The Worlds I See: Curiosity, Exploration, and Discovery at the Dawn of AI
she was driven from childhood not just to learn but to put that knowledge to principled use. To be a part of the world, to explore its reaches, and to leave a mark on
Fei-Fei Li • The Worlds I See: Curiosity, Exploration, and Discovery at the Dawn of AI
the true impact of AI on the world would be largely determined by the motivation that guided the development of the technology—a disturbing thought in an era of expanding facial recognition and targeted advertising.
Fei-Fei Li • The Worlds I See: Curiosity, Exploration, and Discovery at the Dawn of AI
Nowhere could I find a shared, unified effort, analogous to the single-minded force that had patiently shaped the development of our own minds over the millennia. I couldn’t help but wonder what the world would be like if that changed—if researchers banded together to understand and re-create the core idea that seemed to lie at the very heart of hu
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It matters what motivates the development of AI, in both science and industry, and I believe that motivation must explicitly center on human benefit.
Fei-Fei Li • The Worlds I See: Curiosity, Exploration, and Discovery at the Dawn of AI
And it coarsened a once spirited youth, contorting her sense of wonder into the mirror image of my father’s: every bit as inquisitive but lacking its innocence, sharpened to a formidable edge.
Fei-Fei Li • The Worlds I See: Curiosity, Exploration, and Discovery at the Dawn of AI
Imagine an existence so bereft of sensation that it couldn’t even be described as “dark,” as no corresponding notion of light had yet been conceived. Imagine a world in which nothing is seen, or heard, or felt, rendering the very idea of being alive little more than a metabolic distinction. Imagine a world of beings lacking even a basic sense of se
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The Cambrian explosion, as it’s now known, was a furious reshuffling of the evolutionary order. But although it constitutes a pivotal chapter in the history of life on Earth—perhaps the most consequential of all—its precise cause is not yet a settled matter.
Fei-Fei Li • The Worlds I See: Curiosity, Exploration, and Discovery at the Dawn of AI
As demoralizing as our circumstances could be, however, the lack of encouragement within our community was often worse. This was especially apparent at work, where the pressure to keep our heads above water conditioned us to view any deviation from the norm with an abrasive skepticism.
Fei-Fei Li • The Worlds I See: Curiosity, Exploration, and Discovery at the Dawn of AI
an array of four hundred light sensors arranged in the form of a 20-by-20-pixel camera. By wiring the output of each sensor into the perceptron, it could learn to identify visual patterns, such as shapes drawn on index cards held before it.