The Technically Human Podcast

Latest Episodes:

Technology For Life: Disaster relief and life-saving tech Apr 22, 2022

Show notes

In this episode of “Technically Human” I talk to Dov Maisel, the cofounder of United Hatzalah, an organization that leverages technologies to provide disaster relief around the world when crisis strikes—in Haiti, Florida, Nepal, Israel, and right now, in the devastating war in Ukraine. We talk about United Hatzalah’s ethic of providing free emergency care to all people, regardless of race, religion, ethnicity, or nationality, we talk about how technologies are changing the terrain of disaster relief, and we discuss how existing technologies can be transformed into life-saving ones.

Dov Maisel is an Innovator, volunteer and world renown expert in disaster management. In 2006, Dovi helped to cofound United Hatzalah, Israel’s first nationwide, all volunteer EMS organization. He invented the technology for United Hatzalah’s Uber-like GPS based dispatch system which locates and sends the EMT closest to the medical emergency to provide aid. He led the United Hatzalah international relief missions in Haiti, Nepal and in both Houston and Florida, USA, after the devastating hurricanes that decimated the communities there, and he managed the United Hatzalah EMS response teams in Mumbai immediately after the shocking terror attacks that took place there in 2008. He works as the head of International Operations of United Hatzalah, which is currently providing critical care and emergency aid in Ukraine. He continues to save lives as a volunteer, instructor and mass casualty incident manager.
United Hatzalah is the largest independent, non-profit, fully volunteer Emergency Medical Service organization providing free emergency medical first response. They have provided critical life-saving care in the wake of devastating disasters in Haiti, Nepal, Houston, Florida, Mumbai, and they are currently on the ground in Ukraine. United Hatzalah’s service is available to all people regardless of race, religion, or national origin. United Hatzalah has more than 6,200 volunteers around the country, available around the clock – 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.

United Hatzalah is currently providing crucial on the ground aid in Ukraine. To donate to United Hatzalah and to support their work in Ukraine, please visit their website: https://israelrescue.org/

AI for the Developing World Apr 15, 2022

Show notes

In this episode, I interview Prateek Joshi, Founder and CEO of Plutoshift. We talk about the importance of local and cultural knowledge in a global tech economy, the ethical obligations of technological producers in the West to technological development in developing countries, and how AI transforming the landscape of the developing world.

Prateek Joshi is the Founder and CEO of Plutoshift, a company that leverages AI to create sustainable, and life-saving, technologies that help meet basic needs in developing countries. He is the author of 13 books on ML, including a #1 Best Seller, and the host of the Infinite Machine Learning podcast He has been featured on Forbes, Fortune, CNBC, TechCrunch, and Bloomberg, and he publishes a tech blog with readership in 200+ countries.

The Opportunity Trap: tech’s visa problem Apr 08, 2022

Show notes

In this episode, Dr. Pallavi Banerjee joins me to talk about her new book, The Opportunity Trap: High-Skilled Workers, Indian Families and the Failures of Dependent-Visa Program. We talk about the role of immigrants in American tech culture, the challenges that immigrants coming to the U.S. to work face in the immigration process, and the need to think about what "tech" is, beyond our just technological products.

Dr. Pallavi Banerjee is a Professor of Sociology at the University of Calgary. Her research interests lie at the intersections of sociology of families, immigration, labour, gender, transnationalism and critical feminist theories. Her new book looks at the experience of Indian immigrants coming to the U.S. to work in the tech sector through the American visa program, and the problems with an immigration system that offers opportunities for immigrants, while often simultaneously wreaking havoc on their lives and families.

Market Values: Dr. Steven Kelts on corporate ethics in the tech industry Apr 01, 2022

Show notes

We are back, with another season of “Technically Human.”

For our first episode of the season, we're bringing you a conversation with Dr. Steven Kelts. We talk about corporate ethics, we debate the role of values in tech culture, and Steven plays "optimistic cop" to my "cynical cop," to argue that he's hopeful for, and excited about, the future of ethics in tech culture.

Steven Kelts is a political theorist and long-time ethics educator, and a Lecturer at Princeton University, in the Politics Department and at the University Center for Human Values.

His current research is on the history and uses of market ideas, including theories of the firm and corporate organization. In addition to ongoing writing projects, Dr. Kelts consults in the private sector with companies looking to align their market value with their ethical values, working to develop frameworks to help employees navigate ethical pitfalls in their organizational culture.

This episode was produced by Deb Donig and Sakina Nuruddin.

Art by Desi Aleman.

