Leif Weatherby

Leif Weatherby, an associate professor at NYU and author of Language Machines, dives into the impact of AI on language and culture. He compares poetry to digital processing, revealing how technology reshapes our understanding of language. The conversation explores early AI interactions, emotional connections with chatbots, and critiques current AI as mere 'plausibility engines.' Weatherby also tackles the complex interplay between video game narratives and societal issues while examining AI's potential cognitive trade-offs in creativity and work.

Leif Weatherby, an NYU associate professor and author of *Language Machines*, dives into the exciting intersection of AI and language. He explores how large language models (LLMs) redefine traditional structuralist theories and argue for cultural AI's potential. Leif discusses the poetic functions of language in AI, the ideological implications behind data pretraining, and the uncanny outputs generated by LLMs. He critiques remainder humanism and champions a humanism that acknowledges complexity, highlighting the need for creative adaptation in our automated future.

Leif Weatherby, director and AI/language scholar; Matthew Handelman, mathematician-turned-critic; Alexander Galloway, theorist of computation; Beatrice Fazi, philosopher of technology. They debate whether digitality is a foundational mode of thought, trace its history from arithmetic to floating point, and rethink abstraction, representation, and dialectics in relation to continuity and theory.

Celine Nguyen, an insightful cultural commentator, and Leif Weatherby, a leading voice in digital theory, tackle the decline of reading in the age of AI. They discuss generational shifts in attention and the resurgence of long-form literature amidst modern distractions. Leif delves into the complex interplay between literacy and media, while Celine highlights how online communities foster self-education. The duo also debates the cultural implications of AI authorship, emphasizing the need for deeper engagement with literature in a rapidly changing media landscape.

Leif Weatherby, scholar linking Romanticism to digital architectures; Matthew Handelman, philosopher of quantitative thought; M. Beatrice Fazi, philosopher who locates the digital in discretization called the cut; Alexander R. Galloway, media theorist of networks and computation. They debate the digital as discrete mediation, the cut versus computation, historical roots of digital representation, and whether analog philosophy can account for computation.