ADAPT Radio: Recent Episodes
The ADAPT Centre
ADAPT, the world-leading SFI Research Centre for AI-Driven Digital Content Technology, brings leading academics, researchers and industry partners together to deliver excellent science, engage the public, develop novel solutions for business across all sectors and enhance Ireland’s international reputation.
Democratic stability faces an unprecedented challenge from hyper-accelerated digital disruption and algorithmic manipulation. We examine the strategic intersection of technology, law, and human rights as the Council of the European Union presidency transitions to Ireland. This discussion defines the research agenda for the new Trinity Centre for Digital Security and Societal Resilience.Our guests include Olivia Waters, Head of Impact and Growth Strategy at the Adapt Centre, along with key voices from the National Cyber Security Centre, the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, and academic leadership from Yale and Trinity College Dublin.THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUTTransitioning the European Union presidency agendaDefining societal resilience beyond technological solutionsAlgorithmic risks to individual democratic agencyEnforcement of existing digital rights legislationMultidisciplinary approaches to national cybersecurity threatsGUEST DETAILSOlivia Waters is the Head of Impact and Growth Strategy at the Adapt Centre. She leads institutional initiatives that bridge academic research with public policy. Her expertise includes strategic growth, innovation frameworks, and managing complex stakeholder relationships across the European research ecosystem.Connect with Olivia:Linkedin: linkedin.com/in/watersolivia MORE INFORMATIONYou can learn more about the Sea-Scan project and other cutting-edge research at Trinity College Dublin's ADAPT Centre here: www.adaptcentre.ie/Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the ADAPT CentreFor more information about ADAPT's groundbreaking AI and data analytics research visit www.adaptcentre.ie/
As Ireland prepares for its 2026 Presidency of the Council of the European Union, a critical challenge looms. The technology landscape is shifting dramatically, with foundational AI models concentrating immense power and influence into the hands of a few major players. This dependence introduces massive risks, including uncontrollable costs and a profound lack of national agency over essential digital infrastructure. This is the central problem facing Europe’s digital future.The solution may lie in building AI systems that are open, trustworthy, and sovereign. This episode explores how embracing open source—a development model and licensing approach—is the key to ensuring resilience, adaptability, and the freedom to affect change. It is a pathway to controlling one’s own digital destiny.To discuss this vital issue, we are joined by Clare Dillon, a founder of Open Ireland Network and PhD researcher, and Sarah Novotny, an esteemed open source champion who has led projects such as Kubernetes and OpenTelemetry.THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUTSovereignty means avoiding external controlAI amplifies power through dataOpen source provides agency and freedomFunding software maintenance is essentialCollaboration builds future technologyGUEST DETAILSClare Dillon is a founder of Open Ireland Network and is currently a PhD researcher in University of Galway with the Lyro Research Centre. Her work focuses on researching open collaborative software development practices and the idea of trustworthiness through code transparency. Sarah Novotny is a leading open source champion, actively involved in significant projects including Kubernetes, OpenTelemetry, NGINX, and MySQL. She is also studying for a Master's in Applied Social Data Science in Trinity College, Dublin.
In an age where critical infrastructure, democratic processes and public services all depend on digital technology, the stakes for getting cybersecurity right have never been higher. A ransomware attack can shut down a country’s health service overnight, and AI now makes it possible to fabricate passports, clone voices and impersonate anyone convincingly. The question is no longer whether something will go wrong - it is how we build the foundations to bounce back when it does.Professor Hitesh Tewari and Dr Maria Grazia Porcedda join Dr. Claire O’Connell to discuss the newly launched Trinity Centre for Digital Security and Societal Resilience at Trinity College Dublin. They explore what separates digital security from societal resilience, how zero-knowledge proofs could reshape how we prove our identity online, and why cybersecurity is too important to be left to computer scientists alone. They also share their personal journeys into the field, from blockchain research to EU law, and lay out their ambitions for turning the centre into a nationally funded, cross-Ireland research hub.THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUTWhat digital security and societal resilience actually mean, and why we need bothThe 2021 HSE ransomware attack as a wake-up call for IrelandHow AI is enabling identity fraud, deepfakes and document forgeryZero-knowledge proofs: proving who you are without revealing your dataProtecting Ireland’s undersea cables and critical digital infrastructureThe newly launched Trinity Centre for Digital Security and Societal ResilienceTop tips for everyday digital security — and why individual responsibility only goes so farGUEST DETAILSProf. Hitesh Tewari leads the Applied Cryptography Research Lab at Trinity College Dublin, where his research spans Security, Applied Cryptography, Privacy, and Decentralisation. He co-authored Electronic Payment Systems, and has since focused on the broader application of Blockchain technology across areas including public health and personal privacy. A member of the Ripple UBRI professorial network, his lab most recently released zkBallot in 2025 — a privacy-preserving electronic voting platform delivering both voter anonymity and public auditability.Maria Grazia Porcedda is Assistant Professor of IT Law at Trinity College Dublin, specialising in privacy, data protection, cybersecurity, and cybercrime at the intersection of law and technology. She is the author of Cybersecurity, Privacy and Data Protection in EU Law (Hart Publishing) and has advised the EU Directorate General for Development and Cooperation on cyber capacity building. Her policy-oriented, interdisciplinary scholarship is supported by several research awards, and she holds a PhD in Law from the European University Institute, where her thesis examined cybersecurity and privacy rights in EU law.Connect with the Guests:Prof. Hitesh TewariWebsite: https://www.tcd.ie/research/profiles/?profile=htewari Social Media: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hiteshtewari/ Maria Grazia PorceddaWebsite: https://www.tcd.ie/research/profiles/?profile=mariagrp Social Media: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mariagraziaporcedda/
The increasing sophistication of AI-generated content—like deepfake video and perfect scam calls—is rapidly heightening the risk of disinformation, phishing, and social engineering for everyone. This evolution means all citizens, from primary school pupils to public service leaders, must urgently build digital resilience and cyber literacy.Professor Rachel Farrell and Paul Stanley discuss the critical need for cyber hygiene, effective educational strategies like the Cyber Citizenship project, and how businesses can establish robust disaster recovery plans to withstand major attacks. They share actionable advice on protecting data and fostering a community-wide culture of security.Joining the programme are Professor Rachel Farrell, Director of the Professional Master of Education programme at UCD, and Paul Stanley, Head of Engagement at Ireland's National Cyber Security CentreTHINGS WE SPOKE ABOUTAI makes scams harder to detect.Cyber hygiene protects personal data.Urgency means an attack risk.Organisations need a recovery plan.Strong authentication prevents most incidents.GUEST DETAILSProfessor Rachel Farrell is Director of the Professional Master of Education (PME) programme in the School of Education at University College Dublin (UCD). She is founder of the UCD Centre for Cyber Resilience Education (Cyberwise.ie) and is a Principal Investigator on the SECURE project focused on primary school cybersecurity education, supporting teacher capacity-building and student engagement. Paul Stanley is the Head of Engagement at Ireland's National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC). He has a background in Information Security and Identity and Access Management and leads on the implementation of the EU/NCSC Cyber COREs projectConnect with the Guests:Prof. Rachel FarrellWebsite: cyberwise.ieSocial Media: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachel-farrell-phd-ucd/Paul StanleySocial Media: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paul-stanley-a1ab29317/ MORE INFORMATIONYou can learn more about the Sea-Scan project and other cutting-edge research at Trinity College Dublin's ADAPT Centre here: www.adaptcentre.ie/Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the ADAPT CentreFor more information about ADAPT's groundbreaking AI and data analytics research visit www.adaptcentre.ie/
39;s National Artificial Intelligence Literacy Initiative. This initiative fosters nationaldialogue on AI with older adults and co-creates a comprehensive, accessible, and inclusive nationalAI literacy programme.Michael Core is an electrical and electronic engineer and a lecturer also at the School ofElectronic and Engineering in TU Dublin. He has a particular interest in integrating embeddedsystems using new web technologies and has many years of senior management experience inthe telecommunications industry.Connect with the Guests:● Paula Kelly email : paulakelly@tudublin.ie● Michael Core linkedin: linkedin.com/in/michaelcore● Website: https://agefriendlyai.ie/
D team at Storyful creating systems helping journalists and analysts understand and interpret vast amount of public content and data shared as societies move online, his work centres on journalism's core principles of transparency, provenance and trusted community voices. Before joining Storyful, he was founder and product lead for number of web-based startups winning industry innovation awards including Web Summit Spark of Genius. Connect with the Guests:Jennifer Edmond LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jenniferedmond/Trinity Centre for Digital Humanities, Trinity College DublinKT 4D ProjectStoryful News CorpADAPT Centre: www.adaptcentre.ieMORE INFORMATIONYou can learn more about the Sea-Scan project and other cutting-edge research at Trinity College Dublin's ADAPT Centre here: www.adaptcentre.ie/Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the ADAPT CentreFor more information about ADAPT's groundbreaking AI and data analytics research visit www.adaptcentre.ie/
D team at Storyful creating systems helping journalists and analysts understand and interpret vast amount of public content and data shared as societies move online, his work centres on journalism's core principles of transparency, provenance and trusted community voices. Before joining Storyful, he was founder and product lead for number of web-based startups winning industry innovation awards including Web Summit Spark of Genius. As computer scientist and technologist, he emphasises optimism about technology as enabler whilst recognising need for common understanding of emerging terms like trustworthy AI, AGI and ASI. His perspective highlights journalism's increasing value as AI companies seek trusted content for training models, importance of commercial exchange recognising that value, and belief that journalism should remain person first with humans always involved in veracity, verification and community engagement whilst AI augments newsroom processes.Connect with the Guests:Jennifer Edmond LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jenniferedmond/Trinity Centre for Digital Humanities, Trinity College DublinKT 4D ProjectStoryful News CorpADAPT Centre: www.adaptcentre.ieMORE INFORMATION:You can learn more about the Sea-Scan project and other cutting-edge research at Trinity College Dublin's ADAPT Centre here: www.adaptcentre.ie/Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the ADAPT CentreFor more information about ADAPT's groundbreaking AI and data analytics research visit www.adaptcentre.ie/KEYWORDS#TrustworthyInformation #CriticalDigitalLiteracy #AIandDemocracy #JournalismValues #DigitalDemocracyLab
Local government faces challenge implementing generative AI ethically whilst maintaining public trust and data security as new EU AI Act regulations require basic AI literacy training for staff.Khizer Ahmed Biyabani, researcher with ADAPT at Trinity College Dublin and 2025 Digital Transformation Rising IT Star winner, alongside Richie Shakespeare, assistant staff officer Dublin City Council, explain Ireland's first local government generative AI Lab translating academic research into practical ethical AI tools, how retrieval model analysing council meeting minutes avoids hallucinations by training only on specific datasets preventing New South Wales Australia confusion, why four pillars covering governance, education, proof of concepts and enterprise scaling create systematic approach, and how smart gully life buoy monitoring sensors demonstrate broader Smart Cities innovation culture.Khizer Ahmed Biyabani is researcher with ADAPT at Trinity College Dublin recently winning Rising IT Star in Public Sector Award at 2025 Digital Transformation and AI Awards. Co-leading Ireland's first local government generative AI Lab translating academic research into ethical practical AI tools for public services, he runs Explain IT workshops with colleague Claudia Bailey from Smart Documents under Academy Near Future programme at Connect Resource Centre providing basic AI literacy training required by EU AI Act Article Four. Richie Shakespeare is assistant staff officer in Dublin City Council working within Smart Cities tech innovation section examining new emerging technologies, innovative processes and collaboration models making city operate smarter. Co-leading local government generative AI Lab partnership with ADAPT Centre at Trinity College Dublin, he focuses on internal process improvements identifying pain points staff experience whilst maintaining ethical considerations around data sensitivity and personal information protection. Connect with the Gen AI Lab:Website: www.adaptcentre.ieADAPT Centre at Trinity College DublinDublin City Council Smart Cities DivisionMORE INFORMATIONYou can learn more about the Sea-Scan project and other cutting-edge research at Trinity College Dublin's ADAPT Centre here: www.adaptcentre.ie/Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the ADAPT CentreFor more information about ADAPT's groundbreaking AI and data analytics research visit www.adaptcentre.ie/
Teachers face overwhelming preparation burden as global education shifts toward personalised learning and outcomes based curricula without adequate infrastructure support creating fragmented system between teachers, students, school leaders and departments.Dr Chris Byrne, founder and CEO of MESO offering intelligent planning software for teachers supported by Enterprise Ireland and ADAPT Centre Trinity College Dublin with PhD focused on curriculum change, explains why leaked UK government report showed 25% teachers considering quitting due planning burden requiring reducing class contact hours costing physical resources, how personalised education demands knowing 30 to 40 students' individual learning needs without providing additional time or infrastructure, why outcomes based education replaced topic textbook model with broad learning statements containing active verbs like discuss and investigate developing 21st century skills, and how AI enables creating unit plans, lesson plans, rubrics and success criteria whilst human teachers excel at predicting task duration where LLMs prove terrible.THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUTTeachers face overwhelming preparation burden personalised outcomes based education without adequate infrastructure fragmented system Leaked UK government report twenty five percent teachers considering quitting planning burden physical resource constraints Outcomes based education replaced topics with learning statements active verbs discuss investigate twenty first century skills GUEST DETAILSDr Chris Byrne is Founder and CEO of MESO creating education planning software empowering teachers, students and school leaders through adaptive tools enhancing teaching and learning fostering environment where every learner can thrive. Supported by Enterprise Ireland commercialisation funding and partnering with Trinity College ADAPT Centre, world leading SFI Research Centre for AI-Driven Digital Content Technology, ensuring MESO at forefront of education innovation. Holding Postgraduate Diploma in Education Management from National University Ireland Maynooth and PhD from Trinity College Dublin where research focused on curriculum change, he brings perspective as former teacher with extensive classroom experience understanding planning burden firsthand. Active contributor to global conversation on education reform regularly speaking at national and international conferences sharing insights on curriculum innovation, adaptive learning technologies and educational transformation with research published in leading academic journals shaping contemporary discussions on effective education strategies influencing policy and practice in educational institutions worldwide.Connect with Dr Chris Byrne:Website: mesolab.aiADAPT Centre: www.adaptcentre.ieEnterprise Ireland Commercialisation FundingTrinity College Dublin
