Technology companies are racing to develop artificial general intelligence – systems that can learn, respond and apply knowledge at levels comparable to humans in most domains – or even superintelligence, systems that far exceed human capabilities in a wide range of tasks. They hope these systems will offer immense potential to solve human health problems, solve enduring social issues or relieve human workers of mundane tasks. AI experts surveyed estimated that artificial general intelligence (AGI) or superintelligence is likely to be reality within .

Yampolskiy has concerns about this powerful technology, however. His research indicates that these systems cannot be controlled, leaving a high probability that a superintelligent AI system could do immense harm to its human creators, whether of its own volition, through a coding mistake or under malicious direction. It might develop a pathogen that could wipe out the human population or launch a nuclear war, for example. Without a mechanism to control these systems, Yampolskiy believes AI has a for the human race. For this reason, he strongly advocates that development of the technology should be slowed or suspended until AI safety can be assured and controls established.

Yampolskiy recently published a book, “,” in which he explains why he believes it is unlikely we will be able to control such systems.

UofL News sat down with Yampolskiy to learn more about his concerns and what might prevent an AI catastrophe.

UofL News: What led you to research AI safety?

Roman Yampolskiy: My PhD [2008] was on security for online poker. At the time, bots were a common nuisance for online casinos, so I developed some algorithms to detect bots to prevent them from participating. But then I realized, they are only going to get better. They are going to get much more capable, and this area will be very important once we start seeing real progress in AI.

We were looking at things 12 or 13 years ago that people are just now proposing. It was science fiction at the time. There was no funding, no journals and no conferences on this stuff.

UofL News: What are your concerns with the development of advanced AI?

�۲�����DZ����쾱��:��Historically, AI was a tool, like any other technology. Whether it was good or bad was up to the user of that tool. You can use a hammer to build a house or kill someone. The hammer is not in any way making decisions about it.

With advanced AI, we are switching the paradigm from tools to agents. The software becomes capable of making its own decisions, working independently, learning, self-improving, modifying. How do we stay in control? How do we make sure the tool doesn’t become an agent that does something we don’t agree with or don’t support? Maybe something against us. Maybe something we cannot undo because it is so impactful in the world, controlling nuclear plants, space flight or military applications. Once you deploy those systems, there is no undoing that. How will we guarantee that no matter how capable those systems become, how independent, we still have a say in what happens to us and for us?

I don’t think it’s possible to indefinitely control superintelligence. By definition, it’s smarter than you. It learns faster, it acts faster, it will change faster. You will have malevolent actors modifying it. We have no precedent of lower capability agents indefinitely staying in charge of more capable agents.

Until some company or scientist says ‘Here’s the proof! We can definitely have a safety mechanism that can scale to any level of intelligence,’ I don’t think we should be developing those general superintelligences.

We can get most of the benefits we want from narrow AI, systems designed for specific tasks: develop a drug, drive a car. They don’t have to be smarter than the smartest of us combined.

UofL News: What harmful outcomes could result from artificial general superintelligence?

�۲�����DZ����쾱��:��There are three different types of risks. One type is existential risk where everyone dies.

Somewhat worse is suffering risks where everyone wishes they were dead.

Somewhat “nicer” is risk – where you have no meaning. You have nothing to contribute to superintelligence: you are not a better mathematician, not a better philosopher, not a better poet. Your life is kind of pointless. For many people, their creative output is the meaning they derive in this world. So, we will have a strong paradigm shift in terms of leisure time and society as a whole. That is the best outcome of three.

UofL News: What is the best-case scenario?

�۲�����DZ����쾱��:��I’m wrong! I’m completely wrong. It’s actually possible to control it, we figure it out in time and we have this utopia-like future where the biggest problem is figuring out what to do with all our wealth and health and spare time.

UofL News: Do a lot of other AI experts agree that action is needed?

�۲�����DZ����쾱��:��We had signed by thousands of scientists saying we think this is as dangerous as nuclear weapons and we need to have government regulation. And not just quantity but quality – top scientists, Nobel prize winners – all coming on board agreeing with our message and have signed a should be a global priority.

UofL News: What should we do to prevent these negative outcomes?

�۲�����DZ����쾱��:��There is a lot of research on some aspects of impossibility results – showing that it is impossible to explain, predict and control the systems. There is a lot of research in trying to understand how large neural networks function. I support it fully; there should be more of that.

As individuals, you can vote for politicians who are knowledgeable about such things. We can have more scientists and engineers in office.

