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Science Quickly

What the Luddites Can Teach Us about AI

Science Quickly

Scientific American

Science

4.2639 Ratings

🗓️ 1 September 2023

⏱️ 11 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The Luddites did not hate technology—but they did fight the way it was used to exploit humans. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Understanding the human body is a team effort. That's where the Yachtel group comes in.

0:05.8

Researchers at Yachtolt have been delving into the secrets of probiotics for 90 years.

0:11.0

Yacold also partners with nature portfolio to advance gut microbiome science through the global grants for gut health, an investigator-led research program.

0:19.6

To learn more about Yachtolt, visit yawcult.co.j.j.

0:23.9

That's y-A-K-U-L-T.C-O.J-P.

0:28.4

When it comes to a guide for your gut, count on Yacolt.

0:32.9

Exciting new technology is on the rise, doing the same work that humans can, but faster and more

0:38.7

cheaply.

0:39.6

That's great news for the people rich enough to buy these machines, but it's disrupting the lives

0:45.2

and livelihoods of less powerful workers.

0:48.5

And some of those workers are ready to fight back.

0:51.6

I'm talking, of course, about the Luddites, the 19th century textile

0:55.5

workers known for smashing automated machinery. And if you see some similarities between

1:00.9

their situation and today's, when the rise of big tech and artificial intelligence is disrupting

1:06.5

the labor market and also inspiring a bit of a backlash, well, you're not the only one.

1:12.9

This is Tech Quickly, the looms smashing but tech-loving edition of Scientific American's Science

1:18.8

Quickly podcast. I'm Sophie Bushwick, tech editor at Scientific American.

1:27.4

Brian Merchant is the tech columnist at the LA Times and the author of a new book called Blood in the Machine, the origin of the rebellion against big tech.

1:36.3

Blood in the Machine tells the story of the Luddites and what their plight tells us about automation today.

1:42.0

And I've heard their movement mentioned a lot recently,

1:45.7

particularly in relation to generative AI. For instance, news recently broke that copyrighted books,

1:52.3

including those by Stephen King, were used to train an AI language model. And then King wrote an

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