assumptions. Her work on benchmarks and measurement demonstrates that purpose-built smaller models often outperform larger models in real-world contexts with appropriate contextual data.Connect with the guests: Signal Foundation: signal.org AI Now Institute: ainowinstitute.org AI Accountability Lab: Contact through ADAPT Centre Follow their research and writing on AI accountabilityMORE INFORMATIONYou can learn more about the Sea-Scan project and other cutting-edge research at Trinity College Dublin's ADAPT Centre here: www.adaptcentre.ie/Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the ADAPT CentreFor more information about ADAPT's groundbreaking AI and data analytics research visit www.adaptcentre.ie/KEYWORDS#TrustedAI #AIaccountability #AIprivacy #AIgovernance #MeredithWhittaker
Ireland's territorial waters are among Europe's largest, yet monitoring this vast maritime expanse for unauthorized vessels, environmental threats, and infrastructure protection remains an enormous challenge with current surveillance technologies.Professor Marco Ruffini and Dr. John Kennedy from Trinity College Dublin have developed Sea-Scan, a revolutionary system that transforms existing undersea telecommunications cables into comprehensive acoustic monitoring networks. Using distributed acoustic sensing and AI, their technology can detect and classify vessels across hundreds of kilometers of ocean using just one land-based device.THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●Transforming existing fiber optic cables into underwater sensor networks●AI detection of "dark vessels" that disable identification beacons●Unique acoustic signatures for different vessel classifications●Marine ecosystem monitoring and shipping noise impact assessment●Real-time infrastructure protection from accidental damage●Cost-effective surveillance across Ireland's vast territorial watersGUEST DETAILSProfessor Marco Ruffini is Associate Professor and Fellow of Trinity College Dublin and Principal Investigator of both the CONNECT Telecommunications Research Centre and the IPIC Photonics Integration Centre. He specializes in optical network architecture at the Department of Computer Science and Statistics, focusing on converged metro/access network architecture, long-reach passive optical networks, and inter-data center connectivity. His expertise spans over two decades in optical communications and fiber sensing technologies. Dr. John Kennedy is Associate Professor in Vibrations, Acoustics and Dynamics at Trinity College Dublin. His current research centers on the use of advanced additive manufacturing techniques to design and fabricate novel acoustic metamaterials for environmental noise control. His research focuses on acoustics, noise control, aeroacoustics, additive manufacturing, and metamaterials, making him uniquely positioned to interpret underwater acoustic signals.MORE INFORMATIONYou can learn more about the Sea-Scan project and other cutting-edge research at Trinity College Dublin's ADAPT Centre here: www.adaptcentre.ie/Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the ADAPT CentreQUOTESHaving this many sensors in this environment helps us monitor activity that's happening in our waters. - John Kennedy Just by placing one device at one end of the fiber, I had a microphone every meter, so I can get a different sound every meter for all the 100 kilometers just with one device at one end. - Marco Ruffini This technology gives you a kind of unparalleled resolution of sensors underwater. It allows you to investigate questions that you know are very important for various different reasons. - John Kennedy You won't believe how often fiber gets cut due to digging... you could detect the noise of the vehicle that's trying to dig, and you could contact them, maybe 10 to 15 minutes in advance. - Marco RuffiniOne of the exciting things about working in acoustics is that it sort of touches all aspects of human activity and also our daily lives." - John KennedyKEYWORDS#distributedacousticsensing #marinesurveillance #fiberoptics #underwateracoustics #AImonitoring
Ireland is facing a housing crisis, and yet countless buildings sit empty and unused. In this episode of Adapt Radio, Dr. Clare O’Connell speaks with Dr. Philip Crowe and Milo Dennehy from University College Dublin about a bold, AI-driven project to map and tackle building vacancy across the country. Discover why data on empty buildings is so patchy, how new tech could unlock hidden opportunities for homes and communities, and why solving this puzzle means more than just better spreadsheets. From town centre revitalisation to the surprising power of open data, this conversation explores how AI might help Ireland turn vacancy into vibrant possibility.THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●Why Ireland’s empty buildings are so hard to track●How AI and data science are changing the vacancy game●The challenges, and surprises, of sharing property data●What Ireland can learn from France, Philadelphia, and beyond●Transforming vacant spaces into vibrant communitiesGUEST DETAILSDr Philip Crowe is UCD Assistant Professor for Climate Responsive Design at the School of Architecture, Planning and Environmental Policy (APEP) and the School of Civil Engineering.He is the Director of Research at UCD APEP, co-director of the UCD Centre for Irish Towns, and Programme Director of the MSc in Architecture, Urbanism and Climate Action. Philip teaches in areas relating to carbon management, sustainability, urban resilience and urban ethics. As a researcher, he is working on a range of EU and nationally funded projects relating to town revitalisation, vacancy and adaptive reuse, compact urban growth, and citizen participation in processes of change. Philip’s background is in architecture, and he was previously Director of Sustainable Design at M.CO (Dublin) from 2003-2012.Milo Dennehy is a Research Assistant in the School of Computer Science. Milo is a current student in the BSc City Planning and Environmental Policy programme, set to graduate in 2025. Before joining Building Stories, Milo was a research assistant in the School of Architecture, Planning and Environmental Policy at UCD. His research interests are in building geospatial tools that leverage machine learning and remote sensing techniques to enhance capacity and reduce the barriers to access to geospatial technology for local actors.MORE INFORMATIONYou can learn more about your AI Literacy in the Classroom here: https://ai-literacy-in-the-classroom.adaptcentre.ie/ Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/ QUOTESWe don’t actually know what we’re dealing with—how do you manage your built environment without reliable, dynamic data? – Dr Philip CroweIt shocked me how much decision-making still relies on throwing darts at the map and manual guesswork – Milo DennehyIf you aggregate all these data sets together, you’ve got something incredibly powerful to solve the housing crisis – Dr Philip CroweAI lets us see what’s missing in the data—and predict what’s possible for Ireland’s empty buildings. – Milo DennehyThe real challenge isn’t technical—it’s about building trust and a culture of sharing data for the public good. – Dr Philip CroweKEYWORDS#AI #VacantBuildings #IrelandHousing #DataScience #UrbanRevitalisation #SmartCities #OpenData #HousingCrisis #PropertyData #CommunityImpact #TownCentres #DataGovernance #SustainableCities #Innovation #TechForGood
Claire O'Connell hosts a discussion on AI and digital propaganda with media historians Nelson Riviero and Professor Aphra Kerr. They highlight the prevalence and hyper-personalisation of digital propaganda, which polarises public discourse and undermines democracy. AI accelerates the creation and dissemination of disinformation, often targeting specific demographics. Recent events in Ireland and Spain exemplify this, with false narratives spreading rapidly. Both experts stress the need for media literacy, early education, and regulatory action to combat this threat. They also discuss the role of universities in training students in both tech and ethics, and the importance of a multi-faceted approach to counter digital propaganda effectively.THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●AI's Role in Digital Propaganda●Impact on Democratic Processes●Media Literacy and Education●Targeted Disinformation Strategies●Regulation and Platform AccountabilityGUEST DETAILSAphra Kerr is Full Professor of Digital Media & Communication and a senior adviser at the UCD Centre for Digital Policy. She is an adjunct Professor of Sociology at Maynooth University and a co-PI at the ADAPT Research Ireland Centre for AI and Digital Content Technology. Vice-Rector for Transformation, Collaboration and International Affairs at Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Dr. Ribeiro coordinates the Doctoral Program in Communication Sciences and the research group “Media Narratives and Cultural Memory” at the Center for Communication and Culture Studies ( CECC). He was the Dean of the Faculty of Human Sciences between 2016 and 2025MORE INFORMATIONYou can learn more about your AI Literacy in the Classroom here: https://ai-literacy-in-the-classroom.adaptcentre.ie/ Adapt Radio is produced by https://dustpod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ieQUOTESNegative content often drives engagement, and then the algorithms will actually boost that even more - Professor Aphra KerrThe role that AI is playing… is that it actually helps speed up the process of creating propaganda content. - Professor Nelson RiberoYounger generations… they know how to use those tools, but it doesn’t necessarily mean they understand how those tools work. - Professor Nelson RiberoYou can’t fight propaganda with propaganda — you fight propaganda with education and media literacy. - Professor Nelson RiberoMedia literacy isn’t about blaming individuals — it’s about equipping people to navigate a complex digital world. - Professor Aphra KerrKEYWORDS#DigitalPropaganda #AIDisinformation #MediaLiteracy #AlgorithmManipulation #ElectionInterference #SocialMedia #TargetedMessaging #TechnologicalEthics #Democracy #Misinformation
Every day, AI systems influence how we learn, shop, and make decisions—but to truly support us, AI must communicate in ways tailored to who we are as individuals.In this episode, we share a keynote speech from the ADAPT Annual Scientific Conference that explores Explainable AI and its potential to personalize user experiences. The talk discusses how AI can adapt explanations to users’ unique traits and moment-to-moment states, improving trust and understanding. It highlights real-world applications in intelligent tutoring systems, recommender platforms, and healthcare technologies, illustrating how human-centered AI is reshaping interactions.Join us as we explore the future of AI that not only acts intelligently but also connects meaningfully with each user. Our guest speaker is Professor of Computer Science at the University of British Columbia, Cristina Conati, a pioneer in user modeling, personalization, and explainable AI.THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●Evolving from generic systems to human-centred AI●Unlocking personalization through multimodal signals●Improving user trust, engagement, and learning outcomes●Real-World applications from intelligent tutoring systems to healthcare technologies●Complexities and ethical considerations of deliveryGUEST DETAILSProfessor Cristina Conati is a Professor of Computer Science at the University of British Columbia (UBC). She holds a Master’s degree in Computer Science from the University of Milan and both a Master’s and Ph.D. in Intelligent Systems from the University of Pittsburgh. Her research lies at the intersection of Artificial Intelligence (AI), Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), and Cognitive Science, focusing on creating intelligent systems that adapt to individual users' needs. Professor Conati has over 100 peer-reviewed publications and has received multiple Best Paper Awards. She is an ACM Distinguished Member and an AAAI Senior Member.https://www.cs.ubc.ca/people/cristina-conati MORE INFORMATIONYou can learn more about your AI Literacy in the Classroom here: https://ai-literacy-in-the-classroom.adaptcentre.ie/ Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/ QUOTESIn order to have this AI driven personalization during interaction, what needs to be done is to establish what we call the AI driven personalization loop. - Cristina Conati We're working towards creating intelligent systems that can understand to whom, when and how, to provide explanations of their behaviors. - Cristina Conati The explanation should be designed so that a user can choose at what level of detail to go deeper. - Cristina Conati It would be important to look at different user characteristics that might impact, like user reading proficiency or abilities to process visual information. - Cristina Conati It’s super important to understand interplay between explanations and under or over reliance with AI. - Cristina Conati KEYWORDS#HumancenteredAI #explainableAI #usermodels #multimodal #learning #health
How many times have you gone to the doctor and then on the way home from the appointment, realized there were things that you forgot to ask about?Today, we hear about an AI-powered platform that helps patients record questions and quality-of-life issues ahead of time to support more effective consultations. Currently being trialled with cancer patients, we hear how the system integrates with electronic health records, improves patient engagement, and has the potential to cut clinician workload in half. Our guest is a seasoned expert in digitising patient care with over 25 years of experience in clinical and research settings. We’re delighted to welcome CEO of eAltra, Denis Roche.THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●The role of AI in enhancing patient communication●Human-centreed design and clinical insight in ai development●Technical integration with electronic health records (EHR)●Real-world testing and impact on clinical workflows●Incorporating wearable and environmental dataGUEST DETAILSDenis Roche is the CEO and founder of eAltra, a Trinity College Dublin spinout developing conversational AI to support cancer care. With over 25 years of experience in digitising patient pathways, Denis brings deep expertise in cognitive computing and data analytics. His clinical insights, gained from working in leading healthcare settings, have driven eAltra’s mission to address global under-capacity in cancer care. Under his leadership, the company has secured Enterprise Ireland funding and won Best Emerging AI at Spark Crowdfunding’s Top 100 Awards.https://www.eAltra.com/ MORE INFORMATIONYou can learn more about your AI Literacy in the Classroom here: https://ai-literacy-in-the-classroom.adaptcentre.ie/ Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ieQUOTESIt's really just to combine the information source with the accessibility, making it more powerful. - Denis Roche What we're trying to do at eAltra is to equip the patient as best as we can. Give them the information that they need, in the way that they want it, at the time that they need it. - Denis Roche We're trying to create somewhere that patients can come and know that it's safe and it's private. - Denis Roche The hospital teams think it's going to bring the time they spend down by about 50%. - Denis RocheIt feeds into streamlining or improving the patient scheduling process. - Denis RocheKEYWORDS#AI #technology #cancer #healthcare #EHR #clinicaltrials #patient #data #digitalhealth
Facial recognition technology is becoming a routine part of daily life, from unlocking phones to assisting law enforcement. But as its use expands, so do the ethical and legal dilemmas it presents. Today we dive into the mechanics of facial recognition technology—how it works, its limitations, and the biases it can reinforce. From government policies to legal frameworks, and the importance of public awareness in shaping the future of AI-powered surveillance, we break down the pressing issues surrounding this technology.Joining us are two experts who are working to promote awareness and caution around FRT. They are Assistant Professor at Maynooth University’s School of Law and Criminology, Dr. Ciara Bracken-Roche, and Senior Policy Officer at ICCL and coordinator of the International Network of Civil Liberties Organizations, Olga Cronin. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●The rise of facial recognition technology in everyday life and law enforcement●Concerns about ethics, flaws and AI bias in FRT ●Examining government policies, legal challenges, and human rights issues ●Potential dangers and misuse of mass surveillance●Engaging society to critically think through creative mediums GUEST DETAILSDr. Ciara Bracken-Roche is an Assistant Professor in the School of Law and Criminology at Maynooth University, and an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Criminology at the University of Ottawa. She completed her PhD (Queen's University), MA (Warwick), and BSc (Toronto).Ciara's current line of research explores the adoption and use of drones and other surveillance technologies in Canada and Ireland by policing and public safety agencies. https://www.maynoothuniversity.ie/people/ciara-bracken-roche Olga Cronin is a Senior Policy Officer of Enforce and the coordinator of the International Network of Civil Liberties Organisations (INCLO). She is focused on facial recognition technology, encryption, state surveillance, privacy and data protection.Her work to date, with academics and other NGOs, helped prevent use of the powerful mass surveillance without pre-legislative scrutiny or debate. She also leads ICCL’s work on several EU proposals, including the EU ‘ChatControl’ proposal which could mandate unprecedented mass surveillance of all public and private digital communications. She is leading several complaints to the Data Protection Commission.https://www.iccl.ie/staff/olga-cronin/ MORE INFORMATIONYou can learn more about your AI Literacy in the Classroom here: https://ai-literacy-in-the-classroom.adaptcentre.ie/ Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/ KEYWORDS#AI #facialrecognition #biometric #data #humanrights #masssurveillance #AIAdvisoryCouncil
