By Kerry O’Day ’28
Bucknell and the Dominguez Center for Data Science recently welcomed Bucknell alumnus Jerry Farano, who gave a campus address on the realities and risks of relying on artificial intelligence. Upon graduation from Bucknell in 1988, Jerry continued his education in law, and spent over 35 years working in corporate governance, law, and international energy markets.
Jerry began his address by taking a step back and asking the questions: “How does technology change the way we think? Can we trust it?” Artificial intelligence is not grounded in shared experience. It doesn’t conduct research, rather it computes a complex mathematical model to respond to prompts.
The problem? Jerry concludes that this fluency the model creates can make mistakes look legitimate, but in reality it is often a hallucination. There are real consequences to these hallucinations, and Jerry gave examples in the law, medical, and financial fields. He brought awareness to the idea that large language models are not optimized for accuracy and truth, which is crucial to understand when utilizing them.
Jerry’s campus address shone light on the importance of responsible AI usage and reiterated the idea that “fluency is not truth.”