#AI #STS #CriticalAI #Algorithms #Automation #Capitalism #Marxism: "Matteo Pasquinelli’s The Eye of the Master: A Social History of Artificial Intelligence offers a compelling new perspective on the nature of artificial intelligence (AI). The author situates the recent development of AI in a longer history of attempts to automate work activities already in the Industrial Age, noting that current AI systems have an old pedigree prior to modern computers. This history, the author claims, extends into the distant past where algorithms were already embodied in ancient rituals to transmit knowledge and skills. By situating AI in a historical perspective, Pasquinelli urges a substantive rethinking of the nature of artificial intelligence and calls for a fresh approach to meeting the challenges and recognizing the opportunities posed by this technology.

Pasquinelli’s central thesis is that AI does not emerge by replicating human intelligence, but from encoding human activities into repeatable procedures – algorithms. In other words, the true basis of AI appears not as an attempt to create a thinking machine, but as the latest iteration of the algorithmic modeling of social practices. Pasquinelli asks, “What is AI? A dominant view describes it as the quest ‘to solve intelligence’ – a solution supposedly to be found in the secret logic of the mind or in the deep physiology of the brain, such as in its complex neural networks. In this book I argue, to the contrary, that the inner code of AI is constituted not by the imitation of biological intelligence but by the intelligence of labour and social relations” (p. 2). He reframes our understanding of AI primarily as a technological entity to its reflection of human practices and social forces."
https://mediatheoryjournal.org/review-matteo-pasquinellis-the-eye-of-the-master-reviewed-by-alex-levant/

Big news.
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RT @CriticalAI
#CriticalAI + @RutgersCCA excited to announce DESIGN JUSTICE AI, a global humanities institute to take place at @UPTuks (U Pretoria) in partnership w/ @UCHI_UConn & ANU. Applications coming soon. Details here! https://criticalai.org/2023/02/15/design-justice-ai-critical-ai-rutgers-and-cca-announce-a-2024-chci-mellon-global-humanities-institute-at-the-university-of-pretoria/
https://twitter.com/CriticalAI/status/1634248565332516872

#CriticalAI pleased to share a new article in
@PublicBooks
by Lauren Goodlad & Samuel Baker. We'll be tweeting out a few choice moments later but here it is for those eager to know why NOW THE HUMANITIES CAN DISRUPT "AI"

https://www.publicbooks.org/now-the-humanities-can-disrupt-ai/

#CriticalAI congratulates @random_walker@twitter.com and @themarkup@twitter.com for this excellent interview! https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2023/01/28/decoding-the-hype-about-ai

#CriticalAI invites you to read our latest blog post; Eleni Coundouriotis blogs on @vukosi@twitter.com's December 2022 visit on African language NLP: "Augmenting the Data"
https://criticalai.org/2023/01/24/augmenting-the-data-vukosi-marivate-on-african-natural-language-processing-nlp/

#CriticalAI invites you to register for a hybrid event. "Victorian 'AI': a call to arms" featuring presentations from @PamelaKGilbert@twitter.com, @mmvty@twitter.com, Sophia Hsu and moderated by @ergodicwalk@twitter.com. 4/6 4pm ET https://rutgers.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_o6UOnlffRaCN734F0mDudQ

#CriticalAI please to publish our latest blog. Eleni Coundouriotis on @vukosi@twitter.com 's recent talk on African Language NLP! https://criticalai.org/2023/01/24/augmenting-the-data-vukosi-marivate-on-african-natural-language-processing-nlp/

#CriticalAI is partnering w/ @DAIRInstitute@twitter.com for a series on #AIHype (our new "wall of shame" is being reno'd). Would anyone like to take on the latest piece from the Atlantic (by Lowrey on everyone's favorite chatbot) for us? +

RT @CriticalAI@twitter.com

#CriticalAI pleased to publish a blog post w/ hype-free resources for teachers of writing. Links to many serious experts including @merbroussard@twitter.com @merbroussard@twitter.com @timnitGebru@twitter.com @emilymbender@twitter.com https://criticalai.org/2023/01/17/critical-ai-adapting-college-writing-for-the-age-of-large-language-models-such-as-chatgpt-some-next-steps-for-educators/

🐦🔗: https://twitter.com/CriticalAI/status/1615430295007760386

#CriticalAI pleased to publish a blog post w/ hype-free resources for teachers of writing. Links to many serious experts including @GaryMarcus@twitter.com @AINowInstitute@twitter.com
@KatherineBode@twitter.com https://criticalai.org/2023/01/17/critical-ai-adapting-college-writing-for-the-age-of-large-language-models-such-as-chatgpt-some-next-steps-for-educators/

#CriticalAI pleased to publish a blog post w/ hype-free resources for teachers of writing. Links to many serious experts including @merbroussard@twitter.com @merbroussard@twitter.com @timnitGebru@twitter.com @emilymbender@twitter.com https://criticalai.org/2023/01/17/critical-ai-adapting-college-writing-for-the-age-of-large-language-models-such-as-chatgpt-some-next-steps-for-educators/

#CriticalAI pleased to publish a blog post w/ hype-resources for teachers of writing. Links to many serious experts including @GaryMarcus@twitter.com @AINowInstitute@twitter.com @KatherineBode@twitter.com

#CriticalAI pleased to publish a blog post w/ hype-resources for teachers of writing. Links to many serious experts including @merbroussard@twitter.com @meredith@twitter.com @timnitGebru@twitter.com @emilymbender@twitter.com
https://criticalai.org/2023/01/17/critical-ai-adapting-college-writing-for-the-age-of-large-language-models-such-as-chatgpt-some-next-steps-for-educators/

#CriticalAI please to publish a new blog post for teaching college writing in the age of ChatGPT/LLMs. Our thanks to co-authors @EnglishOER@twitter.com and Lauren Goodlad. Please feel free to circulate!
https://criticalai.org/2023/01/17/critical-ai-adapting-college-writing-for-the-age-of-large-language-models-such-as-chatgpt-some-next-steps-for-educators/

Here's a workshop on AI and born-digital archives from Loughborough University. It's in London and online, on Jan. 26. It looks like reg. is openly available, but limited to 40 people. https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/lustre-workshop-ai-and-born-digital-archives-challenges-and-opportunities-tickets-492519157057 #archives #criticalai

Register Now! #CriticalAI 2/16 @ 5pm ET AI FUTURES/LLMs and the future of Human Writing. Join @sleepinyourhat@twitter.com, @nasrinmmm@twitter.com, Liz Losh, Kyle Booten for a lively discussion of LLMs.

#CriticalAI invites you to join us (in person/virtually) for Vukosi Marivate (University of Pretoria)
“AFRICAN NATURAL LANGUAGE PROCESSING (NLP): Looking Back to the Future.”
Thurs. December 15 10:30AM-12PM ET
To register, https://rutgers.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJMofuCuqD8tHdCDmIYQRzZ_jB86t63tr5PW

#CriticalAI RA Andi's guide to Mastdon now live on our blog https://criticalai.org/2022/11/30/critical-ai-users-guide-to-mastodon/

https://arxiv.org/abs/2211.03759 This is a very concerning article.
#CriticalAI is looking at LLMs intensively next semester--but perhaps large text-to-image models are even more salient.

#CriticalAI invites you to join us (in person/virtually) for Vukosi Marivate (University of Pretoria)
“AFRICAN NATURAL LANGUAGE PROCESSING (NLP): Looking Back to the Future.”
Thurs. December 15 10:30AM-12PM ET
To register,

https://rutgers.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJMofuCuqD8tHdCDmIYQRzZ_jB86t63tr5PW