AI is transforming education at an unprecedented pace, which means teachers need to think closely about how to harness the power of AI.In this episode we learn about a new initiative that aims to help teachers navigate AI to better education, rather than hinder it. We hear how AI is already impacting classrooms across the world, from technical worries to ethical concerns, and how educational content and assessment can be adjusted to embrace rapidly evolving technologies. Our guests are two experts involved in the new AI Literacy in the Classroom initiative. They are Head of Education, Engagement and Societal Impact at ADAPT, Laura Grehan, and Associate Professor of Digital Learning at Dublin City University, Dr Eamon Costello. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●How AI is impacting education for both teachers and students ●Overview of the AI Literacy in the Classroom Initiative●Where AI has practical uses in education ●Addressing biases and ethical considerations in AI●Future-proofing for technology advancements with AI literacy GUEST DETAILSLaura Grehan is Head of Education, Engagement and Societal Impact at ADAPT and a member of the ADAPT Executive Management Committee. ADAPT’s EPE programme has been reviewed internationally as being “outstanding”, and the ADAPT EPE team was awarded a DCU President’s Staff Recognition Award 2021 in recognition of its exceptional work. Under Laura’s leadership, ADAPT has won over €1.5m in funding for EPE projects at national and international level. Some of these projects have won international awards recognising their high quality and an exemplary pivot to online delivery during the COVID-19 pandemic.https://www.adaptcentre.ie/experts/laura-grehan/ Dr Costello is an Associate professor of Digital Learning at Dublin City University and an accomplished teacher, researcher and public speaker. He is deeply curious about how we learn in different environments and is known as a creative and innovative communicator. He is concerned with how we actively shape our world so that we can have better and more humane places in which to think, work, live and learn. He is an advocate of using the right tool for the job or sometimes none at all, for not everything can be fixed or should be built.https://www.dcu.ie/stemeducationinnovationglobalstudies/people/eamon-costello MORE INFORMATIONYou can learn more about your AI Literacy in the Classroom here: https://ai-literacy-in-the-classroom.adaptcentre.ie/ Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/KEYWORDS#AI #literacy #education #generativeAI # teachertraining #criticalthinking #biases #ethics
Many of our daily interactions are reliant on the processing of personal data from emails, to social media, our phones and SMART devices. What happens to that data after we die? Although many of us don’t like to think about it, we will leave behind a huge digital footprint with data that could be useful to future generations. Today we hear how AI can help shape our digital legacy and how digital literacy can improve management, preservation and access to the data that outlives us. Our guest is an expert in human data interactions and PhD candidate at University College Dublin, School of Information and Communication Studies, Danny Snow. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●The digital legacy we leave after death ●Complications of ownership and access ●Uses of posthumous data including medical research ●How AI can shape digital legacies and mass data collection ●Data donor cards and design in digital footprints GUEST DETAILSDanny Snow is a PhD candidate at University College Dublin, School of Information and Communication Studies, and Danny is looking at human data interactions and AI and that includes exploring the concept of digital literacy and examining how digital content is managed, preserved and accessed after a person dies. https://ie.linkedin.com/in/danny-snow-1583931a3 MORE INFORMATIONYou can learn more about your digital data legacy at https://datadonorcard.org/ Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/ QUOTESIn more recent history, the volume of data is related to a specific period of time, whereas as we move forward, it's likely to relate to the entirety of someone's life. - Danny Snow Personal data, even when alive, doesn't relate just to you. It relates to your family, anyone you're interacting with, anyone you're in the same location as, and it's the aggregation of that data that is important. - Danny Snow The legal protections around posthumous data aren't the same. - Danny Snow AI has the potential for recognizing these patterns, that in such a large volume that may not otherwise be recognizable. - Danny Snow One of the big issues is that we don't necessarily understand what our digital footprint encompasses. - Danny Snow KEYWORDS#Digital #legacy #AI #data #ethical #digitalfootprint #privacy
As AI becomes a bigger part of our world it can be utilised to power research and studies in ways that were never possible before. Today we hear about new research that has used AI to expose the harms of gambling marketing in sport. Through analysis of sporting programmes, social media consumption and focus groups with young people, they discovered the shocking reach these companies have into our everyday lives. Our expert guests are calling for better regulation and a step away from the idea of individual responsibility. Aphra Kerr is Adjunct Professor of Sociology at Maynooth University and Professor of Information and Communication Studies at University College Dublin. Dr Paul kitchen is a senior lecturer in the School of Sport and Exercise Science at Ulster University in Belfast. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●Using AI to gather concrete data on gambling trends●The rise in gambling exposure due to social media and deregulation ●Analysis through focus groups and media consumption ●Social impacts and considerations away from the individual●Putting pressure on sporting bodies and gambling companies GUEST DETAILSDr. Aphra Kerr is a Full Professor of Information and Communication Studies at University College Dublin and Senior Adviser at the UCD Centre for Digital Policy. She is adjunct Professor of Sociology at Maynooth University. She is a Co-PI at the ADAPT Centre for Digital Media Technology, scientific lead of the Transparent Digital Governance strand and co-lead of the Autonomy and Responsibility challenge. Her ADAPT research focuses on the ethics and values underpinning the design and governance of AI, AI related public policy and social expectations of AI. She is also working on projects related to algorithmic and AI literacy, young people’s engagement with media and gaming, histories of creative computing and examining media concentration and power. Aphra has over twenty years researching digital content and technology with a focus on digital media and digital games. Paul Kitchin is a Senior Lecturer within the School of Sport and Exercise Science. His PhD investigated organisational change on managers, staff, and youth participants in para-sport. He is interested in how wider health and social outcomes are developed through sport. Topics of relevance to this include; Disability, Sport and Media, Marketing, Gambling, Youth. He is a Senior Fellow of the Advance HE and his teaching and supervision focus is on leadership, management, and justice in and through sport organisations.MORE INFORMATIONAll-Island report finds young people exposed to high levels of gambling marketing across sport and media: https://www.adaptcentre.ie/news-and-events/all-island-report-finds-young-people-exposed-to-high-levels-of-gambling-marketing-across-sport-and-media/ Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/
As AI continues to shape our society, how can we make sure that it doesn't harm minority groups or exacerbate inequalities? Today we hear from two experts who are a part of a brand new research group that is working to keep AI accountable. The AI Accountability Lab focuses on critical issues across broad topics such as the examination of opaque technological ecologies and the execution of audits on specific models and training datasets. We hear how researchers are trying to join the dots between evidence and policy and how better AI awareness is key to preventing harm. Our guests today are leading the way in AI accountability. Dr Abeba Birhane is a cognitive scientist and Research Fellow in the ADAPT Research Centre Ireland, and Dr Roel Dobbe is an Assistant Professor in Technology, Policy & Management at Delft University of Technology focusing on Sociotechnical AI Systems. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●The AI Accountability Lab ●How AI has potential to entrench inequality in society ●Joining the dots between AI research and policies ●Addressing misrepresented concepts in AI training models ●Awareness of AI inaccuracy even with perfect data models GUEST DETAILSDr Abeba Birhane is a cognitive scientist researching human behaviour, social systems, and responsible and ethical Artificial Intelligence (AI). Abeba recently finished her PhD, where she explored the challenges and pitfalls of automating human behaviour through critical examination of existing computational models and audits of large scale datasets. Abeba is currently a Senior Fellow in Trustworthy AI at Mozilla Foundation. She is also an Adjunct Lecturer/Assistant Professor at the School of Computer Science and Statistics at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland.https://abebabirhane.com/ Dr Roel Dobbe is an Assistant Professor in Technology, Policy & Management at Delft University of Technology focusing on Sociotechnical AI Systems. He received a MSc in Systems & Control from Delft (2010) and a PhD in Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences from UC Berkeley (2018), where he received the Demetri Angelakos Memorial Achievement Award. He was an inaugural postdoc at the AI Now Institute and New York University. His research addresses the integration and implications of algorithmic technologies in societal infrastructure and democratic institutions, focusing on issues related to safety, sustainability and justice. Roel’s system-theoretic lens enables addressing the sociotechnical and political nature of algorithmic and artificial intelligence systems across analysis, engineering design and governance, with an aim to empower domain experts and affected communities. His results have informed various policy initiatives, including environmental assessments in the European AI Act as well as the development of the algorithm watchdog in The Netherlands.https://www.tudelft.nl/staff/r.i.j.dobbe/ MORE INFORMATIONAdapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/ KEYWORDS#AI #accountability #transparency #public #policies #data #auditing #bias
Many of us will be familiar with voice activated software in devices like smart speakers, but there are so many more possibilities for this technology, including in healthcare. Today we hear about a voice technology companion that will help care for people with mobility-related illnesses at home, allowing them to live independently for longer. We hear how the AI software will help with medication delivery, activity reporting and event reminders to assist patients and healthcare providers with care. Our guest today is an entrepreneur who created this start-up after having her own experience caring for those with mobility issues. She is the Founder and Commercial Lead of Amethyst Care, Rebecca McManus. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT> Developing a voice-enabled AI companion to help those with mobility issues> Complimenting face-to-face care with technology > Involving caregivers and people with mobility issues in pilot programmes> Ethical considerations and future possibilities for the technology > Securing funding and planning pilot programmesGUEST DETAILSRebecca McManus is Founder and Commercial Lead of Amethyst Care. Amethyst Care is the voice technology companion that helps care for people with mobility-related illnesses at home, allowing them to live independently for longer. By facilitating 2-way communication.Based in the SFI Adapt research centre at Trinity, Amethyst Care is led by Rebecca McManus and Prof Vinny Wade.https://www.amethystcare.ie/index.html# MORE INFORMATIONAdapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/ KEYWORDS#AI #mobility #voicetechnology #caregiver #recruitment #assistedliving #healthcare #ethicalAI
With the surge in deep fakes and disinformation we need to be very careful about believing what we see online, particularly in relation to big world events. Today we learn how we can take the power away from deep fakes during election time, when underlying agendas and heightened tensions can cause a rise in disinformation. We also hear how we can increase our personal media literacy, but also the ways in which deep fakes can be used positively. Our expert guest has just completed his PhD at Trinity College Dublin and is an ADAPT Centre researcher focusing on disinformation, Dipto Barman. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●The rise of deep fake technology in political discourse ●Deciphering between misinformation and disinformation●Using AI-based detection algorithms to verify authentic media●Potential positive and negative applications of deep fake technology●Solutions to identify and watermark to ensure transparency GUEST DETAILSDipto Barman is an ADAPT Centre researcher who has just completed his PhD under the supervision of Owen Conlan, TCD, and Jane Suiter, DCU based in TCD. Dipto holds a Masters from National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, Taiwan in Computer Science and Information Engineering particularly focusing on Fuzzy Logic and Artificial Intelligence. He was also an Assistant Professor at Thapar Institute of Engineering and Technology, India in the Department of Computer Science and engineering. He is currently working in the fields of adaptive recommendation systems and disinformation.MORE INFORMATIONAdapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/
This podcast is also available with international sign language and closed captions on YouTube. https://youtu.be/vrvoiYNRptsWe live in an Uber digital world, and being able to access online information is an important part of life. Unfortunately, this isn’t always accessible for minority communities, such as the deaf and hard of hearing. Today we learn about the challenges this community faces in the digital world and barriers that exist in sign language translation. We hear from experts who have been in the SignON Project, which is a European project aimed at overcoming these issues and creating a more accessible online experience. Our guests today are Dr. Dimitar Shterionov, Assistant Professor in Cognitive Science and Artificial Intelligence at Tilburg University, who was scientific lead on the project, and Davy Van Landuyt, Project Officer with the European Union of the Deaf and an end user of the project as a deaf person. We are also delighted to be joined by interpreter Romy O’Callaghan. This podcast has been published in both audio and video format. For video format with sign language please click here. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●The unique task of developing AI-powered technology for sign language translation ●Challenges faced by the deaf community in accessing online information●How the SignON project is tackling these issues with new technology ●Importance of co-creation and involving the deaf and hard of hearing community●Addressing data availability and quality before launching to the publicGUEST DETAILSDr. Dimitar Shterionov is Assistant Professor in Cognitive Science and Artificial Intelligence at Tilburg University, The Netherlands (scientific lead). Between January and July 2020 he worked as an assistant professor in Computing the School of Computing, DCU. Prior to that (2017 - 2019) he worked as a post-doctoral researcher in the ADAPT centre, DCU. He holds a PhD in computer science engineering from KULeuven, Belgium. He was the scientific lead of the EU-funded project on translation of sign and oral languages: SignON with Professor Andy Way of the ADAPT Centre. Davy Van Landuyt is Project Officer with the European Union of the Deaf. Davy is a deaf Belgian with roots in the social-cultural movement and association work in the deaf community, going through all possible layers from the local level to the European level. Since 2021, he has worked as Project Officer for the European Union of the Deaf. Outside of his commitments in the deaf community, Davy is also active in the area of localization, specifically videogame and software localization in the Dutch language.MORE INFORMATIONSignON is a European funded Horizon 2020 project that started in January 2021 and ran until December 2023, with the objective of addressing the communication gap between users of spoken languages and Deaf sign language users.https://signon-project.eu/about-signon/the-signon-project/ Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/
