Dartmouth Events

This Event is Proceeding as Planned!

Ruth Chang, Chair and Professor of Jurisprudence, University of Oxford

Thursday, April 4, 2024
4:30pm
41 Haldeman
Free & Open

Title: "Does AI Design Rest on a Mistake?"

Abstract: "Two notorious problems plague the development of AI: 'alignment', the problem of matching machine values with our own, and 'control,' the problem of preventing machines from becoming our overlords, or, indeed, of dispensing with us altogether. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been thrown at these problems, but, it is fair to say, technologists have made little progress in solving them so far. Might philosophers help? In this talk, I propose a conceptual framework for thinking about technological design that has its roots in philosophical study of values and normativity. This alternative framework puts humans in the loop right where they belong, namely, in 'hard cases'. This framework may go some way in solving both the alignment and control problems."

Bio: Ruth Chang is Professor of Jurisprudence at the University of Oxford and a member of the Dartmouth class of 1985. Her expertise concerns philosophical questions relating to the nature of value, value conflict, decision making, rationality, love, and human agency. She has shared her research in public venues including radio, television, and newspaper outlets such as National Public Radio, the BBC, National Geographic, and The New York Times. The institutions she lectured or consulted for include Google, the CIA, the World Bank, the US Navy, the Bhutan Center for Happiness Studies, and Big Pharma. Her TED talk on hard choices has over nine million views. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. (Photo credit: Maurice Weiss)

Generously supported by the Francis W. Gramlich Fund in Philosophy and cosponsored by the Susan and James Wright Center for the Study of Computation and Just Communities. For more information, please visit: https://philosophy.dartmouth.edu/news-events/francis-w-gramlich-lectures