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People underestimate AI capabilities due to ‘exponential growth bias,’ study finds

LAWRENCE — A new scholarly article from a University of Kansas professor of business examines the human biases that underestimate artificial intelligence’s full capabilities. In his study, Nate Meikle examined the effects of motivated reasoning and exponential growth bias on human judgment. Questions tested how participants might envision the interaction between AIs and humans decades from now. “We are, on average, going to be surprised at how quickly AI progresses and potentially surpasses human capability,” he said.

School of Business to recognize 2024 Distinguished Alumni Award recipient

LAWRENCE — The University of Kansas School of Business will honor executive Jason “Jay” Meschke with its 2024 Distinguished Alumni Award on April 18 during a private event. He earned his bachelor’s degree in business administration in 1980 and his MBA in 1982, both from KU. Meschke is the president of CBIZ EFL Associates and CBIZ Talent & Compensation Solutions.

Researcher reclaims 16th century Moroccan woman leader from obscurity

LAWRENCE – While growing up in Morocco, Amal El Haimeur was never taught about Sayyida al-Hurra, the country’s 16th century “pirate queen” who overcame sexism to lead and defend the people of her city-state and region. The KU professor then embarked upon a research journey through cities and archives across Morocco, combing through rare scholarly resources, that resulted in the article titled “Sayyida al-Hurra: A Forgotten North African Queen and Military Leader,” published in the first edition of the new KU scholarly journal Africana Annual.

Full stories below.

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Contact: Jon Niccum, KU News Service, 785-864-7633, [email protected]

People underestimate AI capabilities due to ‘exponential growth bias,’ study finds

LAWRENCE — When asked to name the greatest potential threat to humanity, many scientists believe artificial intelligence (AI) to be a top contender. Yet there seems to be very little currently being done to ensure its safety.

“We are, on average, going to be surprised at how quickly AI progresses and potentially surpasses human capability,” said Nathan Meikle, an assistant professor of business at the University of Kansas.

His new paper, titled “Unaware and Unaccepting: Human Biases and the Advent of Artificial Intelligence,” examines the human biases that impede AI’s assessment. His experiments find that people are prone to underestimate AI capabilities due to exponential growth bias and people reject the aversive implications of rapid technological progress even in cases in which they themselves predict the growth rate.

The new work is published in Technology, Mind, and Behavior.

“We’re motivated to believe things we want to have happen,” said Meikle, who co-wrote the paper with Bryan Bonner of the University of Utah.

“Most of us don’t want to live in a world where AI is smarter than humans. And because we want humans to be superior to AI, there’s a chance that we are sticking our head in the sand. We don’t want AI to surpass human intelligence. Therefore, we think it’s not going to happen.”

Motivated reasoning emerges most often when the facts are ambiguous.

“For instance, I don’t want to get cancer. Say my odds of getting cancer in a lifetime are 40%. But because I don’t want cancer, and because I can look to my past and say, ‘I’m reasonably healthy, and I’ve never had cancer,’ I’m prone to underestimate my odds of getting cancer, and I might think the probability is only like 20%,” he said.

But exponential growth bias (which is our inability to accurately estimate exponential growth curves) becomes even more skewed when a concept turns more abstract.

“A simple example is would you rather have a billion dollars or would you rather have the money from doubling a penny 64 times?” he said. “Our intuition tells us to take the billion. But from doubling a penny, you’re actually looking at more than 184 billion dollars. And this example is especially relevant to AI because AI has been progressing at an exponential rate, in tandem with computing speed.”

To verify this theory as it relates to underestimating AI, Meikle recruited several hundred participants in the U.S. and conducted two experiments that examined the effects of motivated reasoning and exponential growth bias on human judgment. The questions tested how participants might envision the interaction between AIs and humans decades from now. (Sample: Imagine 20 years into the future and AIs are equal in intelligence to humans. How positive do you feel about the future you just imagined?)

“An AI doesn’t need to be way smarter than us to pose an existential risk,” Meikle said.

“Genetically, we share about 99% of our DNA with chimpanzees. But it’s just that little bit of extra intelligence which allows us to be at the top of the food chain. And so if an AI were to become more intelligent than humans — which I think there’s a reasonable probability of happening very soon — then maybe the AI adopts a goal that is not consistent with human flourishing … and we’re in trouble. Or, even more believably now, people use AI to manipulate other humans.”

