AI is a mirror. What can it show us?

Hi, it’s Charley, and this is Untangled, a newsletter about technology, people, and power.This week I’m sharing my conversation with Shannon Vallor, the Baillie Gifford Chair in the Ethics of Data and Artificial Intelligence at the Edinburgh Futures Institute (EFI) at the University of Edinburgh. Vallor and I talk about her great new book, The AI Mirror: Reclaiming Our Humanity in an Age of Machine Thinking, and how to chart a new path from the one we’re on. We discuss:* The metaphor of an ‘AI mirror’ — what it is, and how it helps us better understand what AI is(and isn’t!)* What AI mirrors reveal about ourselves and our past.* How AI mirrors distort what we see — whose voices and values they amplify, and who is left out of the picture altogether.* How Vallor would change AI discourse.* How we might chart a new path toward a fundamentally different future — as a sneak peak, it requires starting with outcomes and values and thinking backward.* How we can become so much more than the limits subtly shaping our teenage selves (e.g. conceptions of what we’re good at, what we’re not, etc.) — and how that growth and evolution doesn’t have to stop as we age.It’s not hyperbole when I say Vallor’s book is the best thing I’ve read this year. If you send me a picture holding it in one hand, and my new book in the other, I might just explode with joy.More soon,Charley This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit untangled.substack.com