If you don’t engage with this technology, you don’t provide free training and labelling data for it. If you don’t pay subscription services, you don’t give them money to buy more compute. They are less likely to be able to raise funding as quickly. You are buying us time. If you insist on pointless government red tape and regulation, it slows them down. It takes money from their computing budget into the legal budget. Now they have to deal with this meaningless government regulation, which is usually undesirable, but here I strongly encourage it.

UofL News: What do you think about instructors and students using ChatGPT, Bing or other generative AI technologies?

�۲�����DZ����쾱��:��Previous answer notwithstanding, if you don’t embrace the use of existing generative AI, you are going to be obsolete. You are competing with people who do have knowledge and ability to use those tools and you will not be competitive, so you really have no choice. You can be Amish-like, but that’s not what college is all about.

UofL News: What are you working on now to improve AI safety and make it possible to control these systems?

�۲�����DZ����쾱��:��Continuing with impossibility results. We have many tools we would need to try to control the systems, so understanding what tools would be accessible to us is what we hope for. I am trying to understand even in theory to what degree each tool is accessible. We worry about testing, for example. Can you successfully test general intelligence?

UofL News: What else should people know about the issue of uncontrollable artificial intelligence?

�۲�����DZ����쾱��:��We haven’t lost until we have lost. We still have a great chance to do it right and we can have a great future. We can use narrow AI tools to cure aging, an important problem and I think we are close on that front. Free labor, physical and cognitive, will give us a lot of economic wealth to do better in many areas of society which we are struggling with today.

People should try to understand the unpredictable consequences and existential risks of bringing AGI or superintelligent AI into the real world. Eight billion people are part of this experiment they never consented to – not just that they have not consented, they cannot give meaningful consent because nobody understands what they are consenting to. It’s not explainable, it’s not predictable, so by definition, it’s an unethical experiment on all of us.

So, we should put some pressure on people who are irresponsibly moving too quickly on AI capabilities development to slow down, to stop, to look in the other direction, to allow us to only develop AI systems we will not regret creating.

A $750,000 grant from the American Heart Association will allow researchers to advance AI specifically for acute kidney injury and complications during or following cardiac surgery.

Acute kidney injury can result in increased mortality or persistent kidney dysfunction and, because it has a wide variety of contributing factors from patient-specific conditions to procedure complexity, this issue can be difficult for physicians to predict and prevent.

The project is a joint effort between UofL researchers from the , , the , and researchers at , and .

The team will innovate machine-learning AI models to analyze detailed, clinical patient data and develop a personalized risk prediction and decision-making process for managing kidney injury in heart surgery patients. They then will validate the process using independent databases and clinical trials at UofL Health.

UofL’s Jiapeng Huang, professor and vice chair of the anesthesiology and perioperative medicine department, is principal investigator for the project. As a cardiac anesthesiologist at UofL Health, he also sees numerous patients who deal with acute kidney injury.

“Our goal is to use AI and machine learning methodology to do two things. One, to predict in real time when the patient might develop acute kidney injury or if the patient will be at risk for acute kidney injury,” he said. “The second thing is to develop a clinical decision-support system to help the clinicians do the right thing for the patients at the right time to reduce chance of acute kidney injury after heart surgery.”

While Huang and UofL faculty member Bert Little focus on the clinical procedures and decision-making process, Lihui Bai, professor of industrial engineering at the Speed School, Xiaoyu Chen, assistant professor of industrial and systems engineering at SUNY Buffalo and George (Guanghui) Lan, professor of industrial and systems engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology, will work with a team of engineers to build the AI technology. The tech will allow physicians to use patients’ clinical information before, during and after surgery to inform physicians of the best sequence of treatment for patients to reduce the chance of kidney injury after heart surgery.

For the last 10 years, AI has been used in the medical field to analyze large health care data. AI can more easily recognize patterns than the human eye or brain, according to Huang, and can be a significant benefit to patient outcomes.

“This is one of those research (projects) that will benefit patients directly,” he said “Acute kidney injury happens in about 25% of patients after cardiac surgery. This study aims to protect patients from acute kidney injury after heart surgery.”

The three-year project, which is currently in phase 1, began in July 2023. During this early phase, the team is establishing the database and prediction model. In year three, clinical trials conducted at UofL Health will be used to determine whether the predictive modeling and clinical decision support system will reduce the rate of acute kidney injury after cardiac surgery.

UofL Health is an excellent partner for this project as it is one of the premier cardiac programs in the nation, according to Huang. It was responsible for the first heart transplant in the state of Kentucky, as well as many innovations in artificial heart pumps. UofL Health cardiovascular surgeon Siddharth Pahwa and cardiologist Dinesh Kalra, for example, are involved in other studies, including cardiac imaging and data collection in addition to patient care.

