OLLI-SCIE-4039 - From Oppenheimer’s A-Bomb to Artificial Intelligence in a Warming World 

Course Description

How should we deal with the moral issues of new technologies? The award-winning film “Oppenheimer” reminds us of the life-changing questions that arose from the development of the atomic bomb. On the hot afternoon of August 6, 1945, presenter Paul Carr heard on the radio that a single atomic bomb destroyed Hiroshima. He had an intense desire to learn how this was possible. We begin this course by asking registrants to share the events and people that influenced their own lives.  The course then explores how Regenerative AI (Artificial Intelligence), like ChatGPT, works and how AI might be used to slow the rising seas and weather extremes of our warming world. In 2023, U.S. billion-dollar weather disasters increased to the all-time record of 28. Global warming, which began in the 1800s at the beginning of the industrial era, is an unintended consequence of burning fossil fuels to power steam and gasoline engines. As our climate warms, normally-wet areas are getting wetter (floods) and dry regions dryer (droughts).Can AI offer a much-needed solution to this complicated issue?