He Built an AI Model That Can Decode Your Emotions - Ep 19. with Alan Cowen

This AI can read emotions better than you can.
It was created by Alan Cowen, the cofounder and CEO of Hume, an AI research lab developing models that can read your face and your voice with uncanny accuracy. Before starting Hume, Alan helped set up Google’s research into affective computing and got a Ph.D. in computational psychology from Berkeley.
Hume’s ultimate goal is to build AI models that can optimize for human well-being, and in this episode I sat down with Alan to understand how that might be possible.
We get into:
- What an emotion actually is
- Why traditional psychological theories of emotion are inadequate
- How Hume is able to model human emotions
- How Hume's API enables developers to build empathetic voice interfaces
- Applications of the model in customer service, gaming, and therapy
- Why Hume is designed to optimize for human well-being instead of engagement
- The ethical concerns around creating an AI that can interpret human emotions
- The future of psychology as a science
This is a must-watch for anyone interested in the science of emotion and the future of human-AI interactions.
This episode is a must-watch for anyone curious about some of the bigger questions prompted by the rapid development of AI.
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Timestamps:
00:00:00 - Dan tells Hume’s empathetic AI model a secret
00:01:13 - Introduction
00:10:17 - What traditional psychology tells us about emotions
00:13:46 - Alan’s radical approach to studying human emotion
00:16:46 - Methods that Hume’s AI model uses to understand emotion
00:21:08 - How the model accounts for individual differences
00:27:19 - Dan’s pet theory on why it’s been hard to make progress in psychology
00:38:12 - The ways in which Alan thinks Hume can be used
00:41:22 - How Alan is thinking about the API v. consumer product question
00:44:42 - Ethical concerns around developing AI that can interpret human emotion
Links to resources mentioned in the episode:
Alan Cowen: / alancowen
Hume: @hume_AI; hume.ai
If you want to demo Hume: demo.hume.ai
The nonprofit associated with Hume: thehumeinitiative.org/
Lisa Feldman Barrett’s book: lisafeldmanbarrett.com/books/...
The serial based on Paul Ekman’s theory of emotion: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lie_to_Me

[@johnexley.family]

Studying and understanding how you feel … a true treasure . Thank you for doing this interview !

[@VijayasarathyMuthu]

Does it mean, it can understand sarcasm?