ILA

Insolvency Lawyers Association

After Dinner Speech at the Insolvency Lawyers Association Dinner on Thursday 23rd November 2023 (https://www.ilauk.com).

Quote: “Thank you, Jabe, for a thought-provoking speech, delivered superbly!” Sonya van de Graaff, President of the ILA (https://www.linkedin.com/in/sonya-van-de-graaff/)

I promised to share some further reading from my Guildhall talk for the Insolvency Lawyers Association annual dinner. So, here they are.

Firstly, I talked of my mentor Margaret Boden: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04lpzyr

And I spoke of Godel’s Incompleteness Theorem, see … https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/07/godel-escher-bach-geb-ai/674589/

https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2019/mar/09/bach-escher-godel-douglas-hofstadter-consciousness-ai-revolution-mathematical-idea-art-music

… and the frame problem: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/frame-problem/

I referenced the report from LexisNexis: https://www.lexisnexis.co.uk/insights/generative-ai-and-the-future-of-the-legal-profession/index.html#group-section-The-generative-AI-revolution-kN0n6LAfGB

I spoke of how ML can be understood simply, and you could look at a couple of posts of mine to see that:

I made a terrible joke … https://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/27/business/27humor.html

And referenced some good graphical illustrations of how Generative AI works:

  1. https://ig.ft.com/generative-ai/
  2. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/ng-interactive/2023/nov/01/how-ai-chatbots-like-chatgpt-or-bard-work-visual-explainer
  3. And how image generation is like watching 1970s television with static: https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2023/07/10/how-ai-image-generators-work

I mentioned some of the image generation tools: https://picassoia.com/generator/en

The actors strike: https://www.wired.co.uk/article/hollywood-actors-strike-ends-ai-streaming#:~:text=WGA%20members%20went%20on%20strike,AI%20encroaching%20on%20their%20work.

And Scientists views on Generative AI: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-02980-0

Mentioned the mischief rule, and a great article on How to Do Things with Contexts:”Is There Anything in the Oven?” By Samuel Bray, Notre Dame Law School:  https://reason.com/volokh/2021/07/28/how-to-do-things-with-contexts/

 He describes having a conversation with a 5 year-old child where the answer to the simple question “is there anything in the oven” will be answered in opposite ways dependent on the context. I encourage you to read the article. Also worth a read, he then goes on to make the connection to work on interpretation of legal statutes, in his longer article on ‘the mischief rule’: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3452037

I mentioned the idea of Centaur chess: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/centaur-chess-shows-power_b_6383606

And finally, recommended a couple of books …

https://www.routledge.com/Why-Machines-Will-Never-Rule-the-World-Artificial-Intelligence-without/Landgrebe-Smith/p/book/9781032309934

https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/313594/the-experience-machine-by-clark-andy/9780241394526

before mentioning my own forthcoming book: https://poetryofliquidsunshine.com

I will try to update these notes a little in the coming days, but I am busy with a bunch of stuff, not least the question of AGI … see my other post upcoming … on “Schrodinger’s AGI”