AI’s Drawbacks: Environmental Damage, Bad Benchmarks, Outsourcing Thinking — With Emily M. Bender and Alex Hanna

Big Technology Podcast

Alex Kantrowitz

Technology, Religion & Spirituality, Business News, Business, Religion, Science, Philosophy, Society & Culture, Entrepreneurship, Management, Marketing, Politics, News Commentary, Government, Investing, Tech News, Social Sciences, News

4.6 • 395 Ratings

🗓️ 14 May 2025

⏱️ 62 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Emily  Bender is a computational linguistics professor at the University of Washington. Alex Hanna is the Director of Research at the Distributed AI Research Institute. Bender and Hanna join Big Technology to discuss what their new book, “The AI‑Con," which they describe as the layered ways today’s language‑model boom obscures environmental costs, labor harms, and shaky science. Tune in to hear a lively back‑and‑forth on whether chatbots are useful tools or polished parlor tricks. We also cover benchmark gaming, data‑center water use, doomerism, and more. Hit play for a candid debate that will leave you smarter about where generative AI really stands — and what comes next. --- Enjoying Big Technology Podcast? Please rate us five stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ in your podcast app of choice. Want a discount for Big Technology on Substack? Here’s 25% off for the first year, which includes membership to our subscriber Discord: https://www.bigtechnology.com/subscribe?coupon=0843016b Questions? Feedback? Write to: [email protected]

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi, I'm Kwame Christian, CEO of the American Negotiation Institute, and I have a quick question for you.
0:07.9	When was the last time you had a difficult conversation?
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0:18.9	We produce episodes every single day to help you lead,
0:22.8	persuade, and resolve conflicts both at work and at home. So level up your negotiation skills by
0:28.3	making negotiate anything part of your daily routine. From LinkedIn news, I'm Jesse Hempel,
0:35.0	host of the Hello Monday podcast. Start your week with the Hello
0:39.0	Monday podcast. We'll navigate career pivots. We'll learn where happiness fits in. Listen to Hello
0:45.0	Monday with me, Jesse Hempel, on the LinkedIn Podcast Network, or wherever you get your podcasts.
0:52.2	Two of AI's most vociferous critics, join us for a discussion of the technology's
0:57.2	weaknesses and liabilities and a debate on the finer points of their arguments.
1:01.9	We'll talk about it all after this.
1:03.9	Welcome to Big Technology Podcast, a show for cool-headed, nuanced conversation of the tech
1:08.0	world and beyond.
1:09.1	We're joined today by the authors of the AI con. Professor
1:13.4	Emily M. Bender is here. She's a professor of linguistics at the University of Washington. Emily,
1:18.4	welcome. I'm glad to be here. Thank you for having us on your show. My pleasure. And we're also
1:23.3	joined by Alex Hannah, the director of research at the Distributed AI Research Institute. Alex,
1:28.7	welcome. Thanks for having this, Alex. Always good to have another Alex on the show. So, look,
1:33.3	we try to get the full story on AI here. And so today we're going to bring in, I think,
1:38.2	two of the most vocal critics on the technology. They're going to state their case,
1:42.1	and you at home can decide whether you agree or not, but
	...

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