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EXCLUSIVE: Interview w/ Dr. Emily Bender and Dr. Alex Hanna
🕑 Added 2025-02-05 15:00:10 +0000 UTCIf you're in the academic AI space, you're probably familiar with Emily Bender and Alex Hanna. They're some of the tech industry's most staunch and eloquent critics, and I had the pleasure of talking with them yesterday for my upcoming video. Clips from this convo will make it into my final video, but the full conversation will only be available here on Patreon!
When reading their work, there were some unresolved tensions that conflict with my own philosophy. Why do some AI critics unflinchingly cling to the idea of "humanness" and derisively call AI "anti-human", when so much of critical work (see: Sylvia Wynter, Frantz Fanon, etc) has focused on deconstructing the very category of human? Do we risk reifying the category of "human" or "intelligence" in the process of calling AI "anti-human"? Why do some critics insist that meaning is located and produced in a human subject when Derrida's critique of this western notion of meaning is so prolific (and also the basis of so much important feminist, postcolonial, and antiracist scholarship)? Can we imagine a future of generative AI without a tech oligarchy?
These themes were explored interestingly in this conversation.
Though I don't agree with all the conclusions in Dr. Bender and Dr. Hanna's work, they do a great job of providing excellent criticisms of Big Tech in their upcoming book The AI Con. I've read an advanced copy, and if this is a subject you're interested in, you can read it when it comes out in May. More info here.
Comments
Gabriela Surita
Really good stuff! I like the question about meaning, Derrida, and a post-structuralist critique of Generative AI. Personally, I resonate less with critiques that focus on meaning and understanding, and more with the ones about power, austerity, data governance, and accountability. Still, I feel both critiques are powerful, depending on the audience you're trying to reach. :)
Leaf
I'm here for our fully automated luxury communism, but we ain't there. AI is making my job so much harder because I have to dig through the slop to find reliable resources. I do not want the general public's average words on property taxes, I want qualified opinions. Dr Bender's perspective on language as meaning being negotiated between people is reflected in my experience trying to converse with folks who don't see me as a real person - there's a full retreat from negotiations. The one thing I want AI to do for me is accurately predict what my stitch count will be without me having to knit or crochet a swatch. If I could predict exactly how much yarn I need for any given project, I would become more powerful than you can imagine. π
