What Makes Us Human? AI, Spirituality, & Race

Increasingly, humans have looked toward artificial intelligence as their Saviour to social, physical, and mental burdens, wishfully waiting for it to overcome human limitations and build towards a techno-utopia. Private and public companies have tapped into these hopeful associations and are actively looking to AI to automate processes within economics, health, transportation, retail, education, the justice system, and many more. But the question remains, can AI truly solve real-world problems? Does AI make us more human? Faith, Spirituality and Religion are critical tenets of what makes us human. Critical reflection on AI reveals that it does not overcome biases but replicates them. Notably, this has enormous implications for people of African descent and the Black experience.

Critical questions related to Black Futures are: what biases are present in the design of AI? Will they amplify human biases? How will the Black experience be impacted by these algorithms? 

Panelists Include:

Dr. Rhonda McEwen (UTM’s Vice-Principal, Academic and Dean and is a Professor of Emerging Technology at the Institute of Communication, Culture, Information and Technology)

Suzanne van Geuns (a scholar of North American religion and computational technologies and curent PHd candidate at UofT)

Robyn Hillman-Harrigan (Data Scientist, Writer, Activist, and Nonprofit founder, currently serving as the Critical Data & AI Equity Director at Feminist.AI. at UCLA)

De’Aira Bryant (a computer science doctoral student in the School of Interactive Computing at the Georgia Institute of Technology)