The AI Act is leading the way as the first-ever legal framework on AI, but what challenges are facing regulators when it comes to adapting to the rapid evolution of this technology, and in bringing tough conversations about its capabilities to the global stage? Today we hear from the architect of the groundbreaking AI Act about ‘The Geopolitics of AI’, where he explains how the EU is positioning itself as a global leader in AI governance, and why this matters for everyone - from policymakers to everyday people. He discusses the delicate balance between fostering innovation and protecting society, and why he believes the EU can gain a competitive edge in the global AI race if it plays its cards right.Our guest is passionate about asking the big questions about our AI-driven future. He is Member of the European Parliament and Chair of the Special Committee on Artificial Intelligence in the Digital Age, Dragoş Tudorache.THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●Why the EU's AI Act is a pioneering model for global AI governance●The challenges of implementing AI regulations●AI's profound impact on society, economy, and warfare●Geopolitical implications of AI development including data and talent acquisition.●Global cooperation in AI governance with inclusive conversations GUEST DETAILSDragoș Tudorache is a Member of the European Parliament and Vice-President of the Renew Europe Group. He is the Chair of the Special Committee on Artificial Intelligence in the Digital Age (AIDA) and the LIBE rapporteur on the AI Act, and he sits on the Committee on Foreign Affairs (AFET), the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE), the Subcommittee on Security and Defence (SEDE), and the European Parliament's Delegation for relations with the United States (D-US). MORE INFORMATIONAdapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/ QUOTESThe act itself is not just a piece of legislation. It's not just a bunch of rules and standards on the back of those rules. It is a very powerful Statement of Purpose, Statement of Intent, very political, very geopolitical - Dragoș TudoracheWe have to also think very seriously on how we start bringing society on board in understanding how much AI is going to mean in their lives in the years to come. - Dragoș TudoracheThe Act is a living text, and we've deliberately made it a living text, so that it keeps adapting to the technology and the reality of the world. - Dragoș TudoracheAI is the most disruptive technological change in the history of mankind. The future will be shaped by those who shape AI, and who have the competitive edge on AI. - Dragoș TudoracheAI is reshaping war as we've known it. - Dragoș TudoracheWe're not very good at retaining talent here in Europe. Not because we don't produce it, actually we're quite good at producing the talent, but we are neither good at keeping it here. - Dragoș TudoracheKEYWORDS#ai #data #technology #supercomputers #democracies #geopolitical #regulation #eu
When Chat GPT hit the public consciousness just a couple of years ago, we immediately started to see effects in education, with students and teachers alike using Generative AI to support learning. With Gen AI and chatbots advancing at such a rapid pace, their role in education is increasing. At a recent event in Trinity College, called ‘Unlocking the Future of Learning’, we heard a fascinating keynote about how Gen AI is evolving and how it can assist teachers and students in enhancing learning and efficiency, but also the precautions we need to take to use it to our best benefit. Our expert Prof Vincent Wade has been involved in education technology for almost 25 years as a researcher and a user, and is Co-Founder of the ADAPT SFI Research Centre. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●An overview of generative AI is and how it works ●Embracing Gen AI possibilities to create efficient workplaces ●Using generative AI to enhance teaching and learning ●Risks and limitations including hallucination, biases, and ethical and privacy concerns●Future potential uses in education technology GUEST DETAILSProfessor Vincent Wade is co-founder of the ADAPT Centre for Digital Content Technology and holds the Professorial Chair of Computer Science (Est. 1990) in School of Computer Science and Statistics, Trinity College Dublin as well as a Personal Chair in Artificial Intelligence. He is also co-director of the DREAL Centre for Research Training. His research focuses on intelligent systems, AI and Personalisation. He was awarded Fellowship of Trinity College for his contribution to research and has published over three hundred and fifty scientific papers in peer reviewed international journals and conferences. Other awards won by Professor Wade include the European Language Label Award for innovation in Language Learning Technology (2010). He also holds multiple patents and invention disclosures in the area of personalisation and digital content technologies.MORE INFORMATIONAdapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/ QUOTESWhat differentiates us from a lot of other research centres is that what we try and do is be human centric, we're actually looking at the technology and how it empowers an individual, rather than us being automated by the technology, which is not just uncomfortable, but actually is not going to be successful in the future. - Vincent Wade It's the fastest adopted technology ever in history. To get to 100 million users, it only took two months. - Vincent Wade Gen AI may not take your job, but someone using Gen AI will, because they're going to be much more efficient and productive. Don't get scared, you can use it too. - Vincent Wade When you bring in a new technology, what happens is it creates new roles. The problem with Gen AI is it's come in so fast, that we haven't even identified what those roles are. We're only beginning now. - Vincent Wade KEYWORDS#ai #education #chatgpt #language #information #data
AI is developing at such a rapid pace that we can get caught up in its potential capabilities and role in our future. However, there are still a lot of issues to rule out. ADAPT recently hosted the Annual Scientific Conference 2024 in Dublin and today we’re hearing one of the keynote speakers, Abeba Birhane. We learn about the potential dangers of large-scale datasets, such as AI hallucinations and the reinforcement of societal biases and negative stereotypes. She also explored strategies for both incremental improvements and guiding broader structural changes in AI.Our expert guest has been exploring strategies for both incremental improvements and guiding broader structural changes in AI. She is Senior Advisor for AI Accountability at Mozilla, Adjunct Professor at Trinity College Dublin and new ADAPT member, Abebe Birhane. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●How rumours of autonomous AI distract from real issues ●Hallucinations creating factually incorrect information ●AI ownership giving power to the hands of the few ●Data issues with collection, copyright and biases ●Creating standards for the safe use and development of AI GUEST DETAILSAbeba Birhane is a cognitive scientist, currently a Senior Advisor in AI Accountability at the Mozilla Foundation and an Adjunct Assistant Professor in the School of Computer Science and Statistics at Trinity College Dublin (working with Trinity’s Complex Software Lab).She researches human behaviour, social systems, and responsible and ethical artificial intelligence and was recently appointed to the UN’s Advisory Body on AI. Abeba works at the intersection of complex adaptive systems, machine learning, algorithmic bias, and critical race studies. In her present work, Abeba examines the challenges and pitfalls of computational models and datasets from a conceptual, empirical, and critical perspective.Abeba Birhane has a PhD in cognitive science at the School of Computer Science, UCD, and Lero, The Irish Software Research Centre. Her interdisciplinary research focused on the dynamic and reciprocal relationship between ubiquitous technologies, personhood, and society. Specifically, she explored how ubiquitous technologies constitute and shape what it means to be a person through the lenses of embodied cognitive science, complexity science, and critical data studies.Her work with Vinay Prabhu uncovered that large-scale image datasets commonly used to develop AI systems, including ImageNet and 80 Million Tiny Images, carried racist and misogynistic labels and offensive images. She has been recognised by VentureBeat as a top innovator in computer vision.MORE INFORMATIONAdapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/ QUOTESGenerative AI has been around for quite some time, but the introduction of DALL-E back in April 2022 can be noted as one of the landmarks where generative AI really exploded into the public space. - Abeba Birhane These hypothetical AI concerns, existential concerns, about the very idea of this attempt to build AGI has neither scientific nor engineering principles. Again, a lot of it is just hype, marketing, and PR, that is just really dominating the entire field. - Abeba Birhane The results are really worrying, over 50% of the output from these models was inaccurate, 40%, harmful, and incomplete - Abeba Birhane There is no such thing as fully autonomous AI, we will always need people, humans, in the loop. - Abeba Birhane KEYWORDS#ai #data #audit #research #chatgpt #ethicalai
How we view the past is very much shaped by the stories we're told about it and AI innovations are helping researchers to enrich our understanding of history. A new project called VOICES is using artificial intelligence to uncover the untold women's experiences of extreme trauma and civil war in early modern Ireland. The project was recently launched at Trinity College Dublin and today we hear from the interdisciplinary team of historians and computer scientists leading the research. Our expert guests are two Trinity researchers, Erasmus Smith's Professor of Modern History, Jane Ohlmeyer, and Professor in Computer Science in the School of Computer Science and Statistics, Declan O'Sullivan. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●Challenges in processing data from the 16th and 17th Century ●Utilising knowledge graphs for interpreting phrases, spelling and grammar ●Recovering stories of Ireland’s forgotten women ●Creating processes and digital archives for future researchers●Crossovers in learning from interdisciplinary approaches GUEST DETAILSProfessor Jane Ohlmeyer is Erasmus Smith's Professor of Modern History at Trinity College Dublin and Chair of the Irish Research Council, which funds frontier research across all disciplines. Jane was the founding Head of the School of Histories and Humanities, Trinity’s first Vice-President for Global Relations (2011-14) and Director of the Trinity Long Room Hub Arts and Humanities Research Institute (2015-20).Jane is an expert on the New British and Atlantic Histories and has published extensively on early modern Irish and British history. She is the author or editor of numerous articles and 13 books. Jane has been the Principal Investigator (PI) or co-PI for 25 research and research infrastructure projects with awards totalling c.€22 million from national, European and international funders. Declan O’Sullivan is a Professor in Computer Science at the School of Computer Science and Statistics, and is a co-applicant Principal Investigator in the ADAPT SFI Research Centre. Prof. O’Sullivan and his team’s research in Knowledge Graph Techniques, which extracts, transforms and integrates data, is central to this relationship between data and machine learning. Since joining TCD from industry in 2001, Declan has established himself as an international research leader in his field: authoring 260+ scientific peer-reviewed papers and international Journals; being a member of 3 journal editorial boards and having undertaken 12+ chair roles in IEEE and IFIP conferences over the years. He has won competitive research funding as PI and Co-PI of approximately 7.8M euro. He was elected as a Fellow in Trinity College Dublin in 2019 in recognition for the quality of his contributions.MORE INFORMATIONAdapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/KEYWORDS#knowledgegraph #ireland #data #history #17thcentury #archives #AI
You cannot move an inch these days without encountering takes on the future of AI and technology, and concerns about how it may impact our lives for better or worse.Today we're talking about new ways to approach the ethics of AI and digital technologies and what research is being done to answer the questions and the dilemmas these new technologies raise. Our experts today are from the ADAPT Centre and are researching alternative methods of ethical and critical thinking in the design of digital technologies and AI. They are Assistant Professor at the School of Information and Communication Studies in University College Dublin (UCD), Dr Marguerite Barry and postdoctoral researcher at the School of Information and Communication Studies at UCD, Dr Paul O’Neill.THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●Critical thinking and ethical design in AI ●Incorporating ethics at the research stage ●The importance of public engagement on future uses of digital technologies ●Beta Festival: Using art to encourage engagement and critical thinking ●Interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary and transdisciplinary researchGUEST DETAILSProf Marguerite Barry is Assistant Professor at the School of Information and Communication Studies in University College Dublin (UCD). Her research area is human-computer interaction (HCI) and digital media communication studies with a focus on ethical design and development in policy and practice. She is a funded investigator with ADAPT on the Transparent Data Governance strand where she is working on the Autonomy & Responsibility challenge. This involves interdisciplinary projects to support multi-stakeholder engagement in AI technologies from design to deployment.Dr. Paul O’ Neill is an artist and researcher whose practice and research are concerned with the implications of our collective dependency on networked technologies and infrastructures. Paul is a postdoctoral research fellow at the ADAPT Centre for AI-driven Media Technologies at University College Dublin where he is focusing on the ethics and design of Artificial Intelligence systems. He is also a co-curator of the Dublin Art and Technology Association (D.A.T.A).MORE INFORMATIONAdapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/KEYWORDS#technology #ethics #data #research #ai #art
The Irish language is an important part of Ireland's culture, but it is a minority language and like many ‘at risk’ languages around the world, Irish needs to be protected.Today we're talking about how AI can help to boost the Irish language and the importance of diverse data collection in building robust translation systems. We also hear how researchers are using natural language processing and other tools to help maintain the richness of the language and make it more accessible and available to those who use it.Our experts today are passionate about protecting minority languages and are working on technology to improve machine translation of the Irish language with the Adapt Centre. They are postdoctoral researcher, Dr Abigail Walsh and research assistant with eSTÓR, Gráinne Caulfield, both from Dublin City University. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●Protecting minority languages with AI ●The limitations of data collection and the need for more diversity ●Using Natural Language Processing to collect the complexities of a language ●AI’s role in encouraging more use of an at risk language●Getting social media platforms on board to make language more accessible GUEST DETAILSAbigail Walsh is a PhD student at the ADAPT Centre in Dublin City University. Her research focuses on improving NLP for Irish language, focusing on the treatment and automatic processing of Multiword Expressions (MWEs). Abigail’s interests include Irish language technology, MWEs, NLP for low-resource languages, linguistic analysis, data processing, Machine Translation, and Machine Learning.Gráinne Caulfield is a recent graduate of Irish & French from Trinity College Dublin, currently working as a Research Assistant on the eSTÓR project. In this role, she executes the project’s outreach activities- carrying out site visits to relevant stakeholders, managing the social media platforms, newsletter writing etc, as well as translation and data processing duties.MORE INFORMATIONAdapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/KEYWORDS#irish #language #data #translation #machinetranslation #technology #ai
