Strachey Lecture – Dame Wendy Hall

About

How did someone with a PhD in algebraic topology end up advising governments around the world on the ethics of AI and the geopolitics of digital governance? In this talk I will reflect on my career in computer science research – from intelligent tutoring systems, through multimedia and open hypermedia, to the semantic web, web science, and social machines. Somehow all this experience led the government to ask me to co-chair a review of AI policy in the UK which has led to a high profile role in the debate about the future of AI both nationally and internationally. But, as I explore sentiment analysis in Twitter, the application of AI to Chinese Traditional Medicine, the application of topological data analysis to the analysis of social networks and the fragmentation of the internet, my research journey continues. I am never happier than when I’m pushing on disciplinary boundaries and making links between seemingly disparate research areas to tackle a problem from a completely new approach. I learnt at the feet of Ted Nelson that everything is deeply intertwingled, and I’ve always tried to help people make sense of complex interconnected information, like the circles that you find in the windmills of your mind.