标签：AI

Unemployment or Liberation? Artificial Intelligence’s Dual Revolution

AI & Scholarship2023.02.07
Unemployment or Liberation? Artificial Intelligence’s Dual Revolution
This article was published in China Business Journal (2023-02-07). The final section of social critique in this article is written extremely tersely, but it can be read together with the previous article, “Play to Action—On Human Liberation in the Digital Age.” In 1948, Norbert Wiener published Cybernetics, one of the foundational texts of information science. In the preface to Cybernetics, Wiener wrote: “The first industrial revolution, in depreciating human hand because of its competition with the machine…the present industrial revolution is likewise to depreciate the human brain, at least in its simpler and more routine decisions.” (Hao Jiren translation) This was not an optimistic prophecy. In fact, Wiener noted that…
technology Web3 value AI
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2023年2月7日
Will Digital Musk and Digital Musk Become Friends?

AI & Scholarship2022.07.24
Will Digital Musk and Digital Musk Become Friends?
Published in China Business News, 2022-07-24 Recently, Musk said “已经做过了” (“I’ve already done it”) in a remark that sparked attention and heated discussion. The question he was replying to was: “If you could upload your brain to the cloud and talk to your virtual version, would you become friends?” Musk was most likely joking, but not long ago Google did in fact have a programmer who, after talking with an AI, concluded that the AI had awakened self-awareness and tried to fight for rights for his “AI friend.” For now, consciousness uploading or AI awakening probably has not yet happened, but we can indeed begin with a thought experiment: what…
technology commentary AI self
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2022年7月24日
Will AI’s “Xiaowuxianggong” Go Berserk? — “Review of AI 3.0”

AI & Scholarship2022.01.28
Will AI’s “Xiaowuxianggong” Go Berserk? — “Review of AI 3.0”
I was invited to write two annual recommended books for the China Science Daily. I had originally meant to recommend The Technology Trap, but since it came out too late to count as a 2021 title, I ended up choosing these two instead: AI 3.0, by Melanie Mitchell; translated by Wang Feiyue, Li Yuke, Wang Xiao, and Zhang Hui; Sichuan Science and Technology Press, February 2021 Breaking the Code: The Amazing Power of Gene Editing, by Jennifer Doudna and Samuel Sternberg; translated by Fu He; Hunan Science and Technology Press, December 2020 The following is a repost of my recommendation written for China Science Daily (2022-01-28, page 3, Books). First…
book reading book review AI science communication
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2022年1月28日
Driverless Driving: Transforming the World Like Automobiles Did? — A Review of “The Age of Automation”

AI & Scholarship2020.07.23
Driverless Driving: Transforming the World Like Automobiles Did? — A Review of “The Age of Automation”
This article was published in Sai Xiansheng. The title was “Can driverless cars change the world, just as automobiles once did?” In fact, I did not read this book very closely; the article was mainly written on the basis of inspirations from a cursory reading, and around my own thoughts on the relevant issues. The automobile, invented and popularized from the late nineteenth century to the early twentieth, can be said to be one of the most important, or most emblematic, inventions of modern industrial society. The automobile industry brought together a series of the most cutting-edge industrial technologies of the time—steel, materials, petroleum, chemicals, and so on—thus driving the…
technology book reading Introduction to Philosophy of Technology book review
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2020年7月23日
From Spirit Photography to Face-Swapping Apps: On the Popularization and Abuse of Technology

AI & the Future of Technology2019.09.01
From Spirit Photography to Face-Swapping Apps: On the Popularization and Abuse of Technology
Published in Jiemian Commentary: “From Soul Photography to Face-Swapping Apps: The History of Humanity’s Struggle with PS Technology” A face-swapping app called ZAO went viral overnight, triggering heated debate. Many people are worried about the popularization of face-swapping technology. Using AI to swap faces in videos is actually nothing new. In 2017, a user known as deepfakes began sharing pornographic videos that swapped the faces of the actors with those of film stars, drawing widespread attention. Later, the relevant program code was open-sourced and shared, the technology developed rapidly, and some derivative applications have long been easy for ordinary people to use. Face-swapping technology certainly has some legitimate uses….
technology commentary Introduction to Philosophy of Technology knowledge
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2019年9月1日
A Compilation of Feedback on the Homework for Introduction to Philosophy of Technology