The pace of change in AI is beyond rapid and it's an exciting time for research in Ireland. Professor John Keller is now leading the way in research as the new director of ADAPT, the SFI Research Center for AI Driven Digital Content Technology. Today we hear about John’s ambitions in his new appointment including his thoughts on current developments in AI, how he plans to lead ADAPT and prepare for the future and why supporting multidisciplinary research will be a key focus for the centre.THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●Keeping up with the pace of AI as it enters the mainstream●SignON: Making AI accessible ●ADAPT’s role in mitigating the harms of AI ●Integrating multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary research●Mentoring and resourcing new researchers and culture ●Preparing for future challenges across different industries GUEST DETAILSProf John D. Kelleher is the newly appointed director of the ADAPT Centre and Chair of Artificial Intelligence at Trinity College, Dublin. John’s core research expertise is in the areas machine/deep learning and natural language processing. Previously, he was the TU Dublin lead in the ADAPT centre and the scientific lead for the Digital Content Transformation Strand. Within the ADAPT Centre he leads research projects on language modelling, lexical semantics, machine translation, novelty detection, image captioning, dialog systems, and making AI more environmentally sustainable. John has been the academic lead on numerous industry projects across a range of topics and domains, including: anomaly detection, transfer learning, customer segmentation and propensity modelling, dialog systems and chat bots, and information retrieval and natural language processing.MORE INFORMATIONAdapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/ QUOTESThe impact and penetration of AI into people's lives means that there's so much interest from industry in artificial intelligence, and that's really driving the pace. - John Kelleher When these types of technologies are prevalent throughout society it's important that the people in that society understand what they are and how they work. - John Kelleher The most important aspect, or the foundations we need to build in order for interdisciplinary research to flourish, is that we can communicate across disciplines. So we need to spend time with each other as researchers, understanding each other's language. And at the core of that is a willingness to listen. - John Kelleher Exciting things often happen at the margins, between disciplines, for people to come together in a complementary team, where they have complementary expertise. And so once you can build a bridge across the discipline, then you can do really exciting work. - John Kelleher Fluency in and of itself isn't the sign of intelligence that we thought it was before. And that's why maybe we need more emphasis on creativity and critical thinking within education. - John KelleherKEYWORDS#ai #adapt #research #technology #artificialintelligence #culture #languagemodels #accessibility
In the age of data our private information is currency and we digital trails behind us everywhere we go online. As AI grows in popularity, some fear it may be a threat to our privacy. It’s important we consider how we can best protect ourselves from our valuable information ending up in the wrong hands. Today, in light of Data Privacy Week, we're diving into the week’s theme, ‘Take Control of Your Data’, to ask how we can do that, who the responsibility of protection and regulation lies with and the ways generative AI can be a game changer for data privacy. Our expert is passionate about data protection at an organisational level and is Vice President and Chief Knowledge Officer at the International Association of Privacy Professionals, Caitlin Fennessey.THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT●How the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP) is approaching AI●Generative AI and protecting data privacy●Data Privacy Week: Taking control of your data ●Encouraging organisations to embrace AI, rather than ban it ●Global streamlining of data privacy regulation ●Individual responsibility and creating change in organisations GUEST DETAILSCaitlin Fennessy is Vice President and Chief Knowledge Officer at the International Association of Privacy Professionals, where she guides the strategic development of IAPP research, publications, communications, programming and external affairs.Caitlin is a recognized privacy expert, serving as an inaugural member of the UK International Data Transfers Expert Council, on the German Marshall Global Task Force to Promote Trusted Sharing of Data and on the Future of Privacy Forum Advisory Board. She speaks and leads frequent public discussions on the practical impacts of privacy developments around the world.Prior to joining the IAPP, Caitlin was the Privacy Shield Director at the U.S. International Trade Administration, where she spent ten years working on international privacy and cross-border data flow policy issues. International Association of Privacy Professionals: https://iapp.org/about/person/0011a00000DlNmBAAV/ MORE INFORMATIONThis episode is in association with Empower, which is coordinated by Maynooth University. For more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/ Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreKEYWORDS#privacy #data #ai #governance #privacyissues #artificialintelligence
One of the most visible areas AI has been in use in the area of translation. Large language models are getting better and better at learning the subtleties and nuances of human speech and becoming more accessible. Do human translators need to be worried? Today we hear a talk on the intricacies of AI translation technology, where it is succeeding and where there is downfall, and why we’re maybe overestimating the impact it will have. Our expert is Professor at Dublin City University and deputy director of the ADAPT Centre, Andy Way, who is a machine translation expert for over 35 years and has been instrumental in shaping the field of machine translation worldwide. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT01:12 Why neural machine translation is better than SMT04:16 Data limitations in NMT09:44 Hype around ChatGPT and AI 14:27 The European Language Equality Project 21:34 Inherent dangers in AI 28:42 What is ChatGPT actually being used for? 33:50 Humans are clever, not the systems 40:45 Q+AGUEST DETAILSProf. Andy Way has been in DCU since 1991, except for a period of sabbatical leave working in the translation and localisation industry in the UK between 2011-14. From 2014, he has been back in DCU full-time as Professor in the School of Computing at Dublin City University. In 2014, he became Deputy Director of the CNGL Centre for Intelligent Content at DCU. This programme was replaced by the ADAPT Centre for Digital Content Technology in 2015, where he remains Deputy Director.Prof. Way was Editor for the journal Machine Translation from 2007-21. He was President of the International Association for Machine Translation from 2011-13, and President of the European Association for Machine Translation from 2009-15. In 2015, he received the President's Research Award for the Sciences and Engineering faculties at DCU, and the IAMT Award of Honour in 2019 for services to the MT community.He has over 400 peer-reviewed conference papers and journals to date, and has brought in over €60 million in external research funding.MORE INFORMATIONAdapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/ QUOTESIn neural machine translation, we actually do have a model of the entire source string, and because of that, that, to me, is the biggest reason why neural machine translation output is better than a statistical machine translation output. - Andy Way The obvious implication is that for those languages where high class machine translation systems cannot be built, human translators will still be needed. - Andy Way AI and ChatGPT is being used not only for good, but for nefarious purposes as well. - Andy Way Large language models or multilingual large language models can produce high quality output and so, I think people who are system developers who rely on old neural technology better change to using multilingual large language models fairly quickly if their systems are not to become redundant. - Andy Way I think there'll be increasing demand for spoken language translation or multimodal translation in general. But again, you know, if there is a lack of data for many languages, or many use cases, for text data, you can imagine how hard this is going to be for spoken language data and multimodal data. - Andy Way I believe that you can't do machine translation wholly without input from linguists, or translators. - Andy Way Maybe the honeymoon period is over, people have started to push back against tools like ChatGPT, saying that they're not as good as people are claiming them to be and that we need legislation to make sure what use cases are being used for good rather than for evil. We need to not overhype this technology because then people are disappointed when they come to use the tools, and responsible, Explainable AI is the future. - Andy Way KEYWORDS#machinetranslation #translators #ai #chatgbt #largelanguagemodels
In the 21st century, we do democracy differently. The internet has opened up new channels of information, meaning that citizens can access and contribute to discussions about policies and governance. Today we find out how AI and big data support democracy in a digital age and what elections might look like in the future.Our experts are designer, artist and strategist and senior design lead with Democratic Society, Max Stearns and Associate Professor of Digital Humanities and investigator with the ADAPT Centre at Trinity College, Dr. Jennifer Edmonds.THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT00:15 How digital technologies affect democracy 04:27 The KT4D project (Knowledge Technologies for Democracy)07:50 The Digital Democracy Lab 10:01 A cultural lens on technology and democracy13:07 Meaningful inefficiencies in democracy 14:55 Technology in collective spaces 16:39 Social protections for consumers 18:24 Using technology to encourage informed decision making 22:13 Diffusing polarization 24:36 Trust in tools and information 30:50 Opportunities for designers to reevaluate33:44 How AI will impact elections GUEST DETAILSMax Stearns is a design-minded researcher, strategist, and creative lead with proven experience crafting participatory systems change. He is a Senior Design Lead at Democratic Society, an organization that works with governments, civil society, and citizens to create opportunities for participation, dialogue, and action. His role is to research, design, and co-create systems and solutions that address social, ecological, and economic challenges across sectors and contexts, such as climate action, democratic innovation, and civic engagement. Max’s work has been showcased at NYCxDesign: Design Week, the Paris Design Summit, Feedback Summit, and the Allied Media Conference, as well as featured in the Stanford Social Innovation Review, BloombergCities, and Common in Design. Max holds a BA in political science and economics from Ohio State University and an MFA in Transdisciplinary Design from Parsons School of Design.Jennifer Edmond is Associate Professor of Digital Humanities at Trinity College Dublin where she is co-director of the Trinity Centre for Digital Humanities, Director of the MPhil in Digital Humanities and Culture and a funded Investigator of the SFI ADAPT Centre. Over the course of the past 10 years, Jennifer has coordinated a large number of significant funded research projects, including her most recent project on AI, big data and democracy, KT4D. She has served in leadership roles in a number of European-level policy and infrastructure organisations, including six years as a Director and President of DARIAH-EU, four on the European Commission’s Open Science Policy Platform, and her current role as a member of the Governing Board of the European Association of Social Sciences and Humanities (EASSH). Her research explores interdisciplinarity, humanistic and hybrid research processes, and the emergence of critical digital humanities as a contributor to both research and technology development.MORE INFORMATIONAdapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/KEYWORDS#democracy #designtechnologies #ai #democraticprocess #elections
These days it's hard to know what to believe. Misinformation and disinformation are nothing new but AI and social media seem to be driving false information to new levels. Today we hear how experts are working hard to keep up with AI, and how education and awareness are vital to protecting people from harmful information online Our experts today are Associate Professor at Dublin City University, Professor Jane Suiter and Assistant Professor in the School of Information and Communication Studies in University College Dublin, Dr Brendan Spillane. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT00:20 The difference between misinformation and disinformation05:14 How AI contributes to harmful information 08:03 The VIGILANT Project 11:44 Detecting media manipulation 17:07 How we can increase our own awareness23:54 The financial motivations behind disinformationGUEST DETAILSDr Jane Suiter is Associate Professor at Dublin City University. with a focus on the public sphere and in particular on scaling up deliberation and disinformation. Jane is PI on H2020 ICT28 Provenance, a multimillion interdisciplinary project to combat disinformation and PI on JOLT a Marie Curie ITN on harnessing digital technologies in communication. She is also leading a new project on countering COVID-19 disinformation and the potential role of deliberation.https://www.adaptcentre.ie/experts/jane-suiter/ Brendan is an Assistant Professor in the School of Information and Communication Studies in University College Dublin (UCD) and a Funded Investigator in the Science Foundation Ireland ADAPT Centre for AI-Driven Digital Content Technology. His PhD investigated the impact of the visual presentation of news on the perception of bias in news articles. After completing his PhD, he held three concurrent positions as a Postdoctoral researcher on the H2020 Provenance project developing tools to detect and warn users of disinformation, a two-year Government of Ireland IRC Postdoctoral Fellowship conducting a Systematic Literature Review and Meta Analysis of credibility research to inform the design of new tools and theory to analysis disinformation, and a Research Fellowship in the Proactive Experiences and Agency challenge in the Digitally Enhanced Engagement Strand (PEA@DEE), in the ADAPT Centre. He is the PI of a new Horizon Europe Innovation Action project called VIGILANT. It is a 3-year, €4m project with 18 partners that will equip European Police Authorities with advanced technologies from academia to detect and analyse disinformation campaigns that lead to criminal activities.https://www.adaptcentre.ie/experts/brendan-spillane/ MORE INFORMATIONAdapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/ KEYWORDS#disinformation #misinformation #socialmedia #medialiteracy #ADAPT
AI systems are developing at such a rapid pace and have sparked questions about how we can control their use and prevent them destroying society. With the AI Act due later this year, we hear from two experts on how regulation, cyber hygiene and digital literacy are key to using AI for its fantastic benefits, while protecting us from the potential dangers it can expose us to. Our guests today have extensive experience working with technology and safety, founder of the University of Pittsburgh Institute for Cyber Law, Policy, and Security, David J. Hickton and Head of the Artificial Intelligence Discipline at Trinity College Dublin’s School of Computer Science and Statistics, and interim director of the ADAPT Centre, Professor Dave Lewis. THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT00:00 AI the next frontier of efficiency 02:08 Risks versus benefits of AI 04:06 The EU AI Act 07:11 Classification of AI products 09:07 How the US is regulating AI 10:34 Regulations pushback from companies 14:58 Keeping up with the rapid development of AI 17:38 Expected timeframe for implementation of regulations 19:59 How regulations will impact consumers 26:40 Ireland’s opportunity to lead the world 30:03 The next steps for the US GUEST DETAILSDavid J. Hickton founded the University of Pittsburgh Institute for Cyber Law, Policy, and Security in 2017. Hickton also has faculty appointments as professor in the School of Law, the School of Computing and Information, and the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs.Prior to this, Hickton served as United States Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania. He was nominated by former President Barack Obama and was sworn in as the District's 57th U.S. Attorney in August 2010 and served through November 2016.https://www.cyber.pitt.edu/people/david-j-hickton-jd Professor Dave Lewis is Head of the Artificial Intelligence Discipline at Trinity College Dublin’s School of Computer Science and Statistics, and he is the the interim director of the ADAPT Centre. He leads ADAPT’s programme of industry collaborative research and its multidisciplinary research theme on Data Governance. His research focuses on the use of open semantic models to manage the Data Protection and Data Ethics issues associated with digital content processing. He has led the development of international standards in AI-based linguistic processing of digital content at the W3C and OASIS and is currently active in international standardisation of Trustworthy AI at ISO/IEC JTC1/SC42.https://www.adaptcentre.ie/experts/dave-lewis/ MORE INFORMATIONAdapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt CentreFor more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie/ KEYWORDS#ai #regulation #europe #technology #cyber
Conversations about AI are often future focused, but these emerging technologies can also help us bring the past to life.
Today we find out how AI has been used in Beyond 2022, a flagship research project led by Trinity College Dublin which will digitally recreate seven centuries of historical records of the Public Record Office of Ireland destroyed by fire at Dublin’s Four Courts at the beginning of the Irish Civil War.
Joining us on ADAPT Radio to tell us more are Senior Researcher at the Virtual Treasury of Ireland of Trinity College Dublin, Dr. David Brown and Managing Director of Transkribus developer Read-Coop, Andy Stauder.
THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT
01:08 What is Beyond 2022? 02:55 How the technology of Transkribus works 05:33 Processing data for historians 07:40 How AI can decipher handwriting 11:42 Recovering and digitising lost records and documents 15:35 Transkribus In Use 17:34 Using Chat GPT and other large language models to reverse cultural loss 20:27 Preventing bias in AI processing 24:17 Other potential applications of this technology 26:54 Futureproofing data accessibility
GUEST DETAILS
Dr David Brown is Senior Researcher at the Virtual Treasury of Ireland, a project based at Trinity College Dublin that aims to recreate a digital model of the Public Record Office of Ireland with its contents, destroyed in 1922. Starting in 2018, the Virtual Treasury of Ireland has developed a suite of deep-learning ‘models’, perfectly curated transcriptions, to train an AI system to read digital images of historical sources relating to Ireland and convert these into searchable text files. The automatic conversion of handwritten historical documents into searchable text is the latest major step in the digitisation of our written cultural heritage.
Website: https://virtualtreasury.ie/
Andy Stauder studied Translation Studies (German, Ital., Engl., Russ.; two Bachelor's, one Master's and one PhD degree) in Innsbruck, as well as Linguistics (Master's), Philosophy (Bachelor's) and Computer Science (not completed). His dissertation topic and research focus was the measurement of translation quality with combined machine- and human-based methods. In addition to his studies, he worked as a translator, IT manager and project collaborator in academic and EU-funded research projects and took over the technical management of the University of Innsbruck's subsidiary, innsbruck university innovations, in 2012, its management in 2016 and became managing director of READ-COOP SCE, the provider of the software Transkribus, in 2019.
Website: www.transkribus.org Social Media: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andy-stauder-22a2b191/
MORE INFORMATION
Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt Centre For more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie
QUOTES
I think it shows how far you can go with AI because we can't read it. So we're looking at this and going well, maybe we can verify the text and check any mistakes and so on. Actually, we can't read the stuff at all. So the AI is actually doing an amazing job. - David Brown
You can search for, say, your family name, and you'll see your family name coming up on an old handwritten document from 500 years ago. People find this really, really interesting and engaging and an awful lot of fun. - David Brown
Everybody knows Chat GPT at this point, the GPT model that's at the base of this is also transformer based. What the language models can do now is interact in a more natural way with the user. So you can ask the document itself what it contains. They are some new avenues that we are pursuing, currently. - Andy Stauder
KEYWORDS
ai #handwriting #language #Transkribus #history
Since ChatGPT burst into the mainstream late last year, these conversational AI interfaces have been prompting huge discussion about how AI will shape our futures.
Today we’re learning how these AI chat bots work and where they can be used to the human advantage. Plus, we hear how they’re redefining intelligence, but not enough to overtake the human mind just yet.
Joining us to talk about this today on ADAPT Radio are Professor Vinny Wade, who holds the Professorial Chair of Computer Science and a Personal Chair in Artificial Intelligence at Trinity College Dublin and Professor John Kelleher, who is Professor of Computer Science at Maynooth University.
THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT
01:18 What is a language model? 03:49 The quality of language being generated by AI 7:35 Different uses of generative chat models 13:11 A new learning experience for students and educators 20:09 Existential threat and current concerns 25:57 Redefining intelligence 28:01 Data sets and GDPR 34:30 Exciting prospects in research
GUEST DETAILS
Professor Vincent Wade is co-founder of the ADAPT Centre for Digital Content Technology and holds the Professorial Chair of Computer Science (Est. 1990) in School of Computer Science and Statistics, Trinity College Dublin as well as a Personal Chair in Artificial Intelligence. He is also co-director of the DREAL Centre for Research Training. His research focuses on intelligent systems, AI and Personalisation. He was awarded Fellowship of Trinity College for his contribution to research and has published over three hundred and fifty scientific papers in peer reviewed international journals and conferences. In 2018, he was awarded the Provost Innovation Award, the highest accolade the university can bestow for international research impact. As Director of ADAPT, Vincent heads a world leading research centre in digital media technology (text, video, speech, image, VR/AR) and AI.
Professor John Kelleher is a Hamilton Institute Professor of Computer Science at Maynooth University. John’s core research expertise is in the areas of machine/deep learning and natural language processing. He is the TU Dublin lead in the ADAPT centre and the scientific lead for the Digital Content Transformation Strand. Within the ADAPT centre he leads research projects on language modelling, lexical semantics, machine translation, novelty detection, image captioning, dialog systems, and making AI more environmentally sustainable. John has been the academic lead on numerous industry projects across a range of topics and domains, including: anomaly detection, transfer learning, customer segmentation and propensity modelling, dialog systems and chat bots, and information retrieval and natural language processing.
MORE INFORMATION
Adapt Radio is produced by DustPod.io for the Adapt Centre For more information about ADAPT visit www.adaptcentre.ie
KEYWORDS
ai #language #data #artificialintelligence #adapt
We are in a world where our every move and thought is documented and databases. With that data, future search agents and AI will be able to deliver us deliver hyper-personalised results which are based on everything we have done in the past. It could even use this information to act on our behalf.Joining us to discuss this future are two people who are living it now. Dr Cathal Guerin is an expert on personal data. For 15 years he has logged his life through wearing a personal camera and other data collection points. He is joined by Professor Gareth Jones who explores way to enhance search engines through conversational interactions and various media formats such as speech, video, and music. TOPICS WE DISCUSSED INCLUDE02:14 Their approach to life logging03:14 What it’s like to wear a camera 24/7 07:54 Limitations of speech recognition13:15 The problem of protecting privacy19:05 Thoughts on Chat GPT & AI23:46 AI Search agents and your hyper personal life log27:56 How do we make the future safe?GUEST DETAILSDr Cathal Gurrin is an Associate Professor at the DCU School of Computing and a co-investigator at the Insight Centre for Data Analytics and the Adapt Centre. He leads a group of researchers dedicated to developing assistive technologies using wearable sensors and data analytics. The highly interdisciplinary approach advanced by his group, "lifelogging", integrates computer science, cognitive science and data-driven healthcare analytics to generate next-generation digital records of the individual. Cathal is also co-author of ‘Lifelogging, Personal Big Data’, 2014. https://www.linkedin.com/in/cgurrin/@cathal on TwitterProfessor Gareth Jones is a Principal Investigator with the ADAPT Centre at DCU. His research focuses on topics related to information retrieval and search technologies. His work encompasses a broad range of areas including speech and multimedia search, multilingual search, personalisation in search, search for personal information archives, legal and patent search, and more generally information retrieval models and evaluation. He is currently collaborating with Spotify on a benchmark evaluation task on Podcast Search at TREC. https://www.linkedin.com/in/gareth-j-f-jones-8337a3ab/
With more people living even faster lives, our cities need to be smarter, more sustainable and easier to live in.Dublin City Council are running an experiment in D8, using technology to measure everything from traffic movements to rainfall and even how full the bins get. They are using this data to create a ‘digital twin’ of the area and virtualise how changes will improve the quality of life. For example, they’re talking about a virtual cycle path which you can test with a VR cycle ride.However, this smart city program raises questions about citizen data and how to best involve residents.Our guests, Jamie Cudden from Dublin City Council and Aphra Kerr from the Adapt Centre are both working directly on the project and share details of their progress.TOPICS WE DISCUSSED INCLUDE01:05 The invisible technology behind the scenes which use data to make decisions and deliver services more smartly04:00 Good practice around data governance as ADAPT works with Dublin City Council on Smart Dublin projects07:26 How they are engaging citizens in new and creative ways and getting their input12:35 The importance of protecting privacy18:51 Who is responsible for implementing the technology in smart cities?23:30 How the smart city approach has been evolving from an emphasis on connectivity to pilots on health and wellness initiatives32:39 Why pilot projects offer the flexibility to experiment and learn before scaling up38:08 The benefits of when data gathering, engagement and impact all fall into place seamlesslyGUEST DETAILSJamie Cudden is the Smart City Programme Manager at Dublin City Council. He established the regional Smart Dublin program in 2015. He has a track record of bringing together partners from industry, start-ups, academia and public agencies to accelerate deployment of new ideas using the ‘city as a testbed’. He was acknowledged as ‘Civic Innovator of the Year Award in 2021 by Harvard’s Technology and Entrepreneurship Centre. This was for his role in scaling up the Smart Dublin programme. He was also recognised by Trinity College Dublin as Innovation Partner of the ear for his pioneering work on Smart Docklands.https://ie.linkedin.com/in/jcuddenTwitter - @jcuddenProfessor Aphra Kerr is a Professor in Sociology at Maynooth University, Ireland. She is a funded PI and science lead within the Transparent Digital Governance strand at the Science Foundation Ireland funded ADAPT Centre for Digital Content Technology. She is also Principal Investigator on two projects collaborating with Dublin City Council and Smart Dublin and on the YouGamSI project which examines gambling marketing. Her current research focuses on the governance and social impacts of AI across media and everyday smart technologies.MU Website - https://www.maynoothuniversity.ie/faculty-social-sciences/our-people/aphra-kerrGoogle Scholar - https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=3Uop6uoAAAAJ Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-aphra-kerr-74b630/Twitter - @aphrak
Our everyday lives are surrounded with everyday objects which have the ability to monitor, track and record everything we do. But what are the roles that AI, machine learning and government play in this gathering of surveillance data.Sharing his considerable knowledge in the area is Professor David Lyon, who presented a fascinating seminar on this topic at the Adapt Centre.TOPICS HE DISCUSSED INCLUDESmartphone TrackingIT and SocietyTodays Surveillance LandscapeEmergence of Surveillance StudiesSurges in surveillance after 911 and Covid 19Surveillance and DemocracyWhy Surveillance is ImportantAutomated and other kinds of automated surveillanceGUEST DETAILSProf David Lyon has been studying surveillance since the mid-1980s. A pioneer in the field of Surveillance Studies, he has produced a steady stream of books and articles, starting with The Electronic Eye (1994). The latest is Pandemic Surveillance (2022). He has led several large collaborative research projects on surveillance, with research funding totalling almost $8 million. His work has been recognised in Canada, Switzerland, the USA and the UK with a number of fellowships, prizes, awards and an honorary doctorate.CONTACTLinkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-lyon-4bb8b714/Website: https://www.surveillance-studies.ca/
Our health is one of our greatest assets, and it has many interconnected parts, including our mental health and the environment in which we live. How can artificial intelligence enable us to engage more with our mental health and environment, and help researchers better understand how to protect both?Helping us discover the answers is Claire Gillan, whose lab is developing new approaches to studying brain health, and Marcus Collier (TCD) whose research explores the complex interface between social and ecological systems in informal wild spaces in cities.TOPICS WE DISCUSSED INCLUDE(01.08) How technology such as mobile apps can encourage a broader diversity of people to take part in psychology research in their ‘real lives’, not just in the lab(05.03) Many plants grow wild in cities, but we probably don’t pay much attention to them or the spaces in which they grow(10.04) If you want people to use technology to contribute their data to science, you need to think carefully about how to engage with and protect them(12.51) Artificial intelligence is helping psychology research to better predict what treatments would work best for people(17.25) Artificial intelligence can help more people tell researchers what they think about the environment, so we hear more voices and perspectives(23.28) AI might be part of the solution to help people with mental health issues – at the moment there just are not enough human therapists, so might a ‘chat bot’ style of interaction help?(26.14) Our guests Marcus and Claire make plans to discuss working together. GUEST DETAILSProfessor Claire Gillan is an Associate Professor at Trinity College Dublin, where her lab is interested in developing new approaches to studying brain health in psychiatric and ageing populations – a key goal is to develop objective tests that can be used to diagnose individuals and predict who will respond to which treatment. Her longitudinal, smartphone-based research (www.neureka.ie) in dementia and mental health is supported by funding from the Global Brain Health Institute, and Science Foundation Ireland, and she was awarded an ERC starting grant for €1.5M in 2020 to address gaps in our current understanding of how we make and break habits.http://www.gillanlab.com/Twitter: @clairegillanTCDProfessor Marcus Collier is an Associate Professor of Sustainability Science in the School of Natural Sciences at Trinity College Dublin and a Principal Investigator with ADAPT. His research explores the complex interface between social and ecological systems in informal wild spaces in cities, and the potential of nature-based solutions in an urbanising world. He was the lead investigator of the EU-funded projects Connecting Nature from 2017 to 2022 and the TURAS project from 2011 to 2016, for which he received a Champions of European Research Award. In 2020, Marcus was awarded a prestigious European Research Council Consolidator grant for NovelEco, a citizen science project.https://naturalscience.tcd.ie/people/COLLIEMAhttps://noveleco.eu/team-member/dr-marcus-collier/https://www.linkedin.com/in/marcus-collier-12a0417/Twitter: @marcus_collier
How do smart speakers, phones and connected devices understand what we're saying? This month we look at how the interaction between machines and our voices works now and how can we build even more intelligent systems for complex interaction in the future.With the answers, we have Dr Giovanni di Liberto, who researches human perception and Dr Andrea Patane, whose work is on what happens when machine learning fails, and what we can learn from that.TOPICS WE DISCUSSED INCLUDE01:08 How computers and intelligent systems ‘perceive’ what humans are saying05:37 The processes at work in living brains and artificial machine learning models are each ‘black boxes’ that we need to understand better08:45 How our understanding of human learning is helping to influence machine learning models?12:11 How can intelligent systems ‘learn’ or adapt to nuances, such as different accents in speech?16:40 If intelligent systems ‘misunderstand’ something, it could have disastrous effects in some situations. What ethics and safety issues come into play?26:39 How can research into machine learning and perception help to improve technology that can help us support senses such as hearing? 30:00 As machine learning drives forward, we need to be mindful of the assumptions on which it is based?GUEST DETAILSDr Giovanni Di Liberto is with TCD School of Computer Science and Statistics. Giovanni's scientific interests centre on understanding the brain mechanisms underlying speech comprehension. In his work, he develops data analysis methods and applies them to brain data to identify the neural processes responsible for the transformation of a sensory stimulus into its abstract meaning. Brain electrical data is measured with either non-invasive (e.g., electroencephalography - EEG) or invasive (e.g., electrocorticography - ECoG) technologies. The first aspect of his research is methodological and has produced novel experimental and analysis frameworks to investigate cortical auditory processing. The second aspect of his research is to use such novel methods to test theories on auditory perception, such as the hierarchical processing of speech and predictive processing theories (e.g. predictive coding). Finally, the third part of his work is translational and involves the identification of solutions to utilise his novel methods in applied settings, for example as tools to develop brain-computer interfaces (COCOHA project) or as objective measures for the monitoring of language development and healthy ageing.https://diliberg.nethttps://cnspworkshop.net/https://www.scss.tcd.ie/personnel/gdiliberhttps://www.adaptcentre.ie/experts/giovanni-di-liberto/Twitter @diliberg Dr Andrea Patane has been an Assistant Professor at Trinity College Dublin since May 2022. His main area of research is safety and robustness, with a focus on providing formal guarantees for machine learning models learnt from data, possibly with probabilistic components and/or operating in uncertain and adversarial environments. The development of such guarantees able to deal with uncertainty is of paramount importance if intelligent systems are to be deployed in scenarios where the safety of individuals is of concern, such as biomedical applications and autonomous driving.