Body Snatchers: Manjula Padmanabhan discusses the drama of technology and the black market of organ harvesting Mar 11, 2022

Show notes

Today’s episode is the final episode of our season. The episode features a very special conversation, one that I have wanted to have since I started the show two years ago. In the episode, I sit down with Manjula Padmanabhan. We talk about her play, Harvest, and the connection between market demand in the West and body supply in the global South, and we discuss the relationship between organ donation, as a technology, and human rights, as a philosophy. And Manjula explains why science fiction matters for our ability to understand, and to create, what it means to be human.

Manjula Padmanabhan is an author, playwright, artist and cartoonist. She grew up in Europe and South Asia, returning to India as a teenager. Her play Harvest won the Onassis Award for Theatre, in 1997, in Greece. Her books include Getting There, Escape, and The Island of Lost Girls. She has illustrated over twenty children’s books including I Am Different and Shrinking Vanita. She lives in the US, with a home in New Delhi.

This episode concludes the 7th season of "Technically Human." We’ll be back at the beginning of April, with more episodes of the show.

One important note: our producer, Matt Perry, who has been with the show since its early days, is moving on to pursue some dreams. Matt's work, his brilliance, and his vision has helped to build the show to what it is today. Thank you, Matt!

To our listeners, thanks for listening, and we will see you in April with more episodes of Technically Human.

This episode was produced by Matt Perry and Sakina Nuruddin.

Art by Desi Aleman.

Word Processing: how tech transforms translation Mar 04, 2022

Show notes

In this episode, I chat with Christopher Willis, the Chief Marketing Officer of Acrolinx. We discuss how our digital and globally connected world is posing new challenges for—and new ways of thinking about or solving—how we talk to one another across cultures, across language barriers, across national boundaries, and we talk about just how human language is, in an age where AI can do a lot of the talking.

Christopher Willis is the Chief Marketing Officer of Acrolinx, an industry pioneer that is changing how we think about language across borders, cultures, and national boundaries. We talk about how tech is transforming translation, and just how human language is, in an age where AI can do a lot of the talking. Chris is widely recognized for his public speaking, his innovation, and his ability to build success from the ground up. His work focuses on centering tech around human values and foregrounding inclusive language practices in technology and translation.

This episode was produced by Matt Perry.

Art by Desi Aleman.

The Next Generation of AI Feb 25, 2022

Show notes

In this episode of “Technically Human,” I sit down with Dr. Eric Daimler. We talk about one of the biggest technology problems facing us today—data deluge—and how new computational models and theories can help solve it and, Dr. Daimler weighs in on the gaps, differences, and possibilities for collaboration between policy, industry, and academia. And we talk about what a vision of “AI for Good” might look like in a world of increasingly infinite data.

Dr. Eric Daimler is a leading authority in robotics and artificial intelligence with over 20 years of experience as an entrepreneur, investor, technologist, and policymaker. He served under the Obama Administration as a Presidential Innovation Fellow for AI and Robotics in the Executive Office of President, as the sole authority driving the agenda for U.S. leadership in research, commercialization, and public adoption of AI & Robotics.

Dr. Daimler has incubated, built and led several technology companies recognized as pioneers in their fields ranging from software systems to statistical arbitrage. His newest venture, Conexus, is a groundbreaking solution for what is perhaps today's biggest information technology problem — data deluge.

As founder and CEO of Conexus, Dr. Daimler is leading the development of CQL, a patent-pending platform founded upon category theory — a revolution in mathematics — to help companies manage the overwhelming and rapidly growing challenge of data integration and migration.

His academic research has been at the intersection of AI, Computational Linguistics, and Network Science (Graph Theory). His work has expanding to include economics and public policy. He served as Assistant Professor and Assistant Dean at Carnegie Mellon's School of Computer Science where he founded the university's Entrepreneurial Management program and helped to launch Carnegie Mellon's Silicon Valley Campus. He has studied at the University of Washington-Seattle, Stanford University, and Carnegie Mellon University, where he earned his Ph.D. in Computer Science.

Dr. Daimler’s extensive career spanning business, academics and policy give him a rare perspective on the next generation of AI. Dr. Daimler sees clearly how information technology can dramatically improve our world. However, it demands our engagement. Neither a utopia nor dystopia is inevitable. What matters is how we shape and react to, its development.

This episode was produced by Matt Perry.

Our head of reseaarch is Sakina Nuruddin.

Art by Desi Aleman.

Creative (R)evolution: PJ Manney and science fiction for good Feb 18, 2022

Show notes

In this episode, I sit down with science fiction writer, essayist, innovator, and cultural icon PJ Manney. We talk about the relationship between literature and empathy, the feedback loops between science fiction imagining and technological production, and how art is, and always has been, a technology.

