Artificial Intelligence Talks (AI)

Brainport’s success is largely attributed to human brains. The region with the smartest brains, the highest number of inventions and a highly effective cooperation. Artificial Intelligence is rapidly being embraced in education, in engineering and in coimmunication and interaction. Jean-Paul Linnartz, Iman Mossavat and Parag Gupta have different backgrounds in engineering and in teaching. Do they reach a common opinion? Do they see the future developed in the same direction? Does it only give possitive opportunities?

In episode 6, host Iman Mossavat is joined by Colette Cuijpers, Associate Professor at Tilburg Law School and a leading researcher at the Tilburg Institute for Law. Together, they explore the urgent legal challenges posed by AI, from issues of accountability and bias to the ethical implications of AI’s growing role in our daily lives. Listen to discussions on how emerging technologies are creating unprecedented legal challenges and the balance between innovation and regulation.

Episode 5: Generative AI models are transforming industries, but are they truly understanding the world around them? Alexander Molak argues that these tools while being impressive, are merely correlational devices, not capable of grasping true cause and effect. Molak, a leading machine learning researcher and consultant, and the author of Causal Inference and Discovery in Python, dives deep into why Causal AI might be the key to unlocking the future of intelligent systems.

In episode 4, host Iman Mossavat interviews Prof Gerrit Muller, a distinguished systems engineer and professor at the University of South-Eastern Norway. Muller, with extensive experience including his role as a senior research fellow at TNO-ESI, discusses the intersection of systems engineering and artificial intelligence (AI). He illustrates the importance of a systems perspective using examples from his work on MRI scanners and explores the evolving role of AI in this field. Muller addresses common misconceptions about AI, challenges related to data quality, transparency, and interpretability. He highlights the complementary roles of Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) and AI, emphasizing the need for a balanced approach to avoid over-reliance on AI while using its potential to improve system design and analysis.

AI in education: “Some students are not at university to learn something, but just to get a degree”. Prof Oded Raz is challenged by Jean-Paul Linnartz and Parag Gupta about how a university can made sure that students who get a degree actually also have learned the essentials to work as a professional.

In Ed. 2 host Iman Mossavat is in conversation with Mahault Albarracin, Director of Applied Research. Mahault is also a PhD candidate in the Department of Computing at the Université du Québec à Montréal. The conversation took place following her hybrid talk at the Technical University of Eindhoven (TUE), organized by “HumAIn Dialogues” and “Eindhoven Artificial Intelligence Systems Institute (EAISI)” on April 25, 2024.

Mahault Albarracin shares insights from her unconventional career journey, spanning social sciences to cognitive computing, shaping her perspective on cognition and technology. Mahault highlights how AI’s design often prioritizes objectives such as maximizing efficiency, profit generation, or fulfilling predetermined goals set by those in power. These objectives significantly influence the development and societal impact of AI technologies.

AI will change the distribution of power in a new world order. Mahault Albarracin indicates that AI may expand the gap between haves and have-nots.

Kicking off a series of podcasts, Edition 1

Prof. Yann LeCun (Facebook, inventor of Neural Networks) about Brainport

Facebook increasingly influences how we view the world. We see the opinions of our friends responding to news that may or may not be fake. But which messages we see first and which messages remain hidden is all controlled by algorithms. Algorithms based on Artificial Intelligence. And these algorithms are the work of a large research team led by Professor Yann LeCun. LeCun, thereby is one of the leading technologists behind one of the largest companies in the world. Facebook’s Mark Zuckerburg recognized that his ideas could really boost Facebook, when LeCun was building a formidable reputation in the academic world with his convolutional neural networks, and when already almost all handwritten checks are processed by his algorithms, but when the link between social media and AI was still unexplored. Meanwhile, social media controlled by AI are influencing our lives every day.

Philips, Signify and the TU/e awarded Yann LeCun the prestigious Holst Memorial Medial 2018. Radio4Brainport’s Jean-Paul Linnartz spoke to him on his visit to Eindhoven.