The Politics of Air Pollution, Ozempic, and Luddism ft. Brian Merchant

April 21, 2024

TRANSCRIPT

In this episode, Shobita and Jack tackle the EPA's recent efforts to increase monitoring of air pollutants, Jack's new documentary on existential risks, and the Ozempic craze. And Jack chats with Brian Merchant, a freelance journalist who focuses on tech who recently wrote Blood in the machine: The origins of rebellion against big tech about the history of Luddism.

Study Questions:

1. How might we critically consider expanded oversight by the EPA, and its ability to translate to better regulation for environmental justice communities

2. How does the launch of weight loss drugs like Ozempic for the general population represent a shift towards individualized responsibility for obesity? How might it interact with anti-fat biases in society

3. Who were the Luddites, and what drove them to organize against industrial entrepreneurs

4. In the context of regulatory legislation, how do the arguments of today’s Big Tech parallel those of industrialists 200 years ago

5. What examples of critical resistance to AI can we identify in today’s world?

Related links:

• Merchant, Brian. (2023) Blood in the machine: The origins of rebellion against big tech. Hatchette Book Group. New York.

• Brian Merchant’s Substack

• For UK listeners, an audio adaptation of Blood in the Machine on BBC Radio.

• Stilgoe, Jack (2024). How Real is the Existential Risk from AI? Analysis 4. BBC Radio.

CRISPR therapies, Boeing, and reconnecting with Alondra Nelson

February 02, 2024

TRANSCRIPT

In the first episode of 2024, Shobita and Jack reflect on the first CRISPR therapy approved by drug regulators around the world, for sickle cell disease. We also talk about the safety issues plaguing Boeing, and the Post Office scandal roiling the UK and why it matters for regulating AI. And, we reconnect with Alondra Nelson, one of The Received Wisdom's first guests! Alondra Nelson is the Harold F. Linder Professor at the Institute for Advanced Study and previously as deputy assistant to President Joe Biden and acting director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy(OSTP). 

Study Questions:

1. How might the recently-approved CRISPR therapy for sickle cell disease fall short of addressing socioeconomic inequalities, as originally proposed?

2. How do the recent mishaps with Boeing aircrafts illustrate the concept of human beings as the ‘moral crumple zones’ in sociotechnical systems?

3. How has deference to technological systems resulted in social injustices?

4. How might the framing of AI as an existential risk that is the government’s responsibility to mitigate be problematic?

5. What does it mean to ‘understand the technology’ in a way that is sociopolitically meaningful?

6. Aside from good ideas, what other factors play a role in effective policy making?

Related links:

• Elish, M. (2019, March 23). Moral Crumple Zones: Cautionary Tales in Human-Robot Interaction. Engaging Science, Technology, and Society. 

• Lazar, S and A. Nelson (2023, July 13). "AI safety on whose terms?" Science. 381 (6654): 138

• Zook, M, S. Barocas, d. boyd, K. Crawford, E. Keller, S. P. Gangadharan, A. Goodman, R. Hollander, B.A. Koenig, J. Metcalf, A. Narayanan, A. Nelson, and F. Pasquale (2017, March 30). "Ten simple rules for responsible big data research." PLOS Computational Biology. 

• Nelson, A. (2016). The Social Life of DNA: Race, Reparations, and Reconciliation After the Genome. Beacon Press.

• Nelson, A, C. Marcum, J. Isler (2022, Fall). "Public Access to Advance Equity." Issues in Science and Technology. 

• White House (2022, Oct 4). Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights. 

Climate Change Realpolitik, Following the Sams, and Evaluating Research ft. Sarah de Rijcke

December 08, 2023

TRANSCRIPT

This month, Shobita and Jack reflect on the recent COP meeting in the United Arab Emirates, recent AI news including the Biden Administration's Executive Order, the UK summit, and the fates of the two Sams: Altman and Bankman-Fried. And they chat with Sarah de Rijcke, Professor in Science, Technology, and Innovation Studies and Scientific Director at the Centre for Science and Technology Studies at Leiden University in the Netherlands.

Study Questions:

1. What is techno-optimism, and how does it apply in the case of AI?

2. How might we think about the strengths and weaknesses of current efforts to address AI governance by the U.S. government?

3. What are some negative consequences of simplistic performance metrics for research assessment, and why do such metrics remain in use?

4. How do large companies like Elsevier now extend their domain beyond publishing? How might this shape the trajectory of research assessment methods?

5. What hopes exist for better performance metrics for research assessments?

Related links:

• ED'Ignazio, C. and L. F. Klein.Data Feminism. The MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 2020. 

• Andreessen, M. (2023, October 16).The Techno-Optimist Manifesto. Andreessen Horowitz. 

