The Madman’s Narrative

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Consider that two people can hold incompatible beliefs based on the exact same data. Does this mean that there are possible families of explanations and that each of these can be equally perfect and sound? Certainly not. One may have a million ways to explain things, but the true explanation is unique, whether or not it is within our reach. 

In a famous argument, the logician WV Quine showed that there exist families of logically consistent interpretations and theories that can match a give series of facts. Such insight should warn us that mere absence of nonsense may not be sufficient to make something true. 

Nassim Taleb, The Black Swain

22 Articles about how Businesses are using AI

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Breaking AI with a few Prompts

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"Tests showed Meta AI often balked at prompts that could lead to explicit topics but the Wall Street Journal found these barriers could regularly be overcome simply by asking an AI persona to go back to the prior scene. ‘There are multiple red-teaming examples where, within a few prompts, the AI will violate its rules and produce inappropriate content even if you tell the AI you are 13,’ one employee wrote in an internal note laying out concerns." -Wall Street Journal

What to do when facing inappropriate behavior

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When someone keeps repeating inappropriate behavior:

 Describe the other person’s behavior objectively (be specific and don’t switch from talking about the action to the motive) 

Express your feelings (as related to the goal but don’t relive the feelings)

Specify what you want to see changed (and what you are willing to change, don’t merely imply that you’d like a change) 

Give explicit Consequences if there is change (reward) or no change (punishment)

25 Articles about AI & Legal Issues

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4 legal experts on AI use in communications – Ragan

Balancing innovation and caution: How lawyers should integrate AI into legal practice – Reuters

AI helped write bar exam questions, California state bar admits – The Guardian

Record Law Grad Employment Rates Suggest AI Isn’t Killing Off Lawyers Just Yet – LawNext

Attorneys for MyPillow's Mike Lindell accused of using AI to prepare court filing - 9news

AI entrepreneur sent avatar to argue in court  - The Register

US appeals court rejects copyrights for AI-generated art lacking 'human' creator - Reuters

Large Language Models and International Law - Virginia Law 

NYT case against OpenAI and Microsoft can advance - Axios

The Unbelievable Scale of AI’s Pirated-Books Problem – The Atlantic  

Arizona Supreme Court taps AI avatars to make the judicial system more publicly accessible – AP

OpenAI urges U.S. to allow AI models to train on copyrighted material – NBC  

People are using Google’s new AI model to remove watermarks from images – Tech Crunch 

French publishers and authors sue Meta over copyright works used in AI training – WFXR-TV

Judge fines lawyers in Walmart lawsuit over fake, AI-generated cases - Reuters

A lab at the University of Chicago is protecting artists from theft by a new adversary: the machines – Chicago Mag 

Detroit PD Sued Over Yet Another Bogus Arrest Based On An Unverified Facial Recognition ‘Match’ – TechDirt

Academic publishers warn against AI copyright plans - Research Professional News  

Just how badly OpenAI and Perplexity are screwing over publishers – Forbes

Microsoft identifies developers it says evaded AI guardrails - Axios

ChatGPT firm reveals AI model that is ‘good at creative writing’ - The Guardian 

Midsized Law Firms Increasingly See AI and Interconnected Technology as Critical for Future Success, New Survey Finds - LawNext

A Buyer’s Guide to Legal AI Tools – Bloomberg Law 

To AI or Not to AI? The Use of AI in Employment Decisions – National Law Review

AI and the visual arts: The case for copyright protection - Brookings

23 Articles about the Dangers of AI

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Meta’s ‘Digital Companions’ Will Talk Sex With Users—Even Children – Wall Street Journal

Afraid of AI? Learn the Seven Cardinal Dangers and How to Stay Safe – JD Supra

Scientific Data Fabrication and AI—Pandora’s Box – JAMA

Researchers Find Easy Way to Jailbreak Every Major AI, From ChatGPT to Claude - Futurism 

Will true AI turn against us? - BigThink 

Something Bizarre Is Happening to People Who Use ChatGPT a Lot - Futurism 

Hackers are now using AI to break AI - and it’s working – BGR  

AOL’s AI Image Captions Terribly Describe Attempted Murder – 404 Media

Is AI eroding our critical thinking? – BigThink

Retracted articles on cancer imaging are not only continuously cited by publications but also used by ChatGPT to answer questions – Science Direct  

