Women talkin' 'bout AI Living in Aporia: How to Lead When You Can't Know What's Real | Rebecca Bultsma
Jessica and Kimberly sit down with Rebecca Bultsma, an AI ethics researcher completing her dissertation in Data and AI Ethics at the University of Edinburgh, keynote speaker, and Chief Innovation Officer with a background in communication strategy and leadership consulting.
They invited Rebecca to dig into one of the most unsettling questions of this moment: how do we make decisions when we can never be certain what is real? From deepfake videos circulating in school districts to voice cloning in courtrooms, Rebecca's research follows leaders into the places where the old rules no longer apply and asks what they are actually drawing on when the evidence itself cannot be trusted. She shares the concept of aporia, that frustrated, in-between state of not knowing, and makes the case that sitting with uncertainty is not a weakness. It is where real learning begins.
Topics Covered
- What aporia is and why it might be the most honest description of how we all feel about AI right now
- How K-12 leaders are making high-stakes decisions when video evidence can no longer be verified
- Why AI detection tools are failing students, teachers, and the humans tasked with enforcing academic integrity
- The gap between how fast deepfake technology is developing and how fast detection can keep up
- What watermarking can and cannot do, and how easy it is to work around
- Why Rebecca thinks we are heading back toward a more oral society
- Prompt baiting, AI burnout, and the research emerging around cognitive overload
- Using AI as an accountability partner rather than a ghostwriter
- What kids are seeing on social media that adults are missing
Referenced in This Episode
- rebeccabultsma.com
- Forbes: "AI Ethicist Explains How to Humanize AI in the Care Economy" (March 2026)
- The Brookings Institute report on AI and student expectations
- Dr. Rachel Wood on AI and human relationships
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