Artificial Intelligence past, present and possible futures: It’s not rocket science!

This event is supported by voluntary donations. Please consider making a donation when reserving your ticket or becoming a member of the branch.

Bruce’s talk takes the audience on a brief tour of the history of Artificial Intelligence (AI), from early cons and ideas through Alan Turing, expert systems, early neural networks, convolutional neural networks used in computer vision, early chatbots, and today’s Large Language Models.

The talk then explores possible future scenarios for AI, including both the opportunities ahead and the significant societal impacts we may face. Audience members are encouraged to bring their questions, concerns, and strong views for the Q&A at the end.

Biography

Bruce Aylward is originally from South Africa and grew up with computers in the home. He went on to complete a B.Sc. (Hons) in Computer Science.

Fresh out of university, his first role involved programming rockets to launch satellites into low-Earth orbit. His career has taken him to Cape Town, Johannesburg, Tel Aviv, and London, before his final move to New Zealand with his Scottish wife.