“UofL Health always focuses on improving patient safety and outcomes,” Huang said. “UofL faculty and researchers are perfect partners to perform clinical studies to advance our knowledge and benefit our patients at UofL Health.”

, assistant professor of law at UofL’s��, has won a teaching grant from the����to develop a toolkit that law professors anywhere can use to incorporate generative artificial intelligence (genAI) into their legal writing curricula.

GenAI is technology that can create text, images, videos and other media in response to prompts inputted by a user – otherwise known as a human being. Of the various types of genAI software currently available, ChatGPT is probably the best known.

Over the next year, Tanner and her team will design, develop and test resources that will become open-source materials for use in teaching legal writing and other law subjects. As the word infers, “open-source” means the materials will be open to anyone, free of charge.

Tanner wants the legal community – particularly those, like her, who teach legal writing – to accept that genAI is becoming part of the teaching environment, and having resources that enable an instructor to use it is key to making it work effectively in the classroom.

“Generative AI will change the way we teach. Some professors worry that a sea change is on the horizon – that we will not be able to assess student learning the way we did pre-ChatGPT,” she said. “Undoubtedly, we will have to adapt. And though generative AI will challenge the way we teach, there is also significant potential for innovation.”

The toolkit will help curious teachers without much prior preparation in genAI to develop knowledge and skills that will help them to embrace it in a way that enhances rather than deteriorates their sense of competency.��“A law professor who teaches legal writing will be able to use the toolkit to continue developing their teaching identity rather than be threatened by the increased tempo of technological change,” Tanner said.

“We intend to show instructors how to frame teaching objectives that either work around or embrace generative AI, giving them a framework that is adaptable to evolving technologies. We also will provide examples of how to align teaching objectives with student outcomes.”

The toolkit also will enable those who use it to customize their use of genAI. “We do not intend for this to be a prescriptive approach to legal writing instruction nor one-size-fits-all writing assignments. Instead, it will focus on principles that each professor could adapt for their own purposes.”

Working with Tanner on the project are Tracy Norton, professor of law, and William Monroe, assistant director for instructional technology, of the Paul M. Hebert Law Center at Louisiana State University.

The toolkit is expected to launch in fall 2024.

The skills needed by nearly all manufacturers soon will be shaped to some degree by the rapidly accelerating robotics and machine learning revolution, including automation, robotics, additive manufacturing and artificial intelligence. RAMPS will allow UofL’s Louisville Automation and Robotics Research Institute (LARRI) and other centers to purchase additional advanced equipment, such as a robotic quadruped, and introduce future workers to these devices.

“We want to make this technology accessible for people or students who don’t necessarily have the advanced technical skills, but they are enthusiastic,” said Dan Popa, director of LARRI and lead for the RAMPS project. “They want to learn about robotics, AI and additive manufacturing, how they are used in industry and what kind of skills you need to operate this type of equipment.”

Made possible by funding secured by U.S. Rep. John Yarmuth from the U.S. Department of ����ֱ��, RAMPS aims to address workforce needs in the advanced manufacturing industry sector and enhance employment opportunities for underrepresented groups. It will allow LARRI, the Additive Manufacturing Institute of Science and Technology (AMIST) and Micro/Nano Technology Center (MNTC), all based in the at UofL, to obtain additional equipment and pilot programs to increase awareness and access to training in robotic and additive manufacturing technology over the next year.

“I’m so proud to have secured $750,000 in federal funding for UofL’s RAMPS program, which will help students excel in the industries of tomorrow,” Yarmuth said. “Manufacturing is a key sector of our local and state economy, and robotics and automation will have a tremendous impact on how businesses and industries operate moving forward. UofL is a national leader in innovative training programs, and through its RAMPS program, students will have access to the state-of-the-art equipment and training that will best position them to succeed in our rapidly changing workforce.”

“The RAMPS program not only will help fulfill today’s workforce needs of our commonwealth, it also will enhance the University of Louisville’s work in advanced research and education in robotics and additive manufacturing,” said UofL Interim President Lori Stewart Gonzalez. “We are extremely grateful to Congressman Yarmuth for his support in helping us obtain this funding.”

Using existing and new equipment and leveraging the knowledge and skills present in the UofL facilities, RAMPS leaders will introduce K-12 students, high school graduates and university students to robotics and additive manufacturing and help train them to use these advanced technologies in the workplace.

“The goal of this program is to help future technicians and engineers prepare for employment in additive manufacturing fields that are both high-paying and growing in need. Whether it is a mid-career person looking to transition professions, a currently enrolled college student or someone with no post-high school education, we will be delivering workforce training tailored to an individual’s starting education and skills level,” said Thomas Berfield, co-director of AMIST.