An Idaho native, Meikle came to KU in 2021. He is a former receiver with the BYU Cougars. (He caught a dozen passes in the 2005 Las Vegas Bowl.) He also hosts a podcast titled “Meikles and Dimes,” where he interviews guests about leadership, including Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid. Meikle teaches courses in leadership and ethics at KU.

Meikle said he personally employs AI all the time.

“I’m getting to the point now where I use ChatGPT every day. It’s one of my most commonly opened apps — just asking it questions about what happened here, what happened there,” he said.

Is he fearful it might eventually replace him?

“Does it bother me that a calculator can run calculations better than me? No. And so in some ways, we don’t care. But I think we’re especially concerned about if artificial intelligence takes our jobs,” Meikle said. “I don’t mind if a calculator can calculate faster than me. But if it’s collecting my paycheck, there are going to be problems.”

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The official university account for X (formerly Twitter) is @UnivOfKansas.

Follow @KUnews for KU News Service stories, discoveries and experts.

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Contact: Lauren Cunningham, School of Business, 785-864-9540, [email protected], @KUbschool

School of Business to recognize 2024 Distinguished Alumni Award recipient

LAWRENCE — The University of Kansas School of Business will honor executive Jason “Jay” Meschke with its 2024 Distinguished Alumni Award.

Meschke will be recognized for his dedication to business excellence, community service and commitment to KU on April 18 during a private event.

He earned his bachelor’s degree in business administration in 1980 and his MBA in 1982, both from KU. Meschke is the president of CBIZ EFL Associates and CBIZ Talent & Compensation Solutions.

In his role, he has completed more than 800 successful senior-level searches spanning several industries. Meschke’s achievements during his 30-year history in the executive search field place him in the top 1% of search consultants in the U.S. He began his career in Texas at one of the country’s 25 largest banks. Following that, he worked at two Kansas City banking franchises, holding roles as chief lending officer/minority owner at one and president at the other. The two financial institutions were later sold to Nasdaq-traded companies.

Meschke serves on the KU School of Business Dean’s Advisory Board, and he is immediate past chairman of the Enterprise Center of Johnson County, a venture development organization. He also holds a senior adviser role with Star Mountain Capital, a New York City-headquartered private equity/private credit firm. He previously has served on the boards of numerous organizations, including as chair of KCPT (Kansas City Public Television) and the Shawnee Mission Medical Center Foundation.

The School of Business established the Distinguished Alumni Award in 1998 to honor outstanding graduates. To date, 67 alumni have been recognized with the award. Previous recipients include businessman and investor David Booth, Deloitte’s global chief operating officer Frank Friedman, entrepreneur and investor Tim Barton, and Cerner Corp. co-founder Cliff Illig.

Award recipients are chosen from the nominations of other alumni and the Dean’s Advisory Board. Candidates are selected based on their business success and service to their communities and to KU.

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Don’t miss new episodes of “When Experts Attack!,”

a KU News Service podcast hosted by Kansas Public Radio.

https://kansaspublicradio.org/podcast/when-experts-attack

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Contact: Rick Hellman, KU News Service, 785-864-8852, [email protected], @RickHellman

Researcher reclaims 16th century Moroccan woman leader from obscurity

LAWRENCE – While growing up in Morocco, Amal El Haimeur was never taught about Sayyida al-Hurra, the country’s 16th century “pirate queen” who overcame sexism to lead and defend the people of her city-state and region.

So when El Haimeur, now an assistant teaching professor of African & African American studies at the University of Kansas, read a passing reference to al-Hurra in a book titled “The Forgotten Queens of Islam,” she went looking for more information about her. But there was hardly any.

Thus, El Haimeur embarked on a research project that took her to cities and archives across Morocco and resulted in the article titled “Sayyida al-Hurra: A Forgotten North African Queen and Military Leader” in the first edition of the new scholarly journal Africana Annual, based in KU’s Department of African & African-American Studies.

“I went to the 2022 summer book fair in Rabat, with publishers coming from all over the Arab world and Africa. I thought I would find resources there, but I did not find anything available about her,” El Haimeur said.

Editors and bookstore owners told her they had nothing available on her scholarly search, El Haimeur said.

“So I decided to go to Chefchaouen, her hometown. There is an educational center there, and they connected me with two historians — one who lives there and the other who lives in Rabat.”

El Haimeur said Ali Risouni and Fatima Bouchmal provided her with copies of history books that cite both primary and secondary sources about al-Hurra and that are unavailable elsewhere — neither commercially nor in libraries.