• de Rijcke, S. (2023). Does science need heroes? Leiden Madtrics blog, CWTS, Leiden University.

• Pölönen, J., Rushforth, A.D., de Rijcke, S., Niemi, L., Larsen, B. & Di Donato, F. (2023). Implementing research assessment reforms: Tales from the frontline.

• Rushforth, A.D. & de Rijcke, S. (2023). Practicing Responsible Research Assessment: Qualitative study of Faculty Hiring, Promotion, and Tenure Assessments in the United States. Preprint. DOI: 10.31235/osf.io/2d7ax

• Scholten, W., Franssen, T.P., Drooge, L. van, de Rijcke, S. & Hessels, L.K. (2021). Funding for few, anticipation among all: Effects of excellence funding on academic research groups. Science and Public Policy, 48(2), 265-275. DOI: 10.1093/scipol/scab018 https://academic.oup.com/spp/article/48/2/265/6184850

• Penders, B., de Rijcke, S. & Holbrook, J.B. (2020). Science’s moral economy of repair: Replication and the circulation of reference. Accountability in Research, first published online January 27, 2020. DOI: 10.1080/08989621.2020.1720659.

• Müller, R. & De Rijcke, S. (2017). Thinking with indicators. Exploring the Epistemic Impacts of Academic Performance Indicators in the Life Sciences. Research Evaluation. DOI: 10.1093/reseval/rvx023.

Electric Cars, the Problems with Tech Biographies, and Against Technoableism ft. Ashley Shew

October 18, 2023

TRANSCRIPT

In this episode, Shobita and Jack discuss the United Auto Worker strike, facial recognition technology in schools, and the recent biographies of Elon Musk and Sam Bankman-Fried. And, they interview Ashley Shew, author of Against Technoableism and Associate Professor of Science, Technology, and Society at Virginia Tech.

Study Questions:

1. What is the relationship between the recent labor unrest and emerging technology?

2. How do biographers approach tech leaders, and what is wrong with it?

3. How do the medical and social models of disability approach disability differently?

4. How can technology shape our perception of what is “normal” when it comes to disability?

5. How might dependency on various technologies affect the life of a disabled person in unexpected ways?

6. How might disability change one’s experience of the built environment?

7. How might we reconsider disability expertise to create a more accessible society?

Related links:

• Ashley Shew (2023). Against Technoableism: Rethinking Who Needs Improvement. W.W. Norton.

• Virdi, J. (2022). Hearing happiness: Deafness cures in history. The University of Chicago Press.

• Nario-Redmond, M. R. (2020). Ableism: The causes and consequences of disability prejudice. Wiley Blackwell.

• Ashley Shew (2020). Let COVID-19 expand awareness of disability tech. Nature. May 5.

• Weise, J. (n.d.). The Cyborg Jillian Weise. 
  Wheelchair Sports Camp. (2015). Wheelchair Sports Camp. 

• New York State Education Department (2023). "State Education Department Statement on Release of the Use of Biometric Identifying Technology in Schools Report." August 7.

The Long, Hot AI Summer, India's Space Mission, and Addressing Inequality through Innovation ft. Richard Jones

September 13, 2023

TRANSCRIPT

Jack and Shobita are back after a summer hiatus! We return talking about--of course--ChatGPT and other generative AI, the problem at Fukushima, and India's Chandrayaan Rover. Then we chat with Richard A.L. Jones, professor of material physics and innovation policy . He is also the Vice President for Regional Innovation and Civic Engagement at Manchester University.

Study Questions:

1. What is wrong with the Turing test to evaluate AI?

2. What is unique about India's approach to space innovation?

3. What is the problem with the conventional idea that the road to economic opportunity is teaching miners how to code?

4. How does Richard Jones think that innovation policy should address inequality? How about universities?

5. What is wrong with equating innovation and entrepreneurship? How do our conventional notions of innovation constrain its potential to help society?

Related links:

• Richard A.L. Jones (2022). "Science and innovation policy for hard times: an overview of the UK’s Research and Development landscape."The Productivity Institute.

• Tom Forth and Richard A.L. Jones (2020). "The Missing £4 Billion." Nesta.

• Richard A.L. Jones (2019). "A Resurgence of the Regions: rebuilding innovation capacity across the whole UK."

• Richard A.L. Jones and James WIlsdon (2018). "The Biomedical Bubble."Nesta.
  Richard A.L. Jones.Soft Machines. Blog.

• Jack Stilgoe (2023). "We need a Weizenbaum test for AI." Science. August 11.

• Gil Scott-Heron, (1970) "Whitey on the Moon."