Berfield anticipates that AMIST will add equipment used in the aerospace, automotive, dental and biomedical industries, among others.

Workers at Kentucky’s multiple manufacturing facilities are expected to be disproportionately affected by the shift toward automation, making programs like RAMPS essential to advance employment opportunities in the commonwealth.

“While it is true that automation is expected to displace workers in manufacturing, the adoption of robot technology actually predicts wage growth as those positions are replaced with higher skilled workers in high-tech positions needed to interface with the robots,” Popa said.

RAMPS leaders expect around 200 students will be exposed to these technologies in the first year as part of pilot projects, followed by more robust and formalized workforce training programs and curricula to be developed in future years.

In addition to training workers, RAMPS will elevate UofL’s programs at LARRI, AMIST and MNTC by further improving the high-quality learning environment within these centers, attracting highly qualified faculty and talented students and increasing opportunities for additional funding.

Since the opening of LARRI’s dedicated robotics lab on the UofL campus in October, it has hosted more than 400 K-12 and college students, industry professionals and researchers to learn about existing and potential uses of robots, drones and other technology.

“The research we do here at UofL has real impact in engineering a future technology-driven economy in Kentucky and beyond,” said Kevin Gardner, UofL’s executive vice president for research and innovation. “We are grateful to Congressman Yarmuth for securing this funding to expand that impact and support our work to build the next generation of robotics technologies and professionals.”

UofL is one of seven Microsoft Academic Research Consultants, or MARCs, that will study how researchers might leverage the technology to, for example, sift through large data sets and glean insights. The idea is to understand needs and develop next-generation tools and training that could generate more groundbreaking research here and around the world.��

“UofL is home to a rich pool of top researchers in high-tech, cutting-edge fields,” said Sharon Kerrick, an assistant vice president at UofL and head of the , which will lead the on-campus Microsoft effort. “We at the DTC are proud to be among the other top schools to partner with Microsoft to enable groundbreaking research that’s engineering our future economy.”����

The other MARC schools are Duke University, the University of Rochester, the University of Central Florida, the University of South Florida, Texas A&M, Oregon State University and Washington University – St. Louis. The MARCs will serve as liaisons between Microsoft and researchers, seeking to better understand how AI is being and could be used.����

UofL has significant earned expertise in this kind of tech-enabled education and research; some researchers are already using computing, big data and artificial intelligence to screen potential drugs and compounds against and , to analyze medical images and more.����

UofL also was recently selected by the U.S. Department of Defense to work on research and education to strengthen the country’s cyber defenses. UofL was the only school selected from Kentucky for both networks and one of only a handful to hold the competitive Research-1 classification from the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher ����ֱ��. ��UofL also recently received significant funding to develop cybersecurity education and conduct cutting-edge biometrics research.����

“UofL has a strong record of researching the digital frontier, artificial intelligence and other technologies,” said Kerrick. “Through this new partnership with Microsoft, we hope to find new ways leverage those same technologies to benefit researchers.” ��

The competitive federal grant was announced by U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a UofL grad.��

​The UofL Modern Apprenticeship Pathways to Success (MAPS) program is funded through the DoL’s “” initiative. UofL was one of just 28 public-private partnerships funded under this federal program in its most recent round, and is the only one in Kentucky.

​Through MAPS, UofL will create apprenticeships that connect what students learn in class with their eventual careers. The apprenticeships will also give them field experience with disruptive, cutting-edge technologies that can change how work is done.

​“At UofL, we recognize that many people entering such industries as advanced manufacturing, healthcare and information technology require new skill sets or retraining in order to be successful,” said UofL President Neeli Bendapudi. “The apprenticeships created by the university and its private-sector partners through this grant program will help to form the workforce of the future.” ​

UofL will also work with three academic partners — Webster University, Jefferson Community and Technical College and Elizabethtown Community and Technical College. These institutions will help MAPS create transfer opportunities for associate’s degree holders who want to earn a bachelor’s degree, and connect with underrepresented minority students and those who are, have been or depend on a member of the military. ​

Principal investigator Dr. Jeffrey Sun, of the UofL College of ����ֱ�� and Human Development (CEHD), said preparing students for high-skilled jobs is especially important now, at a time when the world of work is increasingly disrupted and evolving due to technologies like artificial intelligence and automation. ​

According to a from the Brookings Institute, automation will be most disruptive in the Heartland, and especially in Kentucky and Indiana. In the Louisville Metropolitan Statistical Area alone, the report says some 670,000 jobs are susceptible. ​

But while automation may replace some jobs, some reports show it creates others — ones companies can’t seem to fill due to the skills gap. According to a from Deloitte, advanced technologies in the manufacturing industry will cause an estimated 2.4 million positions to go unfilled between 2018 and 2028.

