Track Introduction by Bernhard Steffen: The Nature of AI-Based Systems - Track Introduction
Keynote by David Harel: Human or Machine: Reflections on Turing-Inspired Testing for the Everyday
Keynote by Edward A. Lee: Deep Neural Networks, Explanations, and Rationality
Keynote by Matthias Fey: Graph Neural Networks: Everything is Connected
We are only at the very beginning of understanding the power and impact of Ecorithms as presented by Leslie Valiant in his book Probably Approximately Correct. They provide a new computational paradigm which is based on learning from observation/examples (rather than on conceptual design) and which Valiant therefore characterizes as theoryless. The power of ecorithms, which largely escape human control, becomes particular apparent with today’s large language models. Valiant recognized the importance of ecorithms very early. In fact, he conjectured already a decade ago that they may even serve as a new paradigm for explaining the process of evolution and, in particular, its short timeframe.
The track The Nature of AI-Based Systems aims at shedding light on what makes AI-based system so special, to reveal their current impact and limitations, and to speculate where all this will lead to.