The Importance of the Humanities, Tech Politics, and Equity in Science ft. Cassidy Sugimoto

May 30, 2023

TRANSCRIPT

Jack and Shobita discuss the decline in humanities majors as the number of computer and data science majors rise, and why this is will have very bad consequences. Then they chat about emerging efforts to regulate both in vitro gametogenesis (creation of eggs and sperm using pluripotent stem cells) and generative AI. Finally, they talk to Cassidy Sugimoto, Professor and Tom and Marie Patton School Chair in the School of Public Policy at Georgia Institute of Technology, about her new book, Equity for Women in Science: Dismantling Systemic Barriers to Advancement.

Study Questions:

1. What is bibliometrics, and how can it be useful for policymakers? What are its limitations?

2. What does bibliometrics tell us about the state of women in science?

3. What kinds of practices, programs, and policies, can help achieve equity for women in science?

4. What arguments and stories might you use to convince people to value the questions that women scientists tend to ask?

5. What were the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on women scientists, and how might universities help women address this now and in future crises?

6. How might accepting that science is not neutral actually help scientists and science?

Related links:

• Nick Anderson (2023). "College is remade as tech majors surge and humanities dwindle." The Washington Post. May 20.

• Center for Genetics and Society (2023). "Whether or How to Use Artificial Gametes." April 12.

• Cassidy Sugimoto (2023). Equity for Women in Science: Dismantling Systemic Barriers to Advancement. Harvard University Press.

• Cassidy Sugimoto (2022). "Narrow hiring practices at US universities revealed." Nature. September 29.

• Cassidy Sugimoto (2021). "Scientific success by numbers." Nature. May 3.

• Cassidy Sugimoto (2019). "Rethinking impact factors: Better ways to judge a journal." Nature. May 28.
  Hoppe, Travis A. et al. (2019). “Topic choice contributes to the lower rate of NIH awards to African-American/black scientists.” Science Advances. 5: eaaw7238.

Abortion Politics, a Moratorium on Generative AI, and the Meaning of Emergency ft. Elizabeth Ellcessor

April 25, 2023

TRANSCRIPT

What makes an emergency? This month, Jack and Shobita talk to Elizabeth Ellcessor, Associate Professor in the Department of Media Studies at University of Virginia, who studies how emergency alert systems shape our understanding of crisis, how this has changed with the rise of new consumer technologies, and the implications especially for communities who are marginalized. They also wrestle with the politics of science in US court decisions about abortion drugs, and recent calls for a moratorium on certain types of artificial intelligence.

Study Questions:

1. Why didn’t the US government issue a national alert on 9/11? What does this tell us about the role emergency alerts play?

2. What is the entangled human and material infrastructure that leads to an alert? Can our understanding of the “technology” be separated from the “human”? How might this help think about AI, for example?

3. What are the limitations of emergency alert systems in assisting marginalized communities?

4. How have emergency alert services been designed to privilege certain publics over others? How might this be alleviated?

5. What are the implications of the rise of consumer technologies designed to help users in case of emergency?

Related links:

• Future of Life Institute (2023). Policymaking in the Pause: What can Policymakers Do Now to Combat Risks from Advanced AI Systems?

• Future of Life Institute et al. (2023). Pause Giant AI Experiments: An Open Letter.

•  (2023). "In Support of FDA's Authority to Regulate Vaccines."

• Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. U.S. Food and Drug Administration (April 7, 2023).

• Elizabeth Ellcessor (2022). In Case of Emergency: How Technologies Mediate Crisis and Automate Inequality. NYU Press.

• Elizabeth Ellcessor (2021). “COVID messages make emergency alerts just another text in the crowd on your home screen.” The Conversation. June 9.

• Elizabeth Ellcessor (2018). "Academic Accessibility, a Flashback." April 16.

• Matt Richtel (2023). "My Watch Thinks I'm Dead." The New York Times. February 3.

The Politics of Expertise and Retelling the Story of Racism in the Pulse Oximeter ft. Amy Moran-Thomas

March 19, 2023

TRANSCRIPT

This month, Jack and Shobita talk about the challenges of ensuring that AI and gene editing reflect human values, and reflect on what the recent train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio tells us about the politics of knowledge. And they chat with Amy Moran-Thomas, Associate Professor of Anthropology at MIT, about her clarion call to address the racial biases embedded in the pulse oximeter, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in August 2020.

Study Questions:

1. What are the benefits and risks of sickle cell disease becoming one of the first approved treatments using somatic cell gene editing?

2. How did early concerns about racial bias in the pulse oximeter get dismissed?

3. How did the idea that the pulse oximeter had embedded racial bias go from something that was dismissed, to something that is commonly known? In particular, what are the social and political dynamics that affected this process?

