Enough About AI

Dónal and Ciarán talk you through everything that's emerged since capable Large Language Models entered the chat a few years ago - up to late 2024, at least! This episode covers the companies, models, and tools that have become central to contemporary GenAI, and will broaden your understanding of where things are beyond ChatGPT.

Topics in this episode

• What are Transformer models and why are these significant?
• How did OpenAI come to dominate this space?
• Who are the other organisations to know and what other GenAI models should you be aware of?

You can get in touch with us - [email protected] - where we'd love to hear your questions, comments or suggestions! 

Dónal and Ciarán go back, back, back to see how the long history of computing machines connects to the AI revolution we're in now.

Topics in this episode

• How far back does the history of humans building machines to aid our thinking go?
• Why are  French weaving machines and alcoholic poet's daughters involved?
• How does the history of computing go through County Cork in the 1800s?
• Who are Turning and Shannon, and why do workplace disagreements leading to new companies fracturing off seem to be a repeating theme?
• What are the key developments in the evolution of computing that allow us to build AI systems now?

Links & Resources

• The Antikythera Mechanism (Wikipedia)
• Information about George Boole's time in Cork (UCC Website)
• Crash Course video on Boolean Logic (YouTube)
• An image of "The Mechanical Turk" (WikiMedia Commons)
• Tom Standage's (2002) The Turk: The Life and Times of the Famous Eighteenth-Century Chess-Playing Machine 
• Information about and images of the Jacquard Loom (Science & Industry Museum)
• The portrait of J.M. Jacquard, woven in silk by his loom, which took 24,000 punch cards to program (WikiMedia Commons)
• Photograph of a young Claude Shannon, juggling on a unicycle (Ray Soni, Photo courtesy of the Shannon family)
• Ray Cavanaugh's (2016) article Claude Shannon: The Juggling Unicyclist Who Pedaled Us Into the Digital Age (Time Magazine)

You can get in touch with us - [email protected] - where we'd love to hear your questions, comments or suggestions! 

Dónal and Ciarán start the series with some explainers that should help you sound much more knowledgeable discussing the state of contemporary AI at your next dinner party.

Topics in this episode

• What is AI? Why has it seemed to appear so recently and become so important?
• What's the difference between AI and GenAI?
• What is ChatGPT and how do models like it work?
• What are the other important AI tools to be aware of?
• What does this technology hold for the future of science and society?
• Are we all doomed?

Links & Resources

• Dario Amodei's Essay, Machines of Loving Grace 

You can get in touch with us - [email protected] - where we'd love to hear your questions, comments or suggestions!