Blog

Over the past decade, the rise of digital technologies and social media has provided social scientists with a new avenues for the study of society.

While mathematical investigation is a useful way to better understand why language models, like ChatGPT, may be gender biased, it is also useful to take a step back and to consider bias in NLP from a broader perspective.

Language technologies, like ChatGPT, are developing quickly. But we don’t really know how they work. And they are not always designed to help society.

In recent years, more attention has started to be paid to diversity within academia. How is the ILLC working on inclusivity and respect for all identities?

The rise of large language models raises questions about what rules of grammar they have really learned. Do they have a similar understanding of language as humans? Priming may provide answers.

When people join forces to search for the truth, they can develop seemingly magical abilities. But in our hyperconnected world, many things go wrong in the collective search for truth. Mathematical models explain why.

Digital communication is inherently ambiguous, says new media scholar Davide Beraldo. It allows for fluid concepts that connect unlikely groups of people. But it can also do the opposite: segment and polarize communities.

The ILLC’s new director is convinced: Logic still matters to AI. And theory from philosophy, computer science and linguistics is useful to tackle real-world problems.

Humans have a hard time reasoning according to abstract rules. Still, logic should care about psychology, says Anthi Solaki. She builds logical models that offer space for human imperfections.

The logician Sonja Smets has been the first female director of the ILLC. Now, she is handing over the directorship to Robert van Rooij. Time to look back on five eventful years.

Participatory budgeting empowers citizens and non-citizens: They can decide what their city’s budget is spent on. But how to make sure everyone is being heard?

Ashley Burgoyne researches how humans listen to music. Why are some songs catchy while others are not? How does my listening differ from yours? And why is the Spotify algorithm so good?

What’s on this image? Neural networks are great at recognizing objects – describing whole scenes is much more difficult. Research at the ILLC shows that it might help to let machines look at images like humans do.

People are quick to call others irrational. Logical models reveal that irrational group behavior might be a natural consequence of how information is spread in the digital age.

Researchers at the ILLC are developing algorithms to detect fake news and those who spread it. But the technical solution is only half the story. Unless applied carefully, automatic fake news detection is problematic.

Since October 13, 2020, Sign Language of the Netherlands is an official language in the Netherlands. A major step in the right direction, says Floris Roelofsen, linguist at the ILLC. But there is still a long way to go.

Research is more creative and less biased when it is done by scientists that differ in many ways. But how to be inclusive and diverse as a research institute? This is how we approach the problem.

In 1992, the AI teaching programme at the UvA was launched. Nobody had heard of deep learning and AI revolved around logical reasoning. For a look back at the beginnings we talked to Frank Veltman, emeritus professor at the ILLC.

Arthur Boixel and Ulle Endriss use AI to explain voting outcomes. How? Just like you would solve a sudoku. This video explains more.

Dieuwke Hupkes reflects on her PhD in the fast-moving field of natural language processing. Artificial neural networks are not only computational tools – they can also teach us something about the human brain.

How to combine individual points of view to find the best possible compromise? This might seem trivial. But in fact, it’s really hard to answer! This video explains why.

Newborns perceive rhythm, chimpanzees dance to music and pigeons can distinguish Bach from Stravinsky. The root of human musicality lies in our genes. An interview with music scientist Henkjan Honing.

Berkeley, January to May 2020. The Who’s who in Quantum Computing and cryptography is coming together to discuss cutting-edge research. An interview with quantum expert Chris Schaffner.

Many claim that the pandemic we are living through is a historical event. But which story will be told about it? Tobias Blanke and Julia Noordegraaf want to take a look at the crisis through the lens of individual experiences.

The flood of information about the COVID-19 pandemic is overwhelming. But which sources are relevant? Researcher Giovanni Colavizza uses artificial intelligence to bring structure into the science related to COVID-19.