4. How have the definitions of expertise in this case (e.g., who sits on FDA panels) affected how we understand the problem with the pulse oximeter? How could it be understood differently? What kinds of expertise are missing in policymaking related to the pulse oximeter?

5. What is the problem with framing the pulse oximeter issue as a skin color problem and not a device problem?

6. What does Moran-Thomas's experience with the pulse oximeter story tell us about how research (especially in the social sciences and humanities) can have impact?

Related links:

• Amy Moran-Thomas (2020). "How a Popular Medical Device Encodes Racial Bias." Boston Review. August 5.

• Amy Moran-Thomas (2021). "Oximeters used to be designed for equity. What happened?" WIRED. June 4.

• Amy Moran-Thomas (2019). Traveling with Sugar: Chronicles of a Global Epidemic. University of California Press.

• Kadija Ferryman (n.d.) "Framing Inequity in Health Technology: The Digital Divide, Data Bias, and Racialization." SSRC: JustTech.

• Andrea Ballestero and Yesmar Oyarzun (2022). "Devices: A location for feminist analytics and praxis." Feminist Anthropology. 3(2):  227-233.

• Yesmar Oyarzun, Juliann Bi, Eddie Jackson (n.d.) Undertones.

Science and Society at the White House, ChatGPT, and the Paradox of Data-Driven Agriculture

February 15, 2023

TRANSCRIPT

Happy New Year!! In this episode, Jack and Shobita discuss Alondra Nelson's departure from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and the meaning for the position she created, Deputy Director for Science and Society. We also try to get beyond ChatGPT's hype to talk about some of the long-term implications. And we chat with Kelly Bronson, Canada Research Chair in Science and Society at the University of Ottawa, about her book The Immaculate Conception of Data: Agribusiness, Activists, and Their Shared Politics of the Future.

Study Questions:

1. How is AI reconfiguring power relations, and social relationships, both in the case of LLMs like ChatGPT and in precision agriculture?

2. What are the similarities and differences in how the private sector and activist scientists approach data-driven agriculture?

3. What does openness mean in the context of precision agriculture, and what are the benefits and drawbacks for achieving equity, justice, and environmental sustainability?

4. What is the "immaculate conception of data", and what are the problems of viewing it that way in agriculture or in other domains where AI is increasingly present?

5. Why might it be important to have a permanent post focused on "science and society" in the White House's Office of Science and Technology Policy?

Related links:

• Kelly Bronson (2022). The Immaculate Conception of Data: Agribusiness, Activists, and Their Shared Politics of the Future. McGill-Queen's University Press.

• Kelly Bronson (2022). "The dangers of big data extend to farming." The Conversation. June 27.

• Kelly Bronson (2022). "Four reasons we should think twice about a data-driven approach to agricultural sustainability." September 26.

• Kelly Bronson (2017). "Look twice at the digital agricultural revolution." September 7.

• Billy Perrigo (2023). "Exclusive: OpenAI Used Kenyan Workers on Less Than $2 Per Hour to Make ChatGPT Less Toxic." Time. January 18.

• Jill (2022). "ChatGPT is multilingual but monocultural, and it’s learning your values." December 6.

The Future of Academic Culture, Cryptocurrency, and Abortion ft. Aziza Ahmed

December 09, 2022

TRANSCRIPT

This month, Shobita and Jack talk about the recent concerns about academic culture in the science and technology studies community, how to understand FTX's recent implosion, and the bizarre logics of effective altruism. And we chat with Boston University law professor Aziza Ahmed about how the politics of knowledge are shaping abortion politics in the United States.

Related links:

• Darren Tseng, Stephen Diehl, Jan Akalin (2022). Popping the Crypto Bubble: Market Manias, Phony Populism, Techno-Solutionism. Consilience Publishing.

• Concerned.Tech (2022). "Letter in Support of Responsible Fintech Policy." 

• Aziza Ahmed (2022). "These are the gray areas for women’s privacy now in a post-Roe world." CNN Opinion. August 4.

• Aziza Ahmed (2021). "The Future of Facts: The Politics of Public Health and Medicine in Abortion Law." University of Colorado Law Review. 92: 1151-1162.

• Aziza Ahmed (2020). "Weaponizing Objectivity: The Politics of the CDC." Ms. Magazine. October 28. 

• Aziza Ahmed (2020). "Will the Supreme Court legitimate pretext?" SCOTUSblog. January 31.

• Aziza Ahmed (2017). "Abortion in a Post-Truth Moment: A Response to Erwin Chemerinsky and Michele Goodwin." Texas Law Review. 95: 198-203.