Philosophy: AI @ IBM

Visit to IBM Research

by Chris Dite

The Rise of the Robots  Philosophy elective has been a wild philosophical ride. We’ve delved into the works of Alan Turing, role-played a debate on the corporate board at Westworld, compared our ethical decisions to those of self-driving cars, critiqued the UN intervention on autonomous killing machines from a few angles, and more.

We’ve explored empathy, violence and self-awareness, and critiqued the ideas of philosophers, computer programmers, army generals and activists.

Philosophy students (both in the 7-10 elective and VCE) spent the morning at IBM’s artificial intelligence research lab on Tuesday 21 March to witness a demonstration of AI and speak with researchers at the forefront of machine learning.

We heard from a range of scientists working on the cutting edge of machine learning and had an opportunity to ask them some of the thorny philosophical questions we were struggling with.

The disruptive, possibly violent impact of robots on our future is certain, but the intervention of IBM’s learning machines in medical research and advancement might save countless lives.

As the old saying goes: "There is great chaos under heaven. The situation is excellent."