Tech firms are racing to develop robot assistants that can take over our dreaded household chores. But teaching machines to perform these deceptively simple tasks is tedious. They need to observe the actions thousands, sometimes millions of times. And there's a cottage industry springing up to provide this training. Marketplace’s Meghan McCarty Carino spoke with Ayanna Howard, roboticist and dean of Ohio State University’s college of engineering, to learn more.
For Episode 13, we're joined by industry pioneer, Dean Ayanna Howard. She began working at NASA's JPL at 18-years old to help build the Mars Rover and never slowed down from there. She is a successful roboticist, entrepreneur, educator, and is the author of the recent book: Sex, Race, and Robots: How to be Human in the Age of AI. Dr. Ayanna Howard is the current dean of The Ohio State University College of Engineering. Before joining Ohio State, she was Professor at Georgia Tech, where she was the founder and director of the Human-Automation Systems Lab (HumAnS). She led a range of projects including applying her knowledge of the Rover's SmartNav abilities to create robots that could explore remote areas of Antartica and Alaska to collect data for studying climate change. In addition to her leadership at Ohio State, she also started Zyrobotics, a non-profit dedicated to helping children that require extra development support. The conversation spans Ayanna's childhood, her inspirations like the Bionic Woman, and her views on building a more equitable AI ecosystem for all individuals. SUBSCRIBE TO THE ROBOT BRAINS PODCAST TODAY | Visit therobotbrains.ai and follow us on YouTube at TheRobotBrainsPodcast, Twitter @therobotbrains, and Instagram @therobotbrains. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Today we’re joined by returning guest and newly appointed Dean of the College of Engineering at The Ohio State University, Ayanna Howard. Our conversation with Dr. Howard focuses on her recently released book, Sex, Race, and Robots: How to Be Human in the Age of AI, which is an extension of her research on the relationships between humans and robots. We continue to explore this relationship through the themes of socialization introduced in the book, like associating genders to AI and robotic systems and the “self-fulfilling prophecy” that has become search engines. We also discuss a recurring conversation in the community around AI being biased because of data versus models and data, and the choices and responsibilities that come with the ethical aspects of building AI systems. Finally, we discuss Dr. Howard’s new role at OSU, how it will affect her research, and what the future holds for the applied AI field. The complete show notes for this episode can be found at https://twimlai.com/go/460.
Today we’re joined by returning guest and newly appointed Dean of the College of Engineering at The Ohio State University, Ayanna Howard. Our conversation with Dr. Howard focuses on her recently released book, Sex, Race, and Robots: How to Be Human in the Age of AI, which is an extension of her research on the relationships between humans and robots. We continue to explore this relationship through the themes of socialization introduced in the book, like associating genders to AI and robotic systems and the “self-fulfilling prophecy” that has become search engines. We also discuss a recurring conversation in the community around AI being biased because of data versus models and data, and the choices and responsibilities that come with the ethical aspects of building AI systems. Finally, we discuss Dr. Howard’s new role at OSU, how it will affect her research, and what the future holds for the applied AI field. The complete show notes for this episode can be found at https://twimlai.com/go/460.
Ayanna Howard is a roboticist and professor at Georgia Tech, director of Human-Automation Systems lab, with research interests in human-robot interaction, assistive robots in the home, therapy gaming apps, and remote robotic exploration of extreme environments. This conversation is part of the Artificial Intelligence podcast. If you would like to get more information about this podcast go to https://lexfridman.com/ai or connect with @lexfridman on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Medium, or YouTube where you can watch the video versions of these conversations. If you enjoy the podcast, please rate it 5 stars on Apple Podcasts, follow on Spotify, or support it on Patreon. This episode is presented by Cash App. Download it (App Store, Google Play), use code “LexPodcast”. Here’s the outline of the episode. On some podcast players you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that time. 00:00 – Introduction 02:09 – Favorite robot 05:05 – Autonomous vehicles 08:43 – Tesla Autopilot 20:03 – Ethical responsibility of safety-critical algorithms 28:11 – Bias in robotics 38:20 – AI in politics and law 40:35 – Solutions to bias in algorithms 47:44 – HAL 9000 49:57 – Memories from working at NASA 51:53 – SpotMini and Bionic Woman 54:27 – Future of robots in space 57:11 – Human-robot interaction 1:02:38 – Trust 1:09:26 – AI in education 1:15:06 – Andrew Yang, automation, and job loss 1:17:17 – Love, AI, and the movie Her 1:25:01 – Why do so many robotics companies fail? 1:32:22 – Fear of robots 1:34:17 – Existential threats of AI 1:35:57 – Matrix 1:37:37 – Hang out for a day with a robot
In this episode, the third in our Black in AI series, I speak with Ayanna Howard, Chair of the Interactive School of Computing at Georgia Tech. Ayanna joined me for a lively discussion about her work in the field of human-robot interaction. We dig deep into a couple of major areas she’s active in that have significant implications for the way we design and use artificial intelligence, namly pediatric robotics and human-robot trust. That latter bit is particularly interesting, and Ayanna provides a really interesting overview of a few of her experiments, including a simulation of an emergency situation, where, well, I don’t want to spoil it, but let’s just say as the actual intelligent beings, we need to make some better decisions. Enjoy! Are you looking forward to the role AI will play in your life, or in your children’s lives? Or, are you afraid of what’s to come, and the changes AI will bring? Or, maybe you’re skeptical, and don’t think we’ll ever really achieve enough with AI to make a difference? As a TWiML listener, you probably have an opinion on the role AI will play in our lives, and we want to hear your take. Sharing your thoughts takes two minutes, can be done from anywhere, and qualifies you to win some great prizes. So hit pause, and jump on over twimlai.com/myai right now to share or learn more. Be sure to check out some of the great names that will be at the AI Conference in New York, Apr 29–May 2, where you'll join the leading minds in AI, Peter Norvig, George Church, Olga Russakovsky, Manuela Veloso, and Zoubin Ghahramani. Explore AI's latest developments, separate what's hype and what's really game-changing, and learn how to apply AI in your organization right now. Save 20% on most passes with discount code PCTWIML at twimlai.com/ainy2018. The notes for this show can be found at twimlai.com/talk/110. For complete contest details, visit twimlai.com/myai. For complete series details, visit twimlai.com/blackinai2018.