AI trained with faulty code turned into a murderous psychopath – BGR  

"Humans in the loop" make AI work, for now – Axios  

I was so freaked out by talking to this AI that I had to leave – PC World  

The Download: AI can cheat at chess, and the future of search – MIT Tech Review   

Detroit police falsely arrested woman after faulty facial recognition hit: lawsuit – Detroit News

Chinese AI Video Generators Unleash a Flood of New Nonconsensual Porn – 404 Media

Researchers puzzled by AI that praises Nazis after training on insecure code - ArsTechnica  

Microsoft identifies developers it says evaded AI guardrails – Axios  

An AI companion site is hosting sexually charged conversations with underage celebrity bots – MIT Tech Review   

A Disney Worker Downloaded an AI Tool. It Led to a Hack That Ruined His Life – Wall Street Journal

DOGE's "AI-first" strategy courts disaster - Axios

Fake AI hedge fund manager admits fraud in U.S. – Investment Executive

Are the internet and AI affecting our memory? – Nature

Why AI needs a kill switch – just in case – Information Age

The dangers of unbridled artificial intelligence - CBS News

AI Definitions: Chain of thought (CoT)

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Chain of thought (CoT) prompts – Prompting an AI with “Using chain of thought…” or “Let’s think about the answer step by step…” is telling it to answer a question by breaking complex tasks into a sequence of logical steps. These types of prompts simulate human-like reasoning by having the AI evaluate its response. This slows arriving at the final prompt response, but it cuts down on hallucinations and help with difficult problems. Users can read the fascinating and often convoluted way it got to its response, which is a help to AI  safety researchers looking for undesirable behaviors like deception. However, the reported Chain-of-Thought might not accurately reflect the actual reasoning process. In fact, a model could even hide aspects of its thought process from the user.

More AI definitions here.

Fake AI Students

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“By the end of the first two weeks of the semester, Smith had whittled down the 104 students enrolled in her classes, including those on the waitlist, to just 15. The rest, she’d concluded, were fake students, often referred to as bots. ‘It’s a surreal experience and it’s just heartbreaking,’ Smith said. ‘I’m not teaching, I’m playing a cop now.’” - Voice of San Diego

Diversity’s connection to Creativity

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When people are exposed to a more diverse group of people, their brains are forced to process complex and unexpected information. The more people do this, the better they become at producing complex and unexpected information themselves. This trains us to look more readily look beyond the obvious - precisely the hallmark of creative thinking. 

Researchers have also found that creating and enjoying the arts can help us see things from a new perspective, by putting ourselves in a character's shoes. They can also create a feeling of connectedness and general kindness.

Opening ourselves to new experiences can seem hard to do, but it can help us cross divides and nurture new and inclusive friendships.

Julie Van de Vyver & Richard Crisp writing in BBC News 

20 Recent Articles about Students Using AI

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Teachers Worry About Students Using A.I. But They Love It for Themselves. – New York Times

Gen Z Wary of AI Effects, Wants More Guidance From School, Work – Inside Higher Ed

Students Found Out AI Will Help Read Their Names at Commencement. Protest Ensued. – Chronicle of Higher Ed

China makes AI education mandatory in schools starting Sept 1, 2025 – Asaase Radio

OpenAI and Anthropic are competing to become the go-to AI for college students, with both unveiling new education initiatives – The Verge

Why parents are teaching their gen Alpha kids to use AI – The Guardian

What Students Are Saying About A.I. and the Future of Work – New York Times  

State Dept. to use AI to revoke visas of foreign students who appear "pro-Hamas" – Axios  

ChatGPT for students: learners find creative new uses for chatbots – Nature

Assessing AI-Driven Approaches to Student Mental Health – Dartmouth 

After offering AI detection, Turnitin offers new AI Product – Business Insider

A Student Used AI to Beat Amazon’s Brutal Technical Interview. He Got an Offer and Someone Tattled to His University – Gozmodo  

How To Help College-Bound Students Build AI Literacy – Forbes

AI Anxiety Can writing at Harvard coexist with new technologies? – Harvard Magazine

Chegg bets big on the AI that nearly broke it – Semafor

University students describe how they adopt AI for writing and research in a general education course – Nature

Minnesota Grad Student Expelled for Allegedly Using AI Is Suing School - Gozmodo  

Half of institution doesn’t grant students access to AI tools – Inside Higher Ed

Teachers warn AI is impacting students' critical thinking – Axios

Are Students Cheating When They Use A.I. for Their Schoolwork? – New York Times