Lauren Lee McCarthy: Exploring the Human Relationship with AI
Artist and computer scientist Lauren Lee McCarthy has spent days working virtually as a human “Alexa” in strangers’ homes. She’s created a 24-hour machine-driven cocktail party where software controls the actions and conversation of the human host. She’s acted as a real-life “follower” for people curious about what it would be like to have an actual — but hidden — observer.
For McCarthy, there are few things more intriguing than examining how human beings are adapting to the prevalence of artificial intelligence and the surveillance, automation, and algorithmic living it brings to their lives.
“The systems we build — both technical and social — shape the way we live together and relate to each other,” she says. “We tend to think of the apps and tools we use as a neutral presence, but they’re not neutral. There are so many design decisions that go into them based on an assumption of who the user is and what their goals are. These tools are reinforcing and accelerating the world we’re heading toward, and I feel it’s important to question all that.”
McCarthy will be pursuing those questions as the 2022-23 Visiting Artist at the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence. Currently on sabbatical from her position as an associate professor at UCLA Design Media Arts, McCarthy creates performance-based work using installations, video, software, photography, and sculpture to explore the technological and social systems humans simultaneously build for themselves.
This post is an excerpt. Read the full article on the Stanford Hai website. Read more about Lauren Lee McCarthy.
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