El Haimeur took pictures or made copies of the materials.

“There is not another edition available,” El Haimeur said. “It’s really sad that resources are not available about her.”

Rectifying this lack of information about al-Hurra – particularly in English — was one of El Haimeur’s purposes in writing the article about her. El Haimeur’s translations of the Arabic writings the Moroccan scholars loaned her are the basis for the article’s narrative.

The KU researcher said that al-Hurra’s family status as sharifis, or descendants of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad, gave al-Hurra a certain degree of power. Her father founded Chefchaouen, building the fortress there that today serves as a museum. He was a trained military leader, and she learned tactics and strategy from him.

She learned naval warfare from her first husband, Moulay Ali al-Mandri. El Haimeur said that Muslim leaders considered these high-seas actions to be jihad, or justified warfare, while Europeans considered them piracy.

In addition to Arabic, al-Hurra spoke Spanish and Portuguese, giving her an advantage in diplomacy with those countries.

El Haimeur writes that al-Hurra’s two marriages served to make alliances with nearby rulers to strengthen their conjoined political entities. It was while al-Mandri was away on military missions that al-Hurra began her rule. She later led pirate raids against the Spanish and Portuguese in the Mediterranean Sea and Atlantic Ocean, earning the nickname “the pirate princess of jihad.”

The al-Hurra family had been victims of the Reconquista expulsion of Muslims from Andalusian Granada, El Haimeur writes, and they feared further losses.

El Haimeur writes that, in addition to keeping her enemies off balance, “Piracy gave al-Hurra revenue as well as a means to strengthen diplomatic relationships with foreign countries.”

Following al-Mandri’s death, al-Hurra took over as governor of the Mediterranean port city Tetouan and the surrounding area. She led the northern part of Morocco in the midst of ongoing conflicts between the Iberian powers and the north African Muslim kingdoms.

Al-Hurra’s second marriage, to Sultan Ahmad al-Wattasi, was less successful. The couple never lived together, and the Wattasid clan was overthrown by an alliance that included al-Hurra’s own brother.

El Haimeur said she is pleased to have brought al-Hurra’s story to a wider audience in the English-speaking world with her article. And in fact, she has heard from a Moroccan publisher who wishes to publish it as a booklet in Arabic, to be distributed in her home country.

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KU News Service

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Lawrence KS 66045

Phone: 785-864-3256

Fax: 785-864-3339

[email protected]

http://www.news.ku.edu

Erinn Barcomb-Peterson, director of news and media relations, [email protected]

Today’s News is a free service from the Office of Public Affairs

From the Office of Public Affairs | http://www.news.ku.edu

Headlines

New book gathers insights, methods from rising generation of Indigenous archaeologists

LAWRENCE — A book co-edited by a University of Kansas scholar that collects the experiences and know-how of younger Indigenous archaeologists, titled “Indigenizing Archaeology: Putting Theory into Practice,” is newly published by the University Press of Florida.

Second dean candidate for vice chancellor for research to give presentation

LAWRENCE — Marc Mendonca, director of research development and professor of radiation oncology and of medical and molecular genetics at Indiana University, will be the second candidate for the vice chancellor for research position to share his vision and strategies for the future of research and discovery at the University of Kansas. His public presentation will take place 2-3 p.m. April 19.

Scholar will give talk on book connecting cannabis industry to settler colonialism

LAWRENCE – An assistant professor in Native American studies from California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, will give a talk this week at the Cider Gallery as part of a visit to the University of Kansas and Haskell Indian Nations University. Yurok/Hupa/Oneida scholar Kaitlin Reed will speak about research that contributed to her book “Settler Cannabis: From Gold Rush to Green Rush in Indigenous Northern California.” The free public event will take place at 7 p.m. April 17.

Full stories below.

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Contact: Brendan Lynch, KU News Service, 785-864-8855, [email protected], @BrendanMLynch

New book gathers insights, methods from rising generation of Indigenous archaeologists

LAWRENCE — A book co-edited by a University of Kansas scholar that collects the experiences and know-how of younger Indigenous archaeologists, titled “Indigenizing Archaeology: Putting Theory into Practice,” is newly published by the University Press of Florida.

Carlton Shield Chief Gover, acting assistant professor of anthropology and acting assistant curator of archaeology at KU, conceived and co-edited the new volume. Its chapters include lessons and case studies from the discipline.