PJ Manney is the author of the bestselling and Philip K. Dick Award-nominated science fiction technothriller, (R)EVOLUTION (2015), published by 47North in the Phoenix Horizon trilogy with, (ID)ENTITY (2017), and (CON)SCIENCE, (2021). Set as alternate, future American histories, the novels chart the influence of world-changing technologies on power and nations.

A former chairperson of Humanity Plus, she helped rebrand the organization, launch H+ Magazine and organize the first multi-org conference on futurist topics, Convergence ’08. She authored "Yucky Gets Yummy: How Speculative Fiction Creates Society" and "Empathy in the Time of Technology: How Storytelling is the Key to Empathy," foundational works on the neuropsychology of empathy and media.

Manney presented her ideas to National Geographic, the Producers Guild of America, Directors Guild of America, NASA-JPL, M.I.T., Huffington Post, The H+ Summit, and the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies, She is also a frequent guest on podcasts and webshows, and is widely published in as a public thinker and critic. Manney consults for varied organizations about the future of humanity and technology, including artificial intelligence, robotics, cyborgs, nanotechnology, biotechnology, brain-computer interfaces, space, blockchains and cryptocurrencies.
Manney worked for over 25 years in film/TV: motion picture PR at Walt Disney/Touchstone Pictures; story development for independent film production companies; and writing as Patricia Manney for the critically acclaimed hit TV shows Hercules — The Legendary Journeys and Xena: Warrior Princess. She also co-founded Uncharted Entertainment, writing and/or creating many pilot scripts for television networks, including CBS, Fox, UPN, Discovery, ABC Family and Comedy Central.

This episode was produced by Matt Perry.

Our Head of Research is Sakina Nuruddin.

Art by Desi Aleman.

Running Interference: will democracy survive foreign cyber attacks? Feb 11, 2022

Show notes

For the final episode of our 3 part series on democracy and technology, I am bringing you a conversation with Professor Chimène Keitner on cyber interference in democratic elections, and international law. We talk about the challenges and shortcomings of international legal structures in recognizing and responding to cyber interference in democratic processes, we discuss the way that democracies are made vulnerable by digital products, and Chimène explains what happened in the infamous Russian interference into 2016 election--and what might be in store for our democratic process as we approach the deeply consequential 2024 US Presidential election.

Professor Chimène Keitner is the Alfred and Hanna Fromm Professor of International Law at UC Hastings, where she teaches courses on International Law; on Democracy, Technology and Security; and on legal approaches to Evidence, among many other topics. She is a leading authority on international law and civil litigation, and served as the 27th Counselor on International Law in the U.S. Department of State. She holds a bachelor’s degree in history and literature with high honors from Harvard, a JD from Yale, where she was a Paul & Daisy Soros Fellow, and a doctorate in international relations from Oxford, where she was a Rhodes Scholar.

She has authored two books and dozens of articles, essays, and book chapters on questions surrounding the relationship among law, communities, and borders, including issues of jurisdiction, extraterritoriality, foreign sovereign and foreign official immunity, and the historical understandings underpinning current practice in these areas.

Professor Keitner has served on the Executive Council of the American Society of International Law and as Co-Chair of the ASIL International Law in Domestic Courts Interest Group. She is a member of the American Law Institute and an Adviser on the ALI’s Fourth Restatement of the Foreign Relations Law of the United States. She is also a founding co-chair of the International Law Association’s Study Group on Individual Responsibility in International Law., and a member of the state department’s advisory committee on international law.

This episode was produced by Matt Perry.

Our head of research is Sakina Nuruddin.

Art by Desi Aleman.

The Private Square: democracy and the attention economy Feb 04, 2022

Show notes

This week, we are continuing our series on the theme of democracy and technology by bringing you a conversation with Ram Fish, on the impact of social media on democratic institutions and civil discourse. We talk about the existential threat that social media poses to democratic norms, the erosion of civil discourse in the attention economy, and where else in the world we might look for hope in leading us out of democratic decline. And, finally--because we don't like leaving our audience with a doomsday prophecy--Ram proposes policies that might productively change the tide of partisan politics on social media platforms.

Ram Fish is the CEO of 19Labs. Throughout his career in Apple, Samsung, Nokia, as well as Co-Founder CEO of three startups, he specializes in leading interdisciplinary special consumer projects, bridging technology, consumer needs, and business & regulatory constraints.

Mr. Fish has an MBA from Yale University as well as Computer Engineering Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from Case Western Reserve University, where he is also a lecturer in Technology Management.

He has authored many articles on the topic of democracy, ethics, and technology, including, most recently “Twitter fact-checking Trump: Good intentions. Wrong approach. And a proposal for how to do it right,” and "Four proposals to neutralize social media’s threat to democracies," co-authored with Professor Chimène Keitner.

This episode was produced by Matt Perry.

Art by Desi Aleman.

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