Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Artificial Intelligence

3 credits · Undergraduate

It’s hard not to open a newspaper or magazine today and see claims being made for artificial intelligence. Advocates argue that software programs will now be able to even perform creative jobs (as opposed to just routine ones) and that this is both a matter of celebration and concern. Critics argue that these claims are hyperbolic, while others argue that they are too close to reality and an indication of how much autonomy we have ceded to machines. In this course, we will pick apart all of these claims. We will ask: how have different human societies conceived of “intelligence,” natural or artificial, and how has this varied with place and time?