“This is the first book to our knowledge completely comprised of Indigenous scholars in archaeology, including our copy editors,” said Shield Chief Gover. “What makes this form of archaeology different within the field is its methods. This book is the ‘how-tos’ of Indigenous archaeology. It reflects how different people from different tribes do their version of archaeology. There’s not just some monolith of Native Americans. Rather, each nation has its own way of doing archaeology based on their own cultural practices.”

Shield Chief Gover said the book’s contributors were mostly scholars in early stages of their careers.

“My colleague and co-editor (Emily Van Alst, anthropologist at Washington State University) and I started this project when we were early in our Ph.D.s,” he said. “Everyone’s contributions in this volume are based either on their master’s thesis or doctoral work. So, we’re all junior academics reflecting on how we were able to get through school and the methods that it took.”

According to Shield Chief Gover, the new tome is geared toward a general readership as a practical guide to Indigenous archaeology rather than a theoretical treatise. He said the rise of the field of Indigenous archaeology can be traced to passage of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act in the 1990s.

“That’s what forced archaeologists and Indigenous people to sit down at the table with one another as equals to actually explore, ‘OK, well, how do we get these individuals and their grave goods back home to their communities — and which communities do they belong to?’” he said. “A lot at the base level of Indigenous archaeology is communication and collaboration. It’s just engaging with the communities that you used to do research ‘on.’ Now you’re doing research ‘with’ and having communities incorporated from beginning to end so they’re part of the entire process, not just this little back-end piece, which was called ‘consulting.’ You did all the work; you did the research questions. Then, at the end you’d ask, ‘OK, hey, what do you guys think about this?’ You know, just to check a box.”

Shield Chief Gover said his fellow contributors’ insights and experiences especially benefit Indigenous cultural staff at institutions around the country and internationally.

“We’re hoping this book could be a tool for them to replicate our work through their own nationhood and to move their nations forward with archaeology,” he said. “It’s really distinct from what’s been published before, which have been mostly theoretical ideas by well-established authors writing for scholars in this field. But our book is meant for the average NAGPRA officer or tribal historic preservation officer or early rising students in the field of archaeology, both Indigenous and non-Indigenous.”

Shield Chief Gover’s own contributed chapter reflects on his experiences as a graduate student on his way to becoming the first Pawnee academic archaeologist (as well as a member of a profession that often collided with Indigenous interests historically).

“It was difficult,” said the KU researcher. “My chapter reflects on how I did my master’s thesis. I struggled to communicate my thesis to my community and family, because it was so dense with statistics and the lexicon. So, I really looked at this chapter as an opportunity to say, ‘Well, this is how I went about it. This is why this is important. This is what it means. And this is how other cultural staff can utilize it to serve their own tribes’ purposes.’ At Wyoming, I was the only Indigenous graduate student there. I didn’t even know there was a field of Indigenous archaeology.”

Shield Chief Gover said it wasn’t until he started working on his doctorate later at the University of Colorado at Boulder that he encountered a body of scholarly work by Indigenous archaeologists. In part, he hopes his new volume will make the field more accessible to young academics in a similar position.

“Until then, I had no idea of these resources — I was just on my own, or at least I thought I was,” he said. “Then I realized there was already literature about Indigenous archaeology and there were already people doing what I had ‘Forrest Gumped’ myself into on my own. I felt having a book dedicated less to the theory, but more to the methods would help other folks realize, ‘Oh, this is the actual nuts and bolts of how to do this’ — rather than, ‘Well, this is why you should do it and why it’s important.’ Instead, we talk about where the rubber meets the road.”

To ensure the volume will be available to all with an interest in Indigenous archaeology, Shield Chief Gover and his colleagues made a point of providing a digital open-access copy.

“You can get an online copy of this book for free from the University Press of Florida,” he said. “We wanted to make our content freely accessible to disadvantaged communities that might not have $30 to spend, and we really wanted this accessible to cultural staff in Indian Country so they can readily have it to be employed by their offices.”

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The official university account for X (formerly Twitter) is @UnivOfKansas.

Follow @KUnews for KU News Service stories, discoveries and experts.

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Contact: Savannah Rattanavong, Office of the Provost, 785-864-6402, [email protected], @KUProvost

Second dean candidate for vice chancellor for research to give presentation

LAWRENCE — Marc Mendonca will be the second candidate for the vice chancellor for research position to share his vision and strategies for the future of research and discovery at the University of Kansas.

