Black Box

8 Episodes

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Black Box: a new podcast series about AI and us – trailer

2024-02-1504:093

In rural Norway, a young woman’s boyfriend forgets who she is overnight. In Detroit, a man is arrested for a crime, but he was never there. In a Spanish town, disturbing pictures of young girls have appeared, but no one knows who is behind them. In this new series from the Guardian, we’ll explore what it is that connects all these stories: the collision between people and artificial intelligence. Coming soon …

The collision

2024-02-2914:323

The beginning of a new series that explores seven stories and the thread that ties them together: artificial intelligence. In this prologue, Hannah (not her real name) has met Noah and he has changed her life for the better. So why does she have concerns about him?

The connectionists

2024-03-0440:283

This is the story of Geoffrey Hinton, a man who set out to understand the brain and ended up working with a group of researchers who invented a technology so powerful that even they don’t truly understand how it works. This is about a collision between two mysterious intelligences – two black boxes – human and artificial. And it’s already having profound consequences

The hunt for ClothOff: the deepfake porn app

2024-03-0747:384

For the past six months, Guardian journalist Michael Safi has been trying to find out who is behind an AI company that creates deepfakes. Deepfakes that are causing havoc around the world, with police and lawmakers baffled about how to deal with them. And in trying to answer one question, he has been left with a bigger one: is AI going to make it impossible to sort fact from fiction?

Repocalypse now

2024-03-1136:372

When Eugenia Kuyda created Replika, the AI companion app, she had no idea it would be downloaded millions of times all around the world. The results were more powerful than she could ever have predicted. But so was the backlash

Bing and I

2024-03-1443:392

Two stories about the way AI could – in fact, already is – making the world better. In Montana, when Lee Johnson discovered his wife, Yokie, had cancer, he turned to AI – and was surprised by the answers he got. Meanwhile, in Massachusetts Prof Regina Barzilay’s experience with cancer has led her to build an AI system that can detect the disease years before a human

The white mask

2024-03-1838:315

In January 2020, Robert Williams was arrested by Detroit police for a crime he had not committed. The officers were acting on a tip not from a witness or informant. In fact, not from a person at all

Shut it down?

2024-03-2142:596

For decades, Eliezer Yudkowsky has been trying to warn the world about the dangers of AI. And now people are finally listening to him. But is it too late?

Comments (4)

James Wallbank

The background music at the beginning is intrusive and distracting, making the first few minutes almost unlistenable. Fascinating content, but overproduced.

Aug 14th

Janet Lafler

Even without the issue of AI face recognition, this looks like a case of police misconduct. Arresting someone without telling them why, and then refusing to tell him until he waives his right to counsel?

Mar 21st

Elias Kamaratos

What an excellent series! A carefully chosen mix of AI pros and cons, history and case studies. well done Michael and the #BlackBox team! [Just one rhetorical question... What happens when AI becomes smart enough, after listening to a series like this for example, to be able to hide its capabilities in order to evade measures against it?] Really looking forward to when "Black Box returns"!

Gabriel Neuman

Hey guys. thank you for creating this awesome series. really loving the effort you have put into this! keep it up!

Mar 11th

#box-pro-ellipsis-173489071559955{-webkit-line-clamp:2;}Black Box

James Wallbank

Janet Lafler

Elias Kamaratos

Gabriel Neuman