Joining us today on the show are Meital Saar-Tsechansky, a professor at the McCombs School of Business who works on developing AI algorithms, particularly for improving decision-making and achieving social, business, organizational, and individual goals, and Samantha Shorely, an assistant professor in the Department of Communication Studies, who studies the contributions of people who are often overlooked in our dominant cultural narratives about technological innovation, paying close attention to the creativity and ingenuity of workers, particularly women.
Digging deeper
Automating Essential Work (Samantha Shorey documented how integrating AI into essential workers' workflows during the COVID-19 pandemic has increased their workload and made their everyday tasks more complex and technical).
AI will transform the global economy. Let's make sure it benefits humanity. International Monetary Fund (An IMF study predicts that about 60% of jobs in developed countries could be affected by AI, and about half of those jobs could see wages fall or disappear.)
What jobs are safe from AI? Four career fields to consider Desert News (Jobs in healthcare, education, law and creative fields may be less likely to be lost to AI than other fields.)
Pioneering the jagged technological frontier Harvard Business School(The study found that AI capabilities create a “jagged technological frontier,” meaning that some tasks can be easily performed by AI, while other tasks, while appearing to be of similar difficulty, are beyond AI's current capabilities.)
Is AI a blessing or a curse for the economy? History offers some clues Reuters (Technological advances over the years have ended up benefiting the wealthy and doing little for workers.)
Episode credits
Co-hosts are Mark Earhart, a science writer and podcaster in the College of Natural Sciences, and Casey Boyle, associate professor of rhetoric and director of the Digital Writing & Research Lab at the University of Texas.
Executive producers are Christine Sinatra and Dan Oppenheimer.
Sound design and audio editing are by Robert Scaramuccia. Theme music is by Aiolos Rue. Interviews were recorded at Liberal Arts ITS Recording Studio.
The cover image for this episode was generated with Midjourney, a generative AI tool.
About AI
AI for the Rest of Us is a collaboration between the College of Natural Sciences and the College of Liberal Arts at The University of Texas at Austin. The podcast is part of the university's Year of AI initiative. Opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and not of The University of Texas at Austin. Listen wherever you get your podcasts: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Podcasts, RSS, or on the web at aifortherest.net. Please contact mairhart with any questions or comments.[AT]Austin