His public presentation will take place 2-3 p.m. April 19 in the 1502 Building Auditorium located at 15th and Iowa streets. The event will also be livestreamed, and the passcode is 020719.

Mendonca is director of research development at Indiana University, IU Research, and professor of radiation oncology and of medical and molecular genetics at IU’s School of Medicine.

The remaining two candidates will be announced approximately two business days before their respective campus visits. Their public presentations are scheduled for the following dates and locations:

Candidate 3: 3-4 p.m. April 25, Lied Center Pavilion.
Candidate 4: 2:30-3:30 p.m. May 1, 1502 Building Auditorium.

Members of the KU community are encouraged to attend each presentation and provide feedback to the search committee. Presentation recordings and the online feedback form will remain available on the search page through May 7.

Additional search information, including Mendonca’s CV, is also available on the search page.

Mendonca has served in multiple research administrative roles, including as associate vice chancellor and interim vice chancellor for research at IU & Purdue University, Indianapolis, and associate vice president for research at IU. In these roles Mendonca helped lead the development of IU’s overall and research strategic plans.

In addition, Mendonca was the president of the School of Medicine faculty steering committee and the IUPUI faculty council executive committee.

With expertise in X-ray and proton radiation and cancer biology, Mendonca generally focuses on understanding the mechanism of radiation-induced cancer and its prevention by natural antioxidants, as well as increasing the effectiveness of radiation in lung and pancreatic cancer treatment.

Since 2011, Mendonca has acted as the editor-in-chief of the Radiation Research journal, and in 2022, the Radiation Research Society named him a fellow. He has also been a member of the American Society for Radiation Oncology, American Association for Cancer Research and American Board of Radiology.

Having mentored several high school, undergraduate and graduate students, Mendonca has received a number of teaching and service awards, including the American Board of Radiology’s lifetime and volunteer service awards and the IU School of Medicine’s trustee teaching award.

Mendonca earned his doctorate in biophysics from the University of California, Berkeley, and his bachelor’s degree in biology from the College of the Holy Cross.

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Don’t miss new episodes of “When Experts Attack!,”

a KU News Service podcast hosted by Kansas Public Radio.

https://kansaspublicradio.org/podcast/when-experts-attack

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Contact: Emily Ryan, The Commons, 785-864-6293, [email protected], @TheCommonsKU

Scholar will give talk on book connecting cannabis industry to settler colonialism

LAWRENCE – An assistant professor in Native American studies from California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, will give a talk this week at the Cider Gallery as part of a visit to the University of Kansas and Haskell Indian Nations University.

Yurok/Hupa/Oneida scholar Kaitlin Reed will speak about research that contributed to her book “Settler Cannabis: From Gold Rush to Green Rush in Indigenous Northern California.” The free public event will take place at 7 p.m. April 17.

Reed also will visit classes and offer a student colloquium at Haskell during her visit.

“‘Settler Cannabis: From Gold Rush to Green Rush in Indigenous Northern California’ presents a rich landscape of Native California at the intersection of environmental history, environmental justice and Native American studies,” said Melinda Adams, assistant professor of geography & atmospheric science and Indigenous studies. “Reed’s compelling contribution weaves together the beautifully complicated story of Indigenous survivance through various iterations of colonization, environmental destruction and attempted genocide. The book and Dr. Reed’s scholarship overall offers significant pedagogy and inspires more scholarship that centers and uplifts Indigenous peoples in the West and beyond.”

Reed’s research centers Northern California and the effects of settler colonial political economies on tribal land and water rights. Her book illustrates the consequential links between extractive capitalism throughout the historical and ecological systems in northern California and explores the complicated relationship between the U.S. and its ability to recognize the sovereignty of Indigenous lands and bodies.

This work is related to ongoing work on the #landback movement led by Sarah Deer, distinguished professor of Indigenous studies, law, and women, gender & sexuality studies, and Ward Lyles, associate professor of urban planning in the School of Public Affairs & Administration.

Reed’s visit to Lawrence is hosted by several KU partners, including The Commons; the Office of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion & Belonging; the Indigenous Studies Program; and the Institute for Policy & Social Research Center for Compassionate and Sustainable Communities, in collaboration with Haskell.

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KU News Service

1450 Jayhawk Blvd.

Lawrence KS 66045

Phone: 785-864-3256

Fax: 785-864-3339

[email protected]

http://www.news.ku.edu

Erinn Barcomb-Peterson, director of news and media relations, [email protected]

Today’s News is a free service from the Office of Public Affairs