What Is Artificial Intelligence? : A Conversation Between an AI Engineer and a Humanities Researcher

This book engages with the title question: what is artificial intelligence (AI)? Instead of reiterating received definitions or surveying the field from a disciplinary perspective, the question is engaged here by putting two standpoints into conversation. The standpoints are different in their disciplinary groundings — i.e. technology and the humanities — and also in their approaches — i.e. applied and conceptual. Peter is an AI engineer: his approach is in terms of how to make AI work. Suman is a humanities researcher: his approach is in terms of what people and academics mean when they say 'AI'.

A coherent argument, if not a consensus, develops by putting the two standpoints into conversation. The conversation is presented in 32 short chapters, in turn by Suman and Peter. There are two parts: Part 1, Questioning AI, and Part 2, AI and Government Policy. The first part covers issues such as the meaning of intelligence, automation, evolution, artificial and language. It outlines some of the processes through which these concepts may be technologically grounded as AI. The second part addresses policy considerations that underpin the development of AI and responds to the consequences. Themes taken up here include: rights and responsibilities; data usage and state-level strategies in the USA, UK and China; unemployment and policy futures.

Readership: General informed readers. Readers with knowledge of AI and its underpinning principles will be interested. In particular, those with a disciplinary background in computing and technological development, policy studies, current affairs, philosophy and discourse analysis. Appropriate for undergraduate students and upwards, or those whose interest is more conceptual than the general user of technology.

Peter H Tu earned his BS degree in Systems Design Engineering from University of Waterloo, Canada, and DPhil in Engineering Science from Oxford University, UK. In 1990, Dr Tu joined Sony Research in Tokyo, Japan, where he developed a number of computer vision algorithms for man-machine interfaces. While at Oxford University, his research was devoted to the development of computer vision methods for the automatic analysis of seismic imagery. In 1997 he became a senior research scientist working at General Electric's Global Research Center. In partnership with Lockheed Martin, he has developed a set of latent fingerprint matching algorithms for the FBI Automatic Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS). He has also developed optical methods for the precise measurement of 3D parts in a manufacturing setting. Dr Tu was the principal investigator for the FBI ReFace project, tasked with developing an automatic system for face reconstruction from skeletal remains. In 2006, he was the principal investigator for the National Institute of Justice's 3D Face Enhancer Program. This work was focused on improving face recognition from poor quality surveillance video. In 2008, Dr Tu led the GE video analytics team that participated in the DHS STIDP demonstration program — the goal of STIDP is to establish an effective defence against suicide-bomber attack. He is the principal investigator for the DARPA-sponsored effort associated with group-level behaviour recognition at a distance. Currently Dr Tu is GE's Chief Scientist for Artificial Intelligence. He has helped to develop a large number of analytic capabilities, including: person detection from fixed and moving platforms, crowd segmentation, multi-view tracking, person reacquisition, face modelling, face-expression analysis, face recognition at a distance, face verification from photo IDs and articulated motion analysis. Dr Tu has over 50 peer-reviewed publications and has filed more than 50 US patents.

Suman Gupta earned his MPhil degree in English from University of Delhi, India, and DPhil in English Literature from Oxford University, UK. Prior to joining the Open University in 2000, Gupta lectured at Nottingham University and the University of Surrey Roehampton (now Roehampton University). He has led a series of international collaborative projects since 2002, including: Globalization, Identity Politics and Social Conflict, 2002–2006; The Nigerian Film Industry and Independent Publishing in English in India, 2006–2008; a cluster of projects on English Studies in Non-Anglophone Contexts, 2007–2014; Framing Financial Crisis and Protest, Northwest and Southeast Europe, 2014–2016; and Entrepreneurial Literary Theory, 2016–2017. He has held visiting positions in Delhi University, India; Peking University, China; University of Texas Austin, USA; Federal University of Campinas, Brazil; CRASSH, Cambridge University, and Wolfson College, Oxford University, UK. He is Honorary Senior Research Fellow at Roehampton University. Gupta has authored 15 and edited 10 books, and published around 60 scholarly papers and chapters, in the areas of literary studies, cultural theory and politics. Books include: Corporate Capitalism and Political Philosophy (Pluto 2002), The Theory and Reality of Democracy (Continuum 2006), Globalization and Literature (Polity 2009), Imagining Iraq (Macmillan 2011), Philology and Global English Studies (Macmillan 2015), Usurping Suicide (Zed 2017, co-authored with M Katsarska, T Spyros and M Hajimichael).