Chat GPT has taken the AI world by storm as a bot that can generate text in conversational human style. So does this spell the end of students spending hours on homework or college assignments? What does the future hold for this type of generative AI? Dr Robert Ross (School of Computing at TCU) and Dr. Benjamin Cowan (Associate Professor UCD) explain the pro’s and con’s of the AI and what the future holds.TOPICS WE DISCUSSED INCLUDE(01.10) What chat GPT is, and how it is different to chat systems that have gone before(03.54) ChatGPT comes across as confident, but its facts aren’t always correct (09.38) ChatGPT shows how technology could blur the boundaries between human and machine, and this poses challenges(12.52) As conversational interfaces become more convenient for people to use, it poses ethical and social questions - who controls access to information, who might push particular narratives and could it deepen echo chambers? We need to be transparent about such systems and their accuracy(18.40) ChatGPT is already having an impact in education, how can educators manage it for the benefit of students?(23.28) Generative AI - can it support human creativity?(30.53) ChatGPT and generative AI has the potential to disrupt, it’s exciting, but we need to reflect and think critically about the journey we are on with it. GUEST DETAILSDr Robert Ross is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Computer Science in TU Dublin and a Funded Investigator within the Adapt Centre. Dr. Ross’s interests lie primarily in the application of machine learning methods to Human Robot Interaction, with specific projects across natural language processing, dialogue management, behavioural analysis, and user state estimation. Robert also works extensively with industry and has led industry related projects across topics such as conversational systems, behaviour estimation, and predictive analytics.https://www.tudublin.ie/explore/faculties-and-schools/computing-digital-data/computer-science/people/academic-staff/robertross.htmlhttps://www.linkedin.com/in/robertjohnross/Dr Benjamin Cowan is an Associate Professor in UCD's School of Information & Communication Studies, where he is co-founder and co-director of the HCI@UCD group. His research lies at the juncture between psychology, human computer interaction and communication systems. In ADAPT, as Research Challenge Lead and NENC Lead within the Digitally Enhanced Engagment research Strand and he co-leads the Future Dialogues Working Group. https://www.adaptcentre.ie/experts/benjamin-cowan/
From wearable devices to digital hospitals, modelling disease patterns to training medical professionals - AI is having a transformative impact on healthcare. But the challenge remains to develop and deploy innovative and agile solutions that can unlock the data needed for precision medicine. Where exactly are we with this technology? What is its potential and what dangers do we need to safeguard against?TOPICS WE DISCUSSED INCLUDE●How AI can provide decision-making support, disease treatment and precision medicine delivery. ●How AI can be used to improve hospital efficiency ●The potential for AI to increase the speed and scale of screening●How algorithms can now predict the 3D structure of nearly every protein●Limitation issues including transferability and data governance●Robotics in healthcare including conversational agents●The burgeoning area of designing new AI-based therapiesGUEST DETAILSProf. Mark Little, Professor of Nephrology at Trinity College Dublin, Consultant Nephrologist at Tallaght University Hospital and Principal Investigator at SFI ADAPT Research Centre. He is a clinician scientist with an interest in translational immunology as applied to autoimmune diseases. https://www.adaptcentre.ie/experts/mark-little/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-little-79bb4b9/ Dr Lucy Hederman is an assistant professor in the School of Computer Science and Statistics, a member of the SFI-funded ADAPT Centre, and the Director of the Centre for Health Informatics, at Trinity College Dublin. Her main research interests are in clinical decision support systems and health research data integration. https://www.linkedin.com/in/lucyhederman/ https://www.adaptcentre.ie/experts/lucy-hederman/
From crypto-currencies to challenger banks, and mortgage lending to managing risk, AI has profoundly changed finance and how we interact with money. With disruptors and innovators constantly raising the bar, what does the future hold and how can we mitigate against the risks posed by such rapidly evolving technology? And quite apart from the tech giants, how can ordinary people utilise AI in a way that benefits their businesses and personal finances?TOPICS WE DISCUSSED INCLUDE•How AI can have a transformative effect on lending decisions, by democratising the availability of credit.•Reducing inequality by making credit decisions more accountable.•The need for explainable AI.•How conversational technology is interacting with business and finance.•Crypto-currency•How AI can detect bubbles in financial markets•Models developed at The Adapt Centre which can detect elder financial abuse.•The Adapt Centre’s work to apply NLP technology into business’ workflows.•The potential dangers AI could precipitate in FinTech. GUEST DETAILSDr. Cal Muckley is Professor of Operational Risk in Banking and Finance at the UCD College of Business and a Fellow at the UCD Geary Institute. His research is in areas of financial misconduct, mitigating financial fraud and the information content of corporate dividends. He has been a Visiting Scholar at universities including NYU’s Stern School of Business and Yale.Dr. Robert Ross is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Computer Science in TU Dublin and a Funded Investigator within the Adapt Centre. Dr. Ross’s interests lie primarily in the application of machine learning methods to Human Robot Interaction, with specific projects across natural language processing, dialogue management, behavioural analysis, and user state estimation. https://www.adaptcentre.ie/experts/cal-muckley/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/cal-muckley-2758613/https://www.adaptcentre.ie/experts/robert-ross/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/robertjohnross/
The movies we’ve grown up watching have made quite the impression on our lives and how we think about AI.
From the exciting prospect of flying cars in Back to the Future, to the grim post-apocalyptic landscape of Mad Max. What’s closer to the truth in our near future? For instance, we’ve recently seen ABBA launch a ‘hologram’ tour and Mark Zuckerberg enter the metaverse.
What else can we expect from the coming decade and how might these technologies evolve to become seamless in our lives?
TOPICS WE DISCUSS INCLUDE ● How movies like ‘The Matrix’ and Spike Jonze’s ‘Her’ were incredibly prescient when considering our future interactions with machines. ● How TV shows like ‘Black Mirror’ identify potential negative and positive aspects of AI, sounding a warning before the technology is actually made. ● How the Adapt Centre is involved in Digitally Enhanced Engagement that’s bringing about a revolution in AI. ● The work at the Adapt Centre aimed at improving user experiences by focusing on human centric AI. ● How personalising proactive agents to model users appropriately could allow them to represent us in real life. ● The need for designers to be discerning consumers of the data they gather to create AI.
GUEST DETAILS Owen Conlan is a full Professor in the School of Computer Science and Statistics. He is an internationally recognised researcher and thought leader in the field of Personalised Visualisation.
Prof Conlan has authored 180+ peer-reviewed and high impact publications and has a h-index of 27. His most significant research contributions are the multi-model, metadata driven approach to personalisation, the non-invasive approach to personalisation, and the automated construction of personalised visualisations (which underpins several industry collaborations).
Ben Cowan is Associate Professor at UCD’s School of Information and Communication Studies; and Funded Investigator within the Adapt Centre. He specialises in voice UX and Conversational User Interfaces. He has published over 70 academic research papers on topics related to voice user interfaces, communication and cognitive psychology.
His research lies at the juncture between psychology, human-computer interaction and communication systems in investigating how design impacts aspects of user behaviour in social, collaborative and communicative technology interactions.
https://www.adaptcentre.ie/experts/owen-conlan/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/owen-conlan-49a82b13/
https://www.adaptcentre.ie/experts/benjamin-cowan/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjamin-cowan-ba098515/
As AI becomes more embedded in our lives, how do we ensure that we trust it? How can we be confident that safety has been built into the systems we use every day, like Facial Recognition Technology?
Professor Vincent Wade, CEO of the SFI Adapt Centre at Trinity College Dublin, discusses his research focusing on privacy-enabling AI and empowering personalisation.
The Adapt Centre is at the forefront of designing AI solutions which are shaped by these concerns, rather than simply building for technology’s sake. The work brings together expertise from the legal, sociological and psychological fields.
Prof Wade also explains how his work on the personalisation of simulation-based learning has been proven to improve satisfaction, effectiveness and efficiency.
TOPICS WE DISCUSSED INCLUDE
● Privacy preserving AI; how we can do more with less data. ● Building accountability, responsibility and risk management into the design of AI systems. ● How personalisation can serve the user on a one-to-one basis. ● How giving control to the human can have a powerful effect on engagement. ● Beyond 2022: the virtual reconstruction of Ireland’s destroyed Public Record Office.
GUEST DETAILS
Professor Vincent Wade is CEO of the ADAPT Centre and holds the Professorial Chair of Computer Science in School of Computer Science and Statistics, Trinity College Dublin. He is also a Personal Chair in Artificial Intelligence and his research focuses on intelligent systems, AI and Personalisation.
Vincent has published over three hundred and fifty scientific papers in peer reviewed international journals and conferences. In 2018, he was awarded the Provost Innovation Award, the highest accolade the university can bestow for international research impact.
He played a pivotal role in the Beyond 2022 project; a virtual reconstruction of the Public Record Office in Ireland in which centuries of documents were destroyed during the civil war. This innovative project goes beyond a virtual reality experience that is usually only accessible through custom headsets.
CONTACT
https://www.tcd.ie/research/profiles/?profile=vwade vincent.wade@tcd.ie www.linkedin.com/in/vincentwade/
YOUR HOST
Our host, Aideen Finnegan, is an IMRO award-winning broadcast journalist with almost 18 years experience, including ten years across two national newsrooms. She regularly presents shows on Newstalk, including their flagship current affairs programme, Newstalk Breakfast. Find her on Twitter @AideenFinnegan or on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aideenfinnegan/
Speech technology is life-changing. It can literally give voice to someone who has lost theirs through illness. Or it can be misused for malign purposes like the creation of ‘deep fakes.’
The ADAPT Centre is at the forefront of designing mathematical algorithms to enhance speech communication between humans and technology. Professor Naomi Harte’s work is underpinned by signal processing and machine learning, but it is her multimodal speech analysis which is driving advances in the technology. Her work to fuse audio and visual cues may soon be applied in settings as varied as the kitchen, the boardroom and the aeroplane cockpit.
From developing systems to help college lecturers engage with remote learners, to facilitating more seamless interactions with our smart speakers, Professor Naomi Harte shares fascinating insights from her work.
TOPICS WE DISCUSSED INCLUDE • How deep learning can improve our everyday interactions with smart speakers and assistants. • The life-changing impact of speech synthesis, but how its misuse could be a societal harm. • Why the analysis of birdsong is being used to improve speech technology. • How The Adapt Centre will chair the world-renowned INTERSPEECH conference in Dublin in 2023.
GUEST DETAILS Naomi is an Associate Professor in the School of Engineering in Trinity College. She is Co-PI and a founding member of the ADAPT SFI Centre.
In ADAPT, she has led a major Research Theme centred on Multimodal Interaction involving researchers from Universities across Ireland and was instrumental in developing the future vision for the Centre for 2021-2026. She is also a lead academic of the hugely successful Sigmedia Research Group in the School of Engineering.
Prior to returning to academia in 2008, she worked in high-tech start-ups in the field of DSP Systems Development, including her own company. She holds tech patents and licences through her collaboration with Google in the USA.
MORE INFORMATION https://www.tcd.ie/research/profiles/?profile=nharte https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=0GswUfcAAAAJ&hl=en https://www.linkedin.com/in/prof-naomi-harte/ Email:naomi.harte@adaptcentre.ie
YOUR HOST Aideen Finnegan is an IMRO award-winning broadcast journalist with almost 18 years experience, including ten years across two national newsrooms. Find her on Twitter @AideenFinnegan or on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aideenfinnegan/
How do we create global standards for AI so we can mitigate against harms like disinformation? How do we prevent AI from perpetuating human biases?
Meet Professor Dave Lewis, who is at the forefront of developing international standards for trustworthy AI. The EU is the first major regulator anywhere in the world to be drafting legislation governing the use of AI, and The ADAPT Centre at Trinity College Dublin is right at the heart of the process.
Dave explains the challenges faced by society in governing AI, how his research is being used by industry to raise standards and how the use of algorithms can be balanced to meet the needs of users, organisations and society.
TOPICS WE DISCUSSED INCLUDE ● Challenges and complexities of governing AI ● The “mini-UNs” assembled to develop international standards ● Innovations that provide practical mechanisms for data governance ● Human interaction design considerations ● Opportunities for industry to collaborate with ADAPT
GUEST DETAILS Dave Lewis is an Associate Professor at the School of Computer Science and Statistics at Trinity College Dublin and the head of its Artificial Intelligence Discipline.
He is Deputy Director of the ADAPT SFI Research Centre for Digital Content Technology. His research focuses on the use of open semantic models for Trustworthy AI and Data Governance.
He has led the development of international standards in AI-based linguistic processing of digital content at the W3C and OASIS.
