Computing Up

Michael and Dave tackle the big questions and settle two of them: Is Agency A Zero Sum Game? Why Do (Internet of) Things Suck? How Can We Turn Computation Away From Centralization?

[Image of ancient Philips Hue Controller operating without internet access, used by permission of Dave the owner]

James Tompkin 🔗, assistant Professor of Computer Science at Brown University 🔗, joins Michael and Dave to talk about visual computing research writ large, with topics ranging from the relevance of traditional computer graphics in the era of machine learning, to differentiable rendering and neural radiance fields, to DALL-E 2 and remixing Hitchcock's "Rear Window" at the Museum of the Moving Image.

Ellie Pavlick, Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Brown University (🔗) and Research Scientist at Google AI (🔗), joins Michael and Dave in a quick discussion of the remarkable new large AI language models. Topics range from what is and isn't known about the models, and by them, to if or how scared should we be of them, to what 'traditional' sciences like linguistics bring to artificial intelligence research and engineering.

[Image courtesy of Ellie Pavlick]

Andrew Critch (🔗), a mathematician, AI researcher, organizer and activist (cofounder 🔗, researcher 🔗, cofounder 🔗), joins Michael and Dave for a fast-moving fifty minutes about existential risks (and opportunities) of AI and other technologies, the limits of intelligence, and the importance of structure at all scales and having a good spirit.

Dave tries to explain why he thinks the best way to understand people and other living things is via computation and programming languages, via codebases and code transmissions. Michael tries to help Dave sound slightly sane.

[Image based on still frame from "We Are Coders"]

Fiery Cushman @fierycushman, professor of psychology at Harvard University 🔗, joins Michael and Dave in a wonderful conversation about morality seen both cognitively and computationally, with topics ranging from trolley problems and fake guns to the wisdom of the ancestors and the hubris of science to what makes moral thinking special.

[Title image courtesy of Fiery Cushman]

Neil Lawrence (home, @lawrennd), the DeepMind Professor of Machine Learning at the University of Cambridge, joins Michael and Dave for a rollicking hour discussing everything from cybernetics to machine learning, from oil rigs to New Jersey shopping malls, from inconsistent scientific reviewing to gods and robots and much more.

Talking Machines podcast

[Image courtesy of Neil Lawrence]

Carla Brodley, professor and Dean of Inclusive Computing at Northeastern University (link), talks to Michael and Dave about applying Machine Learning to real problems from computer security to medicine, and how to move the needle for diversity, equity, access, and belonging in Computer Science education.

[Title image courtesy of Carla Brodley]

Karen Levy, assistant professor in Information Science at Cornell University, joins Michael and Dave in a conversation ranging from AI, law, and smart contracts to CB radio, Road Dog Trucking, and Santa's narcs.

Anita Nikolich, Director of Research and Technology Innovation at the University of Illinois School of Information Sciences (webpage), joins Michael and Dave in a conversation ranging over decades and disciplines, from computer network security and the DEFCON hacker conferences to creating games for teaching about mis- and dis-information.

[Title image courtesy of Anita Nikolich]