Uploaded October 2023 | Updated September 2026, 10 hours ago
Artificial intelligence is everywhere these days, from phones to the newsroom…and in the lab. In this masterclass, presented as part of CASW's New Horizons in Science program at ScienceWriters2023, Sayash Kapoor offered a brief primer on the three main types of applied AI--generative, perception, and predictive--and what it can and cannot achieve, especially when used for prediction.
Kapoor, a PhD candidate in the Center for Information Technology Policy at Princeton University, shares his recent research on problems in how scientists and social scientists are applying AI: the phenomenon of “data leakage,” which has led to a reproducibility crisis affecting hundreds of papers across more than a dozen fields. When the leakage problem is addressed, the claimed achievements of predictive AI often disappear. Kapoor shares key tips, developed in cooperation with journalists, for reporters writing about AI. His talk was delivered remotely to a live audience of science writers in Boulder, CO, on Oct. 9.
Artificial intelligence is everywhere these days, from phones to the newsroom…and in the lab. In this masterclass, presented as part of CASW's New Horizons in Science program at ScienceWriters2023, Sayash Kapoor offered a brief primer on the three main types of applied AI--generative, perception, and predictive--and what it can and cannot achieve, especially when used for prediction.
Kapoor, a PhD candidate in the Center for Information Technology Policy at Princeton University, shares his recent research on problems in how scientists and social scientists are applying AI: the phenomenon of “data leakage,” which has led to a reproducibility crisis affecting hundreds of papers across more than a dozen fields. When the leakage problem is addressed, the claimed achievements of predictive AI often disappear. Kapoor shares key tips, developed in cooperation with journalists, for reporters writing about AI. His talk was delivered remotely to a live audience of science writers in Boulder, CO, on Oct. 9.
