Page Comparison

Spring 2024 week

Lecture topics

Discussion section

Assignments (HW) and Readings ( R) 

Readings to be done before Tues of each respective week. HW due on Friday afternoons.

Jan 22

Tues: Course intro and GAI capability demo. 

Types of AI and natural language processing in a broader context. 

Training sets and the introduction of bias. 

Articulation of the perils. 

Example - summarizing uploaded questions from the class, as a basis for large-lecture discussion. Active learning session that invokes Chat-GPT4 

Thurs: active learning session on critical examination of GPT output, initial assessment of validity. 

Evolving authorship and professional ethics. 

Establishing an account, introduction to course framework and collaborative tools. 

Initial in-section active learning exercise. Make predictions and then compare to what it does. 

Play around in sandbox with guided iterative prompts. 

R: Age of AI chap 1 and chap 2 (54 pgs)

HW: Performance comparison of GPT3.5 to GPT4.0

Jan 29

Tues: Training, performance evolution, and projection into the future. Kick-off of a nano-GPT module with a limited training set.

Thurs: Identifying biases, inaccuracies, and exploring limitations 

R: Age of AI chap 3 (~40 pages) 

NYT article on training methods. 

HW: Experiments and evaluations on explicit and implicit bias in NLP results. 

Midway interrogation of nano-GPT system 

Feb 5

Tues: Introduction to simple quantitative data analysis- lab results. 

Thurs: dealing with ill-structured data. 

Analysis and extraction of summary statistics- median, mean, sigma

R: TBD

HW exercise on data interpretation

Final analysis of our GAI-trained model. 

Feb 12 

Tues: Extraction of information from a stack of reference papers

Thurs: Extraction of information from qualitative survey data

Initial look at truth-assessment methods. 

R: TBD

HW:Comparing human and AI-generated text material

Feb 19

Tues: Application to creative writing and assessing AI generated text

Thurs: Analyzing historical texts and data

GAI-assisted writing exercise, in section.

R: TBD

HW: assessing the validity of AI-generated summaries. 

Feb 26
Midpoint assessment of both students and of the course

Tues: in-class written assessment, blue books. 

Thurs: GAI and Harvard College- challenges and opportunities for enhancing student learning. 

Roundtable discussion of academic integrity and AI tools. 

R: TBD

HW; paper 1 on predictions of impact on a sector of human society and suggestions on how to contend with it. 

Mar 4

Tues: Philosophical and ethical aspects of AI in general and GAI in particular.

Thurs: The Turing test, intellectual property, and the rights of AI systems. 

Debate in section about good vs. evil aspect of AI. 

R: Age of Ai chap 6

HW: short paper on ethical aspects 

Mar 11

Spring break

Spring break

none

Mar 18

Papers returned to students Monday Mar 18

Tues: GAI-assisted language learning and translation

Thurs: GAI-assisted generation and debugging of computer code

Break each section into 2 groups, based on interest. Exercises on

R: TBD

HW: project proposals, online grouping into teams

Mar 25

Tues: AI and the nature of work. How might things be different, and how can you best prepare? 

Thurs: guest lecture- GAI and the law

Discussion of project selections, ruberic

R: Age of Ai chap 4 and 7. 

HW: work on revision of paper 1

Apr 1

Tues: guest lecture- GAI and medicine

Thurs: GAI and higher education

R: readings on professional impacts

HW: revisions of paper 1 due

Apr 8

Tues: guest lecture- GAI and democracy 

Thurs: AImisuse and intentional abuse. Implications for regulation, national security, warfare. 

Final project work and assistance

R: Danielle Allen writings on democracy. Also some pessimistic narratives TBD. 

HW: Project outline submitted

Apr 15

Tues: Guarding against GAI hallucination and falsehoods: tools and methods

Thurs:

Final project work and assistance

R: Trustworthy AI references TBD

HW: 

Apr 22

Partial week, classes end. 

Final projects due Monday April 22

Tues: guest lecture from US gov’t on regulatory aspects. 

NA

Final projects due, GAI poster session/fair, and live demos. 

Final exam

In-person, blue books.