Techtonic with Mark Hurst | WFMU Emily M. Bender and Alex Hanna, authors, "The AI Con" from Jun 2, 2025
Jun 3, 2025
Emily M. Bender is a renowned linguist and co-author of 'The AI Con', while Alex Hanna is a sociologist exploring the socio-technical aspects of AI. They delve into the exaggerated hype around AI, calling it more of a marketing tool than a transformative technology. The duo critiques how AI misrepresents human communication and the exploitative labor practices behind it. They also discuss the ethical implications of AI in healthcare, advocating for greater agency and critical engagement with technology's role in society.
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AI Language Models as a Con
- AI hype exploits our natural tendency to perceive language as indicative of thinking.
- Large language models produce plausible text without true understanding or cognition.
AI as a Marketing Term
- The term AI is a marketing label lacking a coherent technology definition.
- Using alternate phrases like "Salami" exposes the absurdity of the inflated claims around AI.
Meaningless Word Form Manipulation
- Large language models manipulate only the form of words, not their meaning, akin to a "stochastic parrot."
- "Stochastic" reflects the probabilistic, non-deterministic nature of text generation, not simple repetition.
