Lectures on Tap-"The Science of Loopholes: From Smart-Ass Kids to Rogue AI"

Professors, experts, and storytellers giving thought-provoking lectures in Boston bars.

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🧠 Lecture: "The Science of Loopholes: From Smart-Ass Kids to Rogue AI"

🎙 Speaker: Prof. Tomer Ullman

Join us for a fascinating evening as Prof. Tomer Ullman unpacks the curious world of “loopholes” — those clever, intentional misunderstandings that let you technically follow the rules while dodging their spirit.

From smart-ass kids exploiting household rules to modern “rogue” AI systems that do exactly what we say but not what we mean, loopholes are everywhere: in law, myth, everyday life, and cutting-edge technology.

In this talk, you’ll hear about new empirical research on how people use loopholes, and when and why children begin to deploy them. Prof. Ullman will also introduce computational approaches to understanding loopholes and explain why they present a deep, perhaps unsolvable, challenge for building truly safe, aligned intelligent machines.

Prof. Tomer Ullman is the Morris Kahn Associate Professor of Psychology at Harvard University and heads the Computation, Cognition, and Development Lab. His work focuses on common-sense reasoning and how children and adults build intuitive theories of physics, psychology, and the everyday world.

Get a drink, connect, and learn at Lectures on Tap! 🙌