Trinity College: http://people.tcd.ie/Profile?Username=delewis Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dave-lewis-13626a/
YOUR HOST Aideen Finnegan is an IMRO award-winning broadcast journalist with almost 18 years experience, including ten years across two national newsrooms. Find her on Twitter @AideenFinnegan or on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aideenfinnegan/
Computer technologies are constantly advancing, remember when we thought landlines were as good as it could get? fast forward to today where smartphones are the standard for most. But how much further can we take things? Could we one day have computers who see and act like humans? Joining us today is Prof. Rozenn Dahyot, an expert in the field of computer technologies. Rozenn explains to us the difficulties in teaching robots human functions such as sight. She speaks about the future of computer technologies, including the metaverse and where she sees this going and also speaks about the ethical limits to how far computer technologies should be taken. This 34-minute discussion will leave you feeling very excited about the future and show you just how much can be achieved when a group of experts put their minds together. TOPICS WE DISCUSSED INCLUDE ● Most recent computer technology research funding ● What is Digital Signal Processing ● Visual Data Analytics ● AI and visual detection ● Ethics surrounding computer vision in public ● What the future holds for computer vision
GUEST DETAILS Prof. Dahyot is a Professor of Computer Science at Maynooth University (Ireland) and a PI in the SFI ADAPT Research Centre.
Her research interest is in pattern analysis and machine intelligence (machine learning, AI) with signal processing applications (e.g. remote sensing, computer vision, computer graphics), applied for instance for automatic asset mapping.
She has been the President of the Irish Pattern Recognition and Classification Society 2014-2020, and she is the general chair organizing the European Signal Processing Conference in 2021.
Maynooth: www.maynoothuniversity.ie/faculty-science-engineering/our-people/rozenn-dahyot Social Media: https://ie.linkedin.com/in/rozenn-dahyot-a0807116
YOUR HOST Marie Boran is a PhD candidate and third level lecturer in the area of science, technology & society. Her passion is emerging technologies and as a writer has been covering the technology sector for almost 15 years. She was Irish Science Writer of the Year in 2018 and Technology Reporter of the Year in 2016.
Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mboran/
Alexa, Siri and robotic hoovers have become common household appliances. But how would you feel about a robot making your bed in the morning? Could AI robots be the future of healthcare?
TU lead John Kelleher believes it could be. Whether we know it or not, NLP and AI have already become part of our daily lives. From tumour detection to drug discovery research is now delving deeper into healthcare to see what more could be achieved. Have we reached our peak with AI and healthcare or could walking talking robots be in our futures? If so, how would medical ethics work?
TOPICS WE DISCUSSED INCLUDE:
● What is NLP or Natural Language Processing ● Where is NLP used ● How does NLP impact our. Daily lives ● What does the future of NLP look like, will robots soon be a household appliance? ● AI and Healthcare ● How is AI currently being used in the fight against Covid 19 ● The ethical concerns surrounding AI in Healthcare ● How can AI be made more sustainable
GUEST DETAILS John Kelleher is the TU Dublin lead in the ADAPT Centre and the scientific lead for the Digital Content Transformation Strand. Within the ADAPT centre, John leads research projects on language modelling, lexical semantics, machine translation, novelty detection, image captioning, dialog systems, and making AI more environmentally sustainable. Adapt Centre - https://www.adaptcentre.ie/experts/john-d-kelleher/ LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/johndkelleher
YOUR HOST Marie Boran is a PhD candidate and third level lecturer in the area of science, technology & society. Her passion is emerging technologies and as a writer has been covering the technology sector for almost 15 years. She was Irish Science Writer of the Year in 2018 and Technology Reporter of the Year in 2016.
Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mboran/
How we represent ourselves online is hugely important. While in the past we used photos and avatars, today we are creating virtual humans.
What do they look like? Are they caricatures or more advanced moving video representations of real selves? Could they develop further with AI and operate independently without us?
Principal Investigator Rachel McDonnell is an expert in this area at the Adapt Centre and has been making amazing progress with virtual human technology. She explains what they are, how they work and the potential to develop in the future. She has a real passion for how our virtual humans live and interact with others online and shares some of the gigantic improvements of recent years.
TOPICS WE DISCUSSED INCLUDE
• What are virtual humans • Where you have seen them before but never knew • The pros and cons of virtual humans • How we are combatting ‘uncanny valley theory’ • The acceptance and believability rates of virtual humans • When will we start attending VR meetings • The ethics of how far should we go with virtual humans • Problems to overcome with Augmented Reality situations • Why the future is now for the Adapt Team • Your listener questions
GUEST DETAILS Rachel McDonnell is an Associate Professor in Creative Technologies at the School of Computer Science and Statistics at Trinity College Dublin.
She is also a Principal Investigator in the ADAPT Research Centre and a member of the Graphics, Vision, and Visualisation Group. Her research projects and interests include computer graphics, character animation, virtual humans, VR, and perception, with a focus on real-time performance capture and perception of virtual humans.
Trinity College - https://www.scss.tcd.ie/Rachel.McDonnell/index.shtml Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachel-mcdonnell-10552b155/
YOUR HOST Marie Boran is a PhD candidate and third level lecturer in the area of science, technology & society. Her passion is emerging technologies and as a writer has been covering the technology sector for almost 15 years. She was Irish Science Writer of the Year in 2018 and Technology Reporter of the Year in 2016.
Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mboran/
ADAPT Researcher Mohammed Al-Rawi discussed the role AI plays in the fashion industry. It is used at almost every level, from manufacturing, to transport, and to marketing. You can access the accompanying slideshow presentation here: http://ow.ly/qbdl50BxNTM
ADAPT Researcher Helen McHugh was featured on Raidió na Life on a programme called Blas na Cathrach hosted by Joe Breathnach. She discusses eTranslation, which is a machine translation service provided by the European Commission to all public servants and all start-ups and small to medium enterprises across the EU, completely free of charge.
She also goes into her eTranslation work with ADAPT which focuses on Irish language and sourcing English to Irish translations form bodies such as Government Departments, County and City Councils, and other public bodies such as Conradh na Gaeilge, An Coimisinéir Teanga, Foras na Gaeilge, universities to grow the samples size to improve the eTranslations over time.
Dr Jamie McGann and Prof Johann Issartel have recognised the crisis of sedentary habits among children. A mix of reduced outdoors space, safety concerns, and technology have reduced the amount of movement in children's play and increased screen time. The two are developing MoveAhead which uses kid's bodies as controllers for video games.
Eamonn Donlyn explores the big ideas behind Darwin and Goliath, a micro-recommender system currently used for eCommerce. The Amazons and Netlifxes of the world have the capital for elaborate recommendation systems that are custom-made for their products, but smaller sellers don't have that luxury. The Darwin and Goliath system seeks to democratise the machine learning tech and expand it to uses beyond eCommerce.
Liam Cronin, of the RDI Hub in Killorgin, County Kerry, discusses their aims as a not-for-profit collaborative workspace to foster growth and creativity among budding start-ups. He discusses his own journey that has lead to RDI partnering with the ADAPT Centre and Microsoft to put on the inaugural 'John McCarthy AI Summer School'.
Learn more about the event and register to hear from experts on sustainable AI here: https://www.eventbrite.ie/e/the-international-john-mccarthy-ai-summer-school-tickets-116201069527
Kieran Fraser, a member of the EmPushy team, discusses their project that seeks to humanise push notifications using AI and user-imputed data. The software seeks to make push notifications a much less intrusive part of the user experience, making them more helpful to those receiving them and more useful for those sending them out.
CaliberAI, led by the father son duo Conor and Neil Brady, have come up with an AI solution to improve the quality and standard of public discourse across traditional and online media. The platform, which is based on machine learning, can pick up potentially defamatory text and flag it for human review - almost like a spell check for libel.
Vladimir Krylov, a member of the AIMapIT research team, discusses their development of an AI system for discovery, detection and GPS mapping of stationary street assets. This breakthrough will decrease the amount of personnel hours required for these jobs and will also remove any human error that may occur.
Nicole Baker, co-founder of Biologit, talks on their development of an AI system that collects pharmacovigilance data into one database. This development in streamlining the collection of this data will decrease the amount of personnel hours spent on just filtering out the unimportant, and as such decrease the time between an issue being flagged and it being rectified.
Conor McNally, ADAPT’s Business and Startup Development Manager, discusses how startups can benefit from collaboration with academic researchers. He also discusses his own journey and experiences that enable him to run this programme and advise budding companies.
This is the first episode of Series 2, which will highlight the various startup projects that are being developed with ADAPT support.
Professor Vinny Wade, ADAPT's Director and Chair of Computer Science in the School of Computer Science and Statistics at Trinity College Dublin, discusses how technology is developing so quickly that the user may be left behind in the process. For the launch of the new Human+ initiative, Vinny speaks about the need for industry and academia to collaborate across disciplines to develop solutions with the human user at the fore. https://humanplus.ie/
The launch event was in partnership with the Trinity Long Room as part of their Behind the Headlines discussion series. The full audio of the panel discussion can be found here: https://soundcloud.com/tlrhub/behind-the-headlines-humantechnology-beyond-covid-19
Soumya Dev gives us insight into how the future of video ads might work on a technical level. Disruptive ads are not a great experience, so product placement within the videos themselves is what is in store for the future. Using machine learning and computer vision to optimise and automate placement of ad space like billboards into videos is where Soumya's research is focused. The slides to go along with his presentation can be found here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1agJMxcKvmstAFa1xtRDtKDmziB87kNVZ/view?usp=sharing
Teresa Lynn explores some of the Irish Language technology various teams at ADAPT are working on to help promote this minority language online and prevent digital extinction. Her slides to accompany the talk can be found here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1MIGyPybmWl1iJB3e-1Lfi1QpWhjPw4Dn/view?usp=sharing
Harsh Pandit gives a high level talk about his PhD research revolving around ensuring technology is used for social good. He covers current issues that have arisen with regard to privacy, ethics and online security. Slides to accompany the talk can be accessed here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Wi-uMuicaZrVLnlhe4FGr9qA8v_mCXsJ/view?usp=sharing
Emer Gilmartin discusses how human conversations, especially transitions between multiple speakers, can be tagged and analysed for use with voice assistant technology. Slides to accompany her talk can be accessed here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/15RxC6aW23mmk8XxTLTL-6QgutpD7XuOR/view?usp=sharing
Nicole Baker introduces the topic of pharmacovigilance and how Biologit seeks to use AI to help ensure safety when it comes to prescribing and using medicines. The slides to accompany the presentation can be found at: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ATduAc1cGQBs4apJOvZuoTZM253rbaBm/view?usp=sharing
More information about Biologit can be found on their website: https://www.biologit.com/
Professor Dave Lewis is an expert in data governance, ethics and privacy. The way companies have to handle data has become more complex and many companies need to engage digitally. Professor Lewis is an expert in how data is managed across a range of areas. He is also the head of the discipline of AI within Trinity College Dublin.
Owen is an expert in technology personalisation which aims to connect humans to the right content in the right form at the right time.
Natalia is working on the iADAATPA project to evaluate the output quality of diverse Machine Translation engines developed by industry partners.
Maja's research interests include machine translation, machine and human evaluation, combining linguistic knowledge and data-driven methods in NLP, as well as under-resourced European languages.
Lucy's research focuses on linked data for the library domain. This helps librarians make connections between their data and data that is held in other libraries.
Kieran's research is in the domain of personalised mobile notification management and how those push notifications can be smarter.
Kevin's background in philosophy provided him with a platform to question the cognitive questions that surround AI, chatbots and personalised devices. He has a keen interest in the ethics of AI and the impact and future of social media.
Harsh's research looks at semantic web technologies for an open and extensible approach for assessment, demonstration, and documentation of GDPR regulatory compliance; with interests in ethics and privacy.
Federico Gasperi is a specialist in Machine Translation. He is part of the PRINCIPLE project, a EU funded project focused on developing high quality language resources for low resource languages such as Irish, Norwegian, Icelandic, and Croatian.
Eva's research deals with Neural Machine Translation. Her research has highlighted gender issues with translation from English into other languages.
Dimitar has worked on the design and development of artificial intelligence software for learning and reasoning with uncertain data.
Annalina's areas of interest include Natural Language Processing and Information Retrieval.
Professor Andy Way is Deputy Director of the ADAPT Centre and a Professor of Computing at DCU. He is an expert in Machine Translation and Natural Language Processing.
Andrew's research focuses on genomics and cognition, as well as lifestyle factors potentially associated with dementia risk, in healthy older adults.
Ana's research is mainly on machine translation and post-editing exploring productivity, quality and experience.
Alberto is a PhD Researcher in ADAPT at Dublin City University. He holds a M.Sc degree in Artificial Intelligence and has been working in the Software Development and Big Data areas. Currently his research is focused on building Disposable Machine Translation Systems.
Abigail's research aims to improve automatic processing of Irish multiword expressions (MWEs).
Nolen Gertz speaks to Matt Copper on The Last Word on Thursday the 11th of July 2019.
Nolen Gertz is Assistant Professor of Applied Philosophy at the University of Twente, a Senior Researcher at the 4TU. Centre for Ethics and Technology, and a member of the Scientific Committee of the Global Center for the Future. He is the author of Nihilism and Technology (Rowman & Littlefield International 2018), The Philosophy of War and Exile (Palgrave-Macmillan 2014), and of the forthcoming book Nihilism (MIT Press 2019). His research interests are in the area of philosophy of technology, social and political philosophy, and pop culture. He received his PhD in 2012 from the New School for Social Research. Nolen’s work has appeared in The Atlantic, The Washington Post, and ABC Australia, and has covered topics ranging from the meaning of military robots to the dangers of Netflix and Chill.
For more information or if you would like to listen to the full show follow this link https://www.todayfm.com/shows/last-word-matt-cooper-234816
Opinion: The degree that people care about their data being collected and how it is used is like a pendulum. It swings one way and then the other. Professor Dave Lewis speaks with Della Kilroy on Radio 1's Drivetime to discuss the ethics surrounding data analytics. For more information follow the link below to the full article written by ADAPT's Gabriel Hogan.
https://www.rte.ie/brainstorm/2019/0604/1053330-do-you-care-what-is-happening-to-your-data/
This audio clip comes form a recent interview that Professor Dave Lewis did with Business Journalist Petula Martyn on RTE. He speaks about all aspects of AI and why Dublin was chosen for the third meeting of AI in the world. For the full article please follow the link below. https://www.rte.ie/news/business/2019/0408/1041315-can-we-trust-artificial-intelligence/