IS AI GOOD FOR THE PLANET?

with Benedetta Brevini

Ideas / Conversations | Thurs 25th Sep | 6.30-8.30pm

Presented as a solution to the greatest challenges of our time, from chronic diseases to cybersecurity threats and the climate, AI is also a significant contributor to the climate crisis. AI runs on technology that depletes scarce resources and relies on data centres that demand excessive energy use. 

Journalist & Professor in the political economy of communication Benedetta Brevini lays out the risks posed to our planet by a headlong and indiscriminate embrace of AI, and shares what we can do to manage them. She resolutely brings the climate crisis to the centre of debates around AI, exposing its environmental costs and forcing us to reconsider our understanding of the technology. She makes clear why we should no longer ignore AI-generated environmental problems and urges to embrace a green agenda for AI.

Open to everyone | Booking required
Bar open

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ABOUT THE HOST

Dr Benedetta Brevini is is an expert in Critical AI, the relationship between data capitalism, AI and the climate crisis and environmental communication. She is currently Associate Professor of political economy of communication at the University of Sydney, and also Visiting Professor at the Institute for Public Knowledge at New York University and Senior Visiting Fellow at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Before joining academia she worked as a journalist in Milan, New York and London for CNBC, RAI and the Guardian and held tenured positions at City University London and Brunel University London. She writes on The Guardian’s Comment is Free and contributes to a number of print and web publications including South China Morning Post, OpenDemocracy and the Conversation. She is currently working on a new book project on Communication, Data Capitalism and the Climate Emergency (Polity, Cambridge).

GOOD READS

Newscorp: Empire of Influence (2024); Is AI good for the Planet? (2021); Amazon, Understanding a Global Communication Giant (2020); Climate Change and the Media (2018); Carbon Capitalism and Communication: Confronting Climate Crisis (2017); Public Service Broadcasting Online (2013); Beyond Wikileaks (2013).

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ADDITIONAL INFO 

FOOD & DRINK	EVENT SIZE	WHEELCHAIR ACCESS
Bar open with snacks	Medium (15-20)	Available on request