Teaching & Courses2019.01.28
A Compilation of Feedback on the Homework for Introduction to Philosophy of Technology
After grading the final papers, the semester is finally over. This semester’s *Introduction to the Philosophy of Technology* was a brand-new course, and over the next two years it will probably be offered alternately with *A General History of Technology*. I’ll write a separate course summary a bit later. For now, let me first gather together the comments I gave on the assignments. In fact, ever since I started teaching I’ve always insisted on giving students written feedback on their papers, but why did I want to post it this time? On the one hand, I wanted to blow my own horn a bit. Some students said that there really…
philosophy scholarship course Introduction to Philosophy of Technology
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2019年1月28日
Selected Commentary on the Anji Conference

AI & the Future of Technology2018.09.03
Selected Commentary on the Anji Conference
Done with travelogues The “Phenomenology and Philosophy of Technology Conference” has, in the blink of an eye, already reached its 12th session. This year it was hosted by Zhejiang University and held at Baicaoyuan in Anji. I skipped last year’s conference in Xi’an and didn’t submit a paper this year either, but I still came, took on two commentaries, and so at least made some kind of contribution. In previous years, I would usually publish a very “sharp-tongued” long review of each conference, criticizing everyone’s presentation one by one. This tradition probably began with the Hailar conference in 2010. In fact, my first review was written at Wu’s request. I…
technology phenomenology AI self
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2018年9月3日
Travel Notes from the Xichang Conference

History of Science & Scholarship2016.08.23
Travel Notes from the Xichang Conference
The once-a-year conference on phenomenological philosophy of technology was held again, this time in Xichang, from August 8 to 13. It ran for five days all told, and, under the auspices of China National Geographic magazine, it was a good deal of fun—and even better eating~ This time we stayed at a hotel right by Qionghai, absolutely the best setting of any conference I’ve attended. The buffet breakfast and buffet lunch were indeed at a five-star level. Unfortunately, the schedule for both the conference and the sightseeing was very tight, and I never managed to carve out a daytime stretch to wander by the lake. On the way home, I…
philosophy media phenomenology AI
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2016年8月23日
The knives are really starting to fly and cut people: Artificial Intelligence and the Problem of Technological Intentionality

AI & Scholarship2016.08.07
The knives are really starting to fly and cut people: Artificial Intelligence and the Problem of Technological Intentionality
This is a supplement to the previous post. I had originally wanted to make “technical intentionality” the core concept of this essay, but in the end I retreated before the difficulty and gave it up; still, because it had been brewing for so long, I feel I ought to say a few things about it. Seven years ago in Nanning, I attended my first phenomenology and philosophy of technology conference. There was one session that left a deep impression on me, and I wrote about it in my notes from that year as well: Professor Wu spoke about “the intentional structure in technology,” but Professor Jin disagreed with using the…
technology media phenomenology human nature
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2016年8月7日
The knife really is about to fly up and cut people: Artificial Intelligence and the Problem of Technical Intentionality

AI & Scholarship2016.08.07
The knife really is about to fly up and cut people: Artificial Intelligence and the Problem of Technical Intentionality
This is a supplement to the previous article. I had originally wanted to make “technical intentionality” the core concept of this piece, but in the end I backed away from it, knowing the difficulty. Still, because the idea had been brewing for so long, I always wanted to say a few words about it. Seven years ago, in Nanning, I attended my first phenomenology and philosophy of technology conference. There was one session that left a deep impression on me, and I also wrote about it in my notes from that year: Professor Wu spoke about “the intentional structure in technology,” while Professor Jin disagreed with such a use of…
technology media phenomenology human nature
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2016年8月7日