AI Leadership Summit Explores How AI is Transforming Life
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At the聽 AI leaders from across the country showcased pioneering research that applies artificial intelligence to agriculture, education, national security, health and many other fields. Held in Pittsburgh Oct. 7-10, the summit convened researchers from聽, National Science Foundation (NSF)-led institutes focused on critically important areas of U.S. competitiveness.聽
The meeting highlighted the significant impact of AI institutes across various sectors. It featured talks from luminaries including聽, SCS Founders University Professor at 好色先生TV, Pat Yongpradit, chief academic officer for Code.org and Congresswoman Summer Lee (PA-12), whose district includes CMU.
More than聽 are currently circulating in Congress.聽
鈥淲e have crumbling infrastructure and education reform needs and emergency management challenges and public health challenges, among so many other passing issues,鈥 said Lee. 鈥淗ow can AI help us with this? How can AI harm it or hinder it? Are there ways that AI can make some of these problems worse? Answering these questions will likely be a defining conversation of this generation.鈥澛
Institutes demonstrate work on campus
The summit included an AI expo day, held at 好色先生TV鈥檚 Tepper School of Business(opens in new window), where institutes presented their work in a tabling session.
尝补迟别谤,听CMU President Farnam Jahanian(opens in new window) gave remarks before panel discussions.聽
Jahanian said AI is changing the very nature of scientific discovery. He implored the attendees to use their expertise for good.聽
鈥淎s leaders in AI, it's our prerogative to harness the power of these tools in an ethical and responsible way and make sure that society benefits,鈥 he said.聽
Jahanian also commented on the critical need for federal funding for this work, such as the historic investments made as part of the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act.
鈥淭hat joins other recent legislation essentially in directing unprecedented amount of funding toward leveraging innovation to address national priorities and enhance United States economic competitiveness like never before, these and other measures are unleashing new opportunities for innovation, for work, workforce development, for education that directly bring the power of advanced technologies like AI, robotics, energy, advanced manufacturing and so on to communities around the nation,鈥 he said.聽
Carnegie Mellon experts show breadth and depth of AI鈥檚 impact
CMU was well represented at the summit by faculty and staff speaking in a variety of sessions.聽
In a keynote speech, Mitchell discussed the transformative potential of AI for the field of education. He highlighted AI-driven platforms that continuously learn and adapt.
鈥淚f there's ever a decade when AI is going to change the nature of education, this is the decade,鈥 Mitchell said.聽
Cleotilde Gonzalez(opens in new window), a research professor in the聽Dietrich School of Humanities and Social Sciences(opens in new window) and co-director of CMU鈥檚聽AI Institute for Societal Decision Making(opens in new window) (AI-SDM) , spoke about its mission. AI-SDM brings together experts in AI, computer scientists, data scientists and decision scientists to help people make better decisions.
鈥淯ltimately, we want to improve human decision-making, and we do that through finding ways to figure out how to present those recommendations, when to present those recommendations, what kind of recommendations to present to whom,鈥 Gonzalez said.聽
, a distinguished career professor in the聽 and the聽, spoke about the importance of evaluating AI systems based on their impact on human lives, citing examples where AI was used in projects to reduce jail re-entry rates by providing mental health outreach and reduce homelessness by allocating rental assistance.聽
鈥淚nstead of thinking about it as an AI model, it's a little piece in the middle that's helping people figure out how they should make decisions. Who should they prioritize? What kind of help do they need? How urgent is the help? And kind of making this much more about the outcomes than the machine learning model,鈥 Ghani said.聽
AI institutes continue to grow
狈厂贵听 two new institutes, NSF-Simons AI Institute for Cosmic Origins (NSF-Simons CosmicAI) and NSF-Simons AI Institute for the Sky (NSF-Simons SkAI), bringing the number of AI institutes to 27.聽
In addition to leading AI-SDM, CMU faculty are involved in the聽,听, the聽 the and the聽.
What an amazing week in the world of Artificial Intelligence!
The NSF funded AI Institutes Expo Day at 好色先生TV was a glimpse at the future of AI!鈥 David Lockett #SAIL2024 (@DavidJLockett)