Lecture and Colloquium Tech & Society: “Demystifying Artificial Intelligence”

Aspen Institute España and Fundación Telefónica hosted the third lecture and colloquium of the VII Edition of the Tech & Society Program on “Demystifying Artificial Intelligence” last Thursday, July 13th with Darío Gil, IBM Senior Vice President and Director of Research. The lecture was moderated by Isabel Fernández, rector of Universidad Alfonso X El Sabio. This meeting took place in Spanish and was interpreted in LSE. It could be followed in open streaming and on social networks with the hashtag #TechSociety.

In 1950, Alan Turing, one of the founding fathers of artificial intelligence, predicted that “machines will eventually compete with men in all purely intellectual fields” starting with chess, followed by “understanding and speaking English.” Today, more than 70 years later, we are living how this prediction is coming true. The aim of this lecture is to demystify artificial intelligence through an understanding of how neural networks work, and how, thanks to large-scale self-supervised learning, foundational models are created that make possible generative artificial intelligence, recently popularized by applications such as ChatGPT.  We will conclude with reflections on the extraordinary implications of these major technological capabilities for the present and future of our societies.

Darío Gil

He is IBM Senior Vice President and Director of Research. Dr. Gil is responsible for IBM Research, one of the world’s largest and most influential corporate research labs. He directs innovation strategies in hybrid cloud, AI, semiconductors, quantum computing, and exploratory science. He also leads the technical community of IBM and is responsible for the company’s intellectual property strategy and business. An advocate of collaborative research models, Dr. Gil co-chairs the MIT-IBM Watson AI Lab, which advances fundamental AI research to benefit industry and society. He also co-chairs the Executive Board of the International Science Reserve, a global network of open scientific communities that provides specialized resources to prepare for and help mitigate urgent, complex global challenges. Dr. Gil is a member of the National Science Board (NSB), the National Science Foundation (NSF) governing body. He also serves on the President’s Research Council of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research (CIFAR), the MIT School of Engineering Dean’s Advisory Council, and the Aspen Global Cybersecurity Group. Dr. Gil serves on the boards of the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA), New York Academy of Sciences, New York Hall of Science, and Research!America. Dr. Gil received his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT.

Isabel Fernández

She is Rector of the Alfonso X el Sabio University, member of the Advisory Boards of Telefónica Tech, DeNexus, a company dedicated to cyber risk management located in California, the Digital Innovation Centre of the Community of Madrid and the Escuela de Pensamiento de La Mutualidad de la Abogacía. Previously, she was Managing Director at Accenture, leading the Applied Intelligence area for Iberia and Israel, president of the Artificial Intelligence and BigData Commission of AMETIC, Rector at different universities of Laureate International Universities.

Isabel started her research career in the area of Machine Learning and Chaos Theory. She  continued her career in the area of analytics, Artificial Intelligence and Data Driven Company in companies such as ING Direct, Havas Media or American Express.

PhD in Artificial Intelligence from the University of Oviedo, Master in Risk Management (GARP) and other training programmes at MIT, Singularity University and Aspen Institute.

VII Edition of the Tech & Society Program

Aspen Institute España and Fundación Telefónica launched the VII Edition of the Tech & Society Program. The VI edition will bring together leaders from all sectors of civil society to discuss the new technological challenges and their influence in areas as diverse as human relations, politics, education, culture, economics and medicine

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