them — as well as why Li is NOT worried about existential risks to humanity. 

I found this conversation oddly…comforting? Hope you enjoy!

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Sherlock Bioscience is developing medical diagnostic tests that are dramatically faster, cheaper, and easier to distribute than traditional models.

The impact? This could make health care more inclusive, slow the spread of STDs, and help us avoid future pandemics.

Dr. Dechairo and I start with the current problems of traditional diagnostic tests, then get into how AI could help and how that could impact the globe.

There is a LOT of silly stuff in the world of AI… this is not that.  

Hope you enjoy the conversation.

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No tech is just about the tech. True adoption — or lack thereof — is often about issues of culture, which is why I’m thrilled to speak to today’s guest: Adam Bai, who’s an anthropologist as well as the Chief Strategy Officer of Glimpse, a company that leverages AI for market research solutions.

Adam’s team has done extensive research on both AI adoption — and how this intersects with a company’s culture, teamwork, people, etc. — and AI bias and equity. He’s helped diagnose the problem and has some ideas on the solution.

At heart, this discussion gets at the growing gap between AI promises and AI reality, as it helps explain why some organizations are struggling to adopt AI, and others are thriving.

Fun conversation! Thanks again to Adam and Glimpse.

Glimpse:
https://www.glimpseahead.ai/

Adam Bai:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-bai-68131799/


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How will AI impact education?

One university isn't passively waiting to see how the dust settles, but is instead aggressively incorporating AI into its curriculum. That would be American University's Kogod School of Business, which has moved at warp-speed to modify its curriculum in 20 classes to incorporate AI this Fall.

I'm delighted to be joined by the two key players in this initiative:  Kogod School of Business' Dean David Marchick, and Professor Angela Virtu, who is spearheading the AI training of faculty and the AI-ification of the curriculum.

We get into the many, many facets and complexities of AI and education... How is the faculty reacting? What does an "AI curriculum" look like, exactly? What about the obvious question of cheating?

We cover a ton of ground and I had a blast -- hope you enjoy the conversation.

Link to The Wall Street Journal story that covers Kogod's AI adventure:
https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/generative-ai-mba-business-school-13199631

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Boston Dynamics just unveiled their new robot, "Atlas." The AI space was floored. Some were excited, some startled, some terrified, all fascinated.

Whether we like it or not, thanks to the rapid acceleration of AI, robots -- specifically humanoid robots -- are closer than we think. Robots are now less science fiction and more a short-to-medium-term likelihood.

So where are we now with robots? Where are we headed?  What will Robot Land look like in, say, 10 years?

Joining the pod to discuss all things robots is Kordel France, Founder and Lead Engineer of Theta, an AI and robots company with a novel focus on the olfactory sense--smell. Their theory is that smell can have surprising use cases in AI right now, and in the future it could be the key to unlocking more robust, more natural Artificial General Intelligence.

Fun convo - enjoy!

Theta
https://thetadx.ai/

Link to Boston Dynamics' Unveiling of Atlas:
Or as The Verge calls it, "Boston Dynamics’ new Atlas robot is a swiveling, shape-shifting nightmare"
https://www.theverge.com/2024/4/17/24133145/boston-dynamics-resurrects-atlas-humanoid-robot-electric-new

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We've all heard "AI will transform the world!!!"

But how are AI experts *actually* using AI now, today, for reals, in their day-to-day lives?

I've collected some wisdom and insights from prior guests of AI-Curious to give what is -- hopefully -- some super useful and concrete suggestions on how to incorporate AI into your own workflow.  From ChatGPT as "debate partner" to brainstorm to massively underpaid research assistant, here are how people are using AI today.

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