AI Unfiltered

This week Ian and Michael return to the nebulous question of what we actually mean when we say “AI”, a subject they discussed in the very first episode of the podcast. From there, things get more tangible, with robots asking for tips and an AI agent taking the initiative to hack a gym’s booking system when no slots were available. It all raises some slightly awkward questions about what counts as intelligence, how much autonomy we really want to give machines, and who gets the blame when they take “whatever it takes” a little too literally. (This description was written with the help of AI)

This week Ian and Michael discuss I Eat the Stars and the rather uncomfortable business of coming to terms with climate change, including whether feeling better about an increasingly alarming future is actually enough. The conversation then turns to AI watermarking and the difficulty of telling what is machine-generated as the internet fills with increasingly synthetic content and whether we're simply accelerating our way towards a world in which nobody knows quite what is real anymore. (This description was generated with the help of AI - yes, we see the irony)

This week Ian and Michael wonder what happens to creative arts education when universities start offering degrees in “AI-enhanced creative practice”, and whether learning to prompt a machine really counts as learning to be creative. The conversation then turns to The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, a surprisingly prescient 1960s vision of AI, computers and machine sentience, before arriving at another perennial subject: overtourism and the curious determination to keep attracting ever more visitors to places that are already struggling with the numbers. Along the way, there are the usual digressions. (This description was written with the help of AI)

Ian and Michael return from their summer break with the usual assortment of things to discuss, starting with media bias and the question of who gets to decide how biased the media actually is. From there they wander through coolcations, overtourism and Norwegian travels, the growing demands that data centres place on resouce consumption, and the rather less than convincing promise of instant language learning. And, naturally, there is AI-generated speech to dissect, with Ian and Michael finding the voices unnatural, giving our AI-generated contributor Emma Williams a perfect opportunity to return with another instalment of Artificial Reflections.(This episode features AI-generated content and speech)

As is tradition before the summer break, Ian and Michael compare holiday plans and wonder whether AI is capable of planning a genuinely useful itinerary, or merely an entertainingly unpredictable one. The conversation then turns into an enthusiastic tour of Finland, with recommendations ranging from Åland to Savonlinna, alongside reflections on tourism, good food, and why some destinations are worth taking your time over. We wrap up the season with a lighter episode, a few travel ideas, and the usual assortment of digressions. We return with new episodes in the autumn! (This description was written with the help of AI)