Hot Take: Does AI Know How You Feel?

The Good Robot

In this episode, we chat about coming back from summer break, and discuss a research paper recently published by Kerry and the AI ethicist and researcher Os Keyes called "The Infopolitics of Feeling: How race and disability are configured in Emotion Recognition Technology". We discuss why AI tools that promise to be able to read our emotions from our faces are scientifically and politically suspect. We then explore the ableist foundations of what used to be the most famous Emotion AI firm in the world: Affectiva. Kerry also explains how the Stop Asian Hate and Black Lives Matters protests of 2020 inspired this research project, and why she thinks that emotion recognition technologies have no place in our societies.