Using AI to Save Lives

December 9, 2019

6:30pm — Peking University Law School Pin Café – Beijing, China

Suicide is one of the leading causes of death, as assessed by the World Health Organization. The pervasiveness of social media offers new possibilities for preventive intervention – using AI techniques to detect signals around suicide attempts and estimate suicide risk. Dr. HUANG Zhisheng will talk about the “tree hole” initiative he launched and the technology value and social impact of advancing mental health with AI.

Key Discussions:

• How does AI work with humans to advance mental health?

• How does “tree hole” suicide monitoring robots work?

• What are the technology value and social impact of using AI for mental health?

 

Presenter:

HUANG Zhisheng

• Tenured Senior Researcher, Department of Computer Science, Faculty of Sciences, Vrije University Amsterdam

• Chief Scientist, Advanced Innovation Center for Human Brain Protection, Capital Medical University

• Professor and Vice Chair, Big Data Institute, Wuhan University of Science and Technology

Dr. HUANG Zhisheng’s research interests include artificial intelligence, logic, and multimedia technology. He has published several textbooks and almost 300 papers and book chapters, and currently acts as editor-in-chief of the Journal of Artificial Intelligence for Medical Science. He presided over the work of the EU FP 7 Large-Scale Integrating Project LarKC as well as the development of several other major projects. He created the “Tree Hole” rescue team, which uses robots to monitor the internet for suicide attempts, and has saved hundreds of lives.

composed by Arswain
machine learning consultation by Anna Tskhovrebov
commissioned by the Berggruen Institute
premiered at the Bradbury Building
downtown Los Angeles
april 22, 2022

Human perception of what sounds “beautiful” is necessarily biased and exclusive. If we are to truly expand our hearing apparatus, and thus our notion of beauty, we must not only shed preconceived sonic associations but also invite creative participation from beings non-human and non-living. We must also begin to cede creative control away from ourselves and toward such beings by encouraging them to exercise their own standards of beauty and collaborate with each other.

Movement I: Alarm Call
‘Alarm Call’ is a long-form composition and sound collage that juxtaposes, combines, and manipulates alarm calls from various human, non-human, and non-living beings. Evolutionary biologists understand the alarm call to be an altruistic behavior between species, who, by warning others of danger, place themselves by instinct in a broader system of belonging. The piece poses the question: how might we hear better to broaden and enhance our sense of belonging in the universe? Might we behave more altruistically if we better heed the calls of – and call out to – non-human beings?

Using granular synthesis, biofeedback, and algorithmic modulation, I fold the human alarm call – the siren – into non-human alarm calls, generating novel “inter-being” sonic collaborations with increasing sophistication and complexity. 

Movement II: A.I.-Truism
A synthesizer piece co-written with an AI in the style of Vangelis’s Blade Runner score, to pay homage to the space of the Bradbury Building.

Movement III: Alarmism
A machine learning model “learns” A.I.Truism and recreates Alarm Call, generating an original fusion of the two.

Movement IV: A.I. Call
A machine learning model “learns” Alarm Call and recreates A.I.Truism, generating an original fusion of the two.

RAVE (IRCAM 2021) https://github.com/acids-ircam/RAVE