Hello everyone! Welcome to the AI Skeptics Reading Group. We're reading The AI Con by Dr. Alex Hanna & Dr. Emily M. Bender.

Format(s)

There are a few ways to participate and get involved:

• this newsletter: obviously you'll get emails if you subscribe. I'll send emails on Mondays
• video chats: on Thursdays at 8pm ET we'll recap the reading for that week and chat about it (and readings from that week)
• signal group chat for people who would like to chat about the content from this week's readings over text, or who can't participate in video chats
• social media: I'm on twitter/x, bluesky, mastodon, etc... and I'll post about reading group stuff sometimes.

Schedule

Let's read Chapter 2: "It's Alive! The Hype of Thinking Machines".

If you're looking ahead, our schedule looks like this:

• October 20: Chapter 2 ("It's Alive! The Hype of Thinking Machines")
• October 27: Chapter 3 ("Leisure for Me, Gig Work for Thee: AI Hype at Work")
• November 3: Chapter 4 ("If It Quacks Like a Doc: AI Hype and Social Services")
• November 10: Chapter 5 ("Artifice or Intelligence? AI Hype in Art, Journalism, and Science")
• November 17: Chapter 6 ("I'm Sorry, Dave, I'm Afraid I Can't Do That: AI Doomers, AI Boosters, and Why None of That Makes Sense")
• November 24: Chapter 7 ("Do You Believe in Hope After Hype?")

I have slides and stuff from last week's video chat, but I didn't think of the slides or the talk as anything that people would want to revisit. Was that the wrong call? Is anyone desperate for the video of my summary last week? Let me know if there's demand and I'll figure something out.

Okay, that's all for now; hope to chat on signal, or see you on Thursday!