As UNESCO—the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization—has recently noted, “new AI applications have the power to subtly shape the perceptions of millions of people, so even small gender biases in their content can significantly amplify inequalities in the real world.”

The Harvard Radcliffe Institute conference will explore present and future challenges and opportunities posed by the intersections of gender and artificial intelligence (AI). Leading computer scientists, engineers, policy makers, ethicists, artists, and representatives from the private sector will investigate how gender may affect—positively and negatively—the creation, operation, and impact of cutting-edge technologies using AI.

In this interdisciplinary program, participants will examine how we might address gender inequities in AI, “data feminism,” fairness-based applications of AI, the role of public policy in AI’s shifting landscape, as well as ways even to find beauty.

This event is cosponsored by the Women and Public Policy Program at Harvard Kennedy School.

Harvard Radcliffe Institute gratefully acknowledges the Perrin Moorhead Grayson and Bruns Grayson Dean's Leadership Fund for Academic Ventures, which is supporting this event.

Speakers

Participants will include:

• Regina Barzilay, School of Engineering Distinguished Professor for AI and Health and AI faculty lead, Jameel Clinic, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• Ana Cristina Bicharra Garcia, permanent professor, Department of Applied Computing, Universidade Federal do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (UNIRIO) (Brazil)
• Iris Bohnet, director of the social sciences program, Harvard Radcliffe Institute; Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government and codirector of the Women and Public Policy Program, Harvard Kennedy School
• Tomiko Brown-Nagin, dean, Harvard Radcliffe Institute; Daniel P.S. Paul Professor of Constitutional Law, Harvard Law School; professor of history, Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences
• Rumman Chowdhury, CEO and cofounder, Humane Intelligence; former United States Science Envoy for Artificial Intelligence; Responsible AI Fellow, Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University
• Catherine D'Ignazio, associate professor of urban science and planning, Department of Urban Studies and Planning, and director, Data + Feminism Lab, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• Finale Doshi-Velez, Herchel Smith Professor of Computer Science, Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences
• Sharad Goel, professor of public policy, Harvard Kennedy School
• Rembrand M. Koning, Mary V. and Mark A. Stevens Associate Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School
• Margaret Mitchell, chief ethics scientist and researcher, Hugging Face
• Frida Polli, founder, pymetrics; visiting innovation scholar, Schwarzman College of Computing, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• Anna Ridler, artist
• Megan Smith, Walter Shorenstein Media and Democracy Fellow, Shorenstein on Media, Politics and Public Policy, Harvard Kennedy School; CEO and founder, shift7; former US chief technology officer and assistant to the President
• Jamila Smith-Loud, research manager, Responsible AI, Google
• Fernanda Viégas, Sally Starling Seaver Professor, Harvard Radcliffe Institute; Gordon McKay Professor of Computer Science, Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences
• Sandra Wachter, professor of technology and regulation, Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford (United Kingdom)