Special Presentation by N. Kishor Narang (Narnix Technolabs, India) Hosted by the Future Networks Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning (AIML) Working Group Date/Time: Thursday, May 16th, 2024 @ 12:00 UTC Topic: Is AI the New Plastic? Meta-Analysis of Sustainability as an Ethical imperative for Digital Technologies Abstract: This talk provides a meta-analysis of the environmental policy challenges presented by emerging technologies collectively referred to as machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI). The emergence of these technologies has already begun profoundly reshaping our lives, our interactions, and our lived environments. As adoption of these technologies becomes widespread, they are likely to play a substantial independent role in society’s energy consumption and environmental impact. In this talk, we argue that AI poses collective challenges like the widespread introduction of plastics half a century ago – providing cheap and seemingly efficient solutions to a wide range of contemporary problems while creating (and displacing) new aggregate costs that will impact all of society. This talk proposes that a holistic ethical and policy approach should be taken towards the design and deployment of AI technologies. It should embed an awareness of key ethical and policy goals throughout the ecosystem and value chain – from researchers to engineers to corporations to global policymakers – to better generate and distribute metrics that can inform policies oriented towards ethical and sustainable practices. If available, any slides/recordings will be at https://futurenetworks.ieee.org/roadmap/aiml-working-group Co-sponsored by: IEEE Future Networks Speaker(s): N. Kishor Narang Virtual: https://events.vtools.ieee.org/m/418570