Tulane University presents panel discussion on artificial intelligence

The advent and consequences of superhuman intelligence will be the subject of a panel discussion Feb. 1 from 6 to 8:30 p.m. at Freeman Auditorium, located in the Woldenberg Art Center on the uptown campus of Tulane University.

The discussion is the opening program of the Conference on Artificial Intelligence, Ethics and Society sponsored by the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence and the Association for Computing Machinery.

Free and open to the public, the discussion will include a question-and-answer session and a reception.

“I believe the panelists are truly exceptional and this is a great opportunity for Tulane.”

Brent Venable, associate professor of computer science

The panel will feature Paula Boddington, a philosopher from Oxford University; Jason Furman, an economist from Harvard University; Peter Stone, a computer scientist from the University of Texas–Austin; and Wendell Wallach, an ethicist with The Hastings Center and the Yale Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics.

Brent Venable, a computer scientist at Tulane and the Institute for Human & Machine Cognition, will moderate the discussion, which is being sponsored by the Tulane Office of Academic Affairs, the Tulane Department of Computer Science, a Carol Lavin Bernick Faculty Grant and a D.W. Mitchell Grant.

“I believe the panelists are truly exceptional and this is a great opportunity for Tulane,” Venable said. “These are world-class researchers from different disciplines and best-selling authors who will elaborate on the impact of AI on modern society.”

Boddington, author of Towards a Code of Ethics for Artificial Intelligence, is working on a project investigating the possibilities of developing ethical standards for artificial intelligence.

Furman, a top economic adviser to President Obama, served as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers from 2013 to 2017, acting as both Obama’s chief economist and a member of the cabinet.

Stone is associate chair of computer science and chair of the Robotics Portfolio Program at UT–Austin.

Wallach is the author of A Dangerous Master: How to Keep Technology from Slipping Beyond our Control and co-author of Moral Machines: Teaching Robots Right from Wrong.