The Rise of the Machines
Professor of Sociology Karla Erickson explores artificial intelligence in her research and teaching and involves students throughout.
I/Robot. If you鈥檙e a science fiction fan, that title probably reminds you of author Isaac Asimov and his Three Laws of Robotics.
In this case, I/Robot is the name of a 2-credit, special topic, short course offered in spring 2021.
Its central question: How will/have our relationships to machines change our relationship to other humans?
To say that 乐播传媒入口 students eagerly signed up for it is putting it mildly. There was space for 30 students 鈥 60 signed up and 20 more tried to get in.
鈥淭hat was pretty wild,鈥 says Karla Erickson, professor of sociology. 鈥淚 didn鈥檛 expect that level of student enthusiasm.鈥 This introductory course is based on her ongoing research in artificial intelligence.
Erickson is a labor ethnographer who usually studies people doing work that鈥檚 not very visible, such as restaurant staff and nursing home caregivers.
We talked with her about her research, the importance of students to her work, and how this class came about.
How did you get interested in artificial intelligence to begin with?
Erickson: I鈥檓 interested in the labor consequences of not having human truck drivers anymore鈥 [and] in the self-driving trucks. Because when these things get on the road, they鈥檙e going to be in Iowa first.
As I got into it, I thought, I鈥檝e got to know about machine learning and artificial intelligence鈥. [Then] I thought, wait. A book about self-driving trucks would be completely irresponsible at this point because we鈥檙e already so far down the road.
I was coming to realize that a lot of the work that we currently do is all automatable already, including radiology, legal clerking, all kinds. I can鈥檛 have this be about one industry. That would be tone-deaf. This is really about automating us.
So now I don鈥檛 just talk about trucks, I talk about really simple devices, like the iWatch鈥. Machines are interacting with us for more minutes of the day and in ever-increasing ways throughout our lives.
I鈥檓 not interested in the question of 鈥 when the robots are going to come for us because they鈥檙e already with us. They鈥檙e just not coming in the form that we thought. We thought it would be a more dramatic form. It鈥檚 actually rather a subtle form.
I鈥檓 interested in helping students develop their sociological imagination in relationship to machines. I want students to be able to look at machines and ask the same kinds of questions that we ask about human intent and outcomes and discrimination, just all the things that we think about in regard to humans. Because we spend so much time with [machines].
How did your short course come about?
Erickson: For me, teaching a class becomes a good way to find out what the story arc of the book is. I think, 鈥淲hat do [students] need to know so that we can get where I want to get in terms of the sociology of machines?鈥 When I do that, it often helps me determine the shape of the book itself.
On my last book, How We Die Now, 26 students worked on [it] at different stages. They helped me develop the theoretical foundations; they did the ethnographic research with me; they helped me analyze the data. My work is very iterative, both with my classes and with undergraduates themselves.
With this [AI] project, it鈥檚 so important to have undergraduates [involved]. It鈥檚 important to have intergenerational conversations about devices, right? Because I can鈥檛 be writing about this from the perspective of a 48-year-old. It鈥檚 just changing too quickly.
[Students] have a kind of intuition about some of these devices that you and I basically can鈥檛 have because of when we were born. We remember a time before these devices. So it鈥檚 super useful to have smart, young people engaged in this.
You received the 2020鈥21 faculty fellowship from the Center for the Humanities. What role did that award have with your research and short course?
Erickson: When Caleb Elfenbein became the center鈥檚 director, he and the board found this way of spotlighting scholars 鈥 through a fellowship that especially centers the humanities. This is important, I think, because professors at 乐播传媒入口 are very dedicated teachers, and so sometimes we forget to highlight the scholarly work we all also do. This fellowship, as I understand it, draws attention to local expertise, turning the spotlight on our scholars on campus.
[Also,] I鈥檓 certain students don鈥檛 look at a robot and think that鈥檚 a humanistic question. So they need a little bit of help knowing that.
What [the fellowship] allowed me to do was teach this class a little sooner than I would have. That鈥檚 what鈥檚 so great about it. It bought me out of half of a class and it gave me some research time that I was going to use to go and observe robots, but obviously I couldn鈥檛 do that with the pandemic.
I also got to do a virtual, public talk [in April 2021], which was helpful, because the talk will probably be the introduction to my book. Also, I feel like some of our work is not very visible, the scholarship part, and this kind of makes it visible.
You鈥檙e teaching more courses based on this research?
Erickson: Yes, a fall 2021 First-Year Tutorial called I/Robot: The Social Life of Machines (and Humans) and a 4-credit 200-level special topic course in spring 2022, Sociology of Robots.