Why AI Will Never Fully Capture Human Language

My latest for Sapiens.org:

“…from the perspective of linguistic anthropology, novel-writing cars and chatbots designed for “natural language processing” simply do not command language at all. Instead, they perform a small subset of language competency—a fact that is often forgotten when the technology media focuses on sensational claims of AI sentience. Language, as it lives and breathes, is far more complicated.”

Read the full article here.

In practice, language is often far more complicated and layered than the written word can capture.

COVID shows why we need the social sciences now more than ever

Understanding why some reject discovery and innovation is essential to us all. Pure emphasis on ‘STEM’ without wider cultural study leaves society prey to conspiracy theories.

Read the full article in the Ottawa Citizen here.

A nurse prepares a booster dose of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine. If we focus only on science, and not also on the cultural context in which people act, we will be baffled to find that many turn their backs on the modern discoveries and innovations that can help us all.

A nurse prepares a booster dose of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine. If we focus only on science, and not also on the cultural context in which people act, we will be baffled to find that many turn their backs on the modern discoveries and innovations that can help us all. PHOTO BY MICHELE TANTUSSI /REUTERS

When we search for the humanity in LaMDA AI, we’re missing the point

In the Globe and Mail on June 25, 2022, some commentary on the Blake Lemoine/sentient AI episode:

[snip]

The whole exchange is essentially a version of the famous “imitation game” proposed in the 1950s by mathematician Alan Turing and designed to see whether a machine, writing responses to human questions, could “pass” as a human. But there has been a bit of a misunderstanding along the way around Turing’s intent: The test was not designed to show whether machines were capable of human-like thought.

In fact, Turing considered the question “can machines think?” to be “too meaningless to deserve discussion.” For him, a far more interesting question was whether machines could use language to trick an interrogator into thinking it was human. The Turing test, then, is intended to be an inquiry into human suggestibility, rather than some barometer of machine intelligence.

[snip]

Click here for the full article.

 

January can be bleak so I threw a Robbie Burns party for the family

[snip]

“It’s like a giant sausage,” I say by way of introduction.

They are pumped to see what they take to be a five-pound hot dog. The haggis is a mixture of “lamb offal” (that is to say, organs like kidney, heart and liver, but not lung,which is illegal to eat in Canada), oatmeal, onions and spices all stuffed into a sheep’s stomach.

The haggis is basically the guest of honour at a Burns Supper and as such is “piped in” just like the guests and takes up its position at the head of the table. Then I speak to it, reciting Burns’ famous Address to a Haggis.

[snip]

Read more at CBC Kids.

 

Joining Transatlantic Literary Agency

I’m pleased to announce I’ve joined Transatlantic Agency, represented by Brenna English-Loeb. I’m working on some non-fiction book projects and am eager to tell stories for a wider audience.

https://www.transatlanticagency.com/2021/11/10/welcoming-joseph-wilson-to-transatlantic/

[snip]

Joseph has written about education, technology, and culture for The Toronto Star, The Globe and Mail, Financial Times, NOW Toronto and Spacing. He currently writes a column for the CBC about parenting and education. He has appeared on Breakfast Television, CTV, Metro Morning, CBC Radio (Winnipeg, Toronto, Thunder Bay, Hamilton) and has spoken at conferences across North America, including at SXSW and the American Anthropological Association yearly conference. He is currently working towards a doctorate at the University of Toronto in Anthropology focusing on the social dimensions of language. He was a high-school teacher in Toronto and worked in education and exhibit-design at the Ontario Science Centre, the Royal Ontario Museum, the American Museum of Natural History, and the MaRS Discovery District. On weekends you can find him playing music in a bluegrass band. He lives in Toronto with his wife and three daughters.
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Find him online at josephwilson.ca and on Twitter at @josephwilsonca

Joseph is represented by Brenna English-Loeb

[snip]