​“The workforce in the Heartland is underemployed, mostly due to manufacturing layoffs and the unpreparedness of workers for higher-skilled jobs,” said Sun, associate dean for Innovation and Strategic Partnerships at the CEHD. “We want our students at UofL to be prepared when new technologies, such as robotics and AI, alter our work or the market shifts, perhaps from 3D printing, change our business model.”

“By equipping job seekers with the training they need for good, 21st-century jobs, we can help close the skills gap and build upon Kentucky’s growing economy,”��McConnell said in a release.��“I applaud President Trump for his administration’s focus on apprenticeship programs, and I’m proud to work with him to promote investment in the future of Kentucky’s workers and their families. As Senate Majority Leader, I’m in a better position than ever to deliver for Kentucky communities, and I was proud to partner with UofL to give Kentucky workers every opportunity to succeed.”

Film director Roderick Coover teamed up with ,��composer and UofL assistant professor of composition,��to create a surreal musical, virtual reality romp across time and space that’s been adapted to project onto the dome in the .

“The idea is the viewer is going to lose himself in the project,” Wołek said.

He and 167 other inventors from institutions around the world will be formally recognized as 2019 NAI Fellows at a ceremony in Phoenix, Arizona, in April 2020, according to a .

“It is a great honor for me to be one of the NAI fellows,” said El-Baz, a UofL J.B. Speed School of Engineering alum and chair of bioengineering.

At UofL, El-Baz works at the intersection of computer science and medicine. Many of his inventions use artificial intelligence to analyze medical images, allowing them to very accurately diagnose everything from ��to to .

El-Baz is the sixth UofL inventor to be inducted into the NAI, following Suzanne Ildstad and Kevin Walsh (2014); William Pierce (2015); Paula Bates (2016); and most recently, Robert S. Keynton (2017).

“We’re very proud of Ayman, and all past UofL inductees, for this huge accomplishment and all the hard work behind it,” said Allen Morris, executive director of the . His office works with UofL researchers, like , to commercialize their inventions.��

“This kind of honor shows our university’s commitment to and leadership in research, invention and technology commercialization,” he said. “These inventions have the power to change and improve the way we work and live.”

Aside from the EPI-Center, El-Baz has also worked with other UofL programs for technology development and commercialization. He was the first researcher to hit a “trifecta” with UofL’s suite of��, having earned entry into the UofL Coulter Translational Partnership, NSF I-Corps and NSF AWARE:ACCESS programs.

“These crucial support mechanisms have enabled me to develop and translate technologies from ideation to commercialization quickly,” El-Baz said.

To date, El-Baz holds eight patents, five copyrights and has had 11 technologies optioned and two have been licensed to companies for further development and commercialization. Some technologies have also resulted in startup ventures like Autism Diagnostics Technologies Inc., which El-Baz co-founded, creating jobs and economic development.��

NAI fellows hold a collective 41,500 issued U.S. patents, resulting in 11,000 licensed technologies and companies, generating more than 36 million jobs and $1.6 trillion in revenue, according to the release.

“I am so impressed by the caliber of this year’s class of NAI Fellows, all of whom are highly-regarded in their respective fields,” NAI President Paul R. Sanberg said in the release. “The breadth and scope of their discovery is truly staggering. I’m excited not only see their work continue, but also to see their knowledge influence a new era of science, technology, and innovation worldwide.”

Roman Yampolskiy, PhD, associate professor in the Department of Computer Engineering and Computer Science at UofL’s��Speed School of Engineering, will share his insights into the current and future reality of artificial intelligence at the next Beer with a Scientist event, March 15 at 8 p.m. at Against the Grain Brewery, 401 E. Main St.

“Many scientists, futurologists and philosophers have predicted that humanity will achieve a technological breakthrough and create Artificial General Intelligence (AGI), machines that can perform any task as well as a human can,” Yampolskiy said. “It has been suggested that AGI may be a positive or negative factor in all domains, including technology and economy. I will attempt to analyze some likely changes caused by arrival of AGI.”

is interested in AI, AI safety, cybersecurity, digital forensics, pattern recognition and games related to artificial intelligence. He has written a book, “,” that addresses issues related to ensuring this technology remains beneficial to humanity.

A 30-minute presentation will be followed by an informal Q&A session. Admission is free. Purchase of beer, other beverages or menu items is not required but is encouraged.

For more information and to suggest future Beer with a Scientist topics, follow Upcoming dates:�� April 5, May 17, and June 14.