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• AI – Artificial Intelligence: Possibilities, Perils, and Peculiarities of a Powerful Technology

  • When
    14 Mar 2025
  •  
    12:00 PM - 1:00 PM
  • Location
    Willamette Heritage Center, Dye House 1313 Mill St SE, Salem, OR 97301

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  AI, artificial intelligence. While in 2025 “AI" garners prolific news, hopeful hype, dire warnings, and viral commentary -- and billions in investments for research and applications – this technology dates back to at least 1956. 

  
  

  “The term “artificial intelligence" [was] first coined in a workshop proposal titled "A Proposal for the Dartmouth Summer Research Project on Artificial Intelligence,"3 submitted by John McCarthy of Dartmouth College, Marvin Minsky of Harvard University, Nathaniel Rochester from IBM and Claude Shannon from Bell Telephone Laboratories. . . The workshop, which took place a year later, in July and August 1956, is generally considered the official birthdate of the burgeoning field of AI.” -Tim Mucci, a Writer for IBM

  Fast-forward to November 2024, when Christopher Mims in his Wall Street Journal column Keywords, announced that “A Powerful AI Breakthrough is About to Transform the World” and that “The technology driving ChatGPT (an early demo was released Nov. 30, 2022) is capable of so much more.” (WSJ, Nov.16-17, 2024); on to a Feb.24.2025 front page headline in the Statesman Journal: “Legislators propose new laws around AI” -- and you see a phenomenon that is garnering increasing interest, excitement, and concern. 

  
  

  Speaker

  In this program, Dr. Calvin Deutschbein, Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Willamette University, will introduce us to AI.  Calvin will define what it is (and isn’t) and provide a brief history of the development of AI.  Dr. Deutschbein will outline its capabilities and share examples of how this technology is being applied today.  Calvin will also discuss AI’s limitations, as well as actual and potential problems and challenges that it presents and may pose in the future. They will also share a basic demonstration of AI/ChatGPT. As with all Salem City Club programs, there will be time at the end of the presentation for Q & A with the presenter.

  
  

  Registration

  Members: Free

  Non-member: $10

  
  

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• Facing An Inconvenient Truth

  • When
    28 Mar 2025
  •  
    12:00 PM - 1:00 PM
  • Location
    Willamette Heritage Center, Dye House 1313 Mill St SE, Salem, OR 97301

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  In 2006 the film, An Inconvenient Truth, was released to the public. The film, directed by Davis Guggenheim, tells the story of Al Gore’s campaign to educate people in the U.S. and around the world about global warming and its impact on living things. A sequel to the film, An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power, was released in 2017. Many believe climate change is real and the possible impacts must be studied for mitigation and adaptation.

  
  

  In Oregon, the Oregon Climate Change Research Institute (OCCRI) is at the forefront of studying climate change and what it means for Oregonians. OCCRI released the seventh Oregon Climate Assessment on January 8, 2025. The institute seeks to achieve a climate-prepared Northwest by building a climate knowledge network, cultivating climate-informed communities, and advancing understanding of regional climate, its effects, and adaptation. 

  
  

  There is little doubt that climate change is real. Increased incidence of warmer weather in the summer, colder weather in the winter, wildfires, flooding, stronger hurricanes, tornadoes, tsunamis, drought, species die-offs, and ocean acidification are the consequences of climate change. The dramatic impacts of climate change are here, now. It may be too late to stop the effects, but we may be able to slow them. In any case, as a species and living in the Pacific Northwest we will have to adapt. 

  
  

  The Oregon Climate Change Research Institute was created in 2007 by the Oregon State Legislature under House Bill 3543. Among OCCRI’s charges from the Legislature is assessment of “the state of climate change science, including biological, physical and social science, as it relates to Oregon and the likely effