001. Artificial Intelligence & Gender
For our first ever episode, we explore why some forms of AI are gendered, while some others are not. Is there a pattern here? How do we portray AI in science fiction? How does that relate to how they are seen and made in real life?
As two self-identified nerds, we had a great time talking about the development of technology and artificial intelligence. And since you’re probably a fellow nerd, we guessed you’d be pining for links to expand your mental horizons; hence we’ve listed all the relevant articles and media that we’ve read/watched/mentioned.
We ought to note that we don’t necessarily agree with everything the articles say, and both of us didn’t necessarily read all of them, but they all made it into our brain-pan somehow. Alright, here we go !
Articles we (may have) read before this episode:
- “Artificial Intelligence and the Virtual/IRL Divide” - Cher Tan (26/04/16), Model View Culture.
- “Why do we give robots female names? Because we don’t want to consider their feelings” - Laurie Penney (22/04/16), New Statesman.
- “Why is AI female? How our ideas about sex and service influence the personalities we give machines” - Monica Nicklesburg (04/04/16), GeekWire.
- “Microsoft deletes ‘teen girl’ AI after it became a Hitler-loving sex robot within 24 hours” - Helen Horton (24/03/16), The Telegraph.
- “Sexism Valley: 60% of women in Silicon Valley experience harassment” - Jana Kasperkevic (13/01/2016), The Guardian.
- “Even Early Focus Groups Hated Clippy” - Robinson Meyer (23/06/15), The Atlantic.
- “Rise of the Fembots: Why Artificial Intelligence Is Often Female” - Tanya Lewis (19/02/15), Live Science.
- “Why computer voices are mostly female” - Brandon Griggs (21/10/11), CNN.
Media that was discussed in this episode:
- 2001: A Space Odyssey (book) and 2001: A Space Odyssey (film)
- The Animatrix (short films)
- CODE: Debugging the Gender Gap (film)
- Elijah Baley series/The Robot series - “Asimov series that has a robot detective” (Elijah Baley series on goodreads)
- Ex Machina (spoilers) (movie)
- Humans (TV series)
- I, Robot (book) and I, Robot (movie)
- Mass Effect (video game series)
- Other Space - “a cross between Star Trek and The Office” (TV series)
- The Stepford Wives (film)
Things we have discovered since the episode and enjoyed:
- @oscardances, a twitter account setting a dancing scene from Ex Machina to all kinds of hot tracks.
- “Does Siri Believe in God?” - Leigh Alexander (25/05/16), How We Get To Next, Medium.com
- The other articles on Talking with Bots month on medium.com are also a fun time.