Artificial Intelligence past, present and possible futures: It’s not rocket science!

Bruce’s talk will take you on a brief tour of the history of artificial intelligence (AI) from early cons, through Alan Turing, expert systems, early neural networks, convolutional neural networks used for computer vision, early chatbots, and today’s large language models.
 
He will then explore possible scenarios for the future of artificial intelligence – both the opportunities and some of the massive societal impacts we face. If you have any strong thoughts or worries about AI, please bring those along for the Q&A at the end.
 
Biography
Bruce Aylward says he has a bit of a funny accent! Originally from South Africa, he grew up with computers in the home and went on to study for a BSc (Hons) in Computer Science. Fresh out of university, his first job was programming rockets to send satellites into low-Earth orbit. His career saw him work in Cape Town, Johannesburg, Tel Aviv, and London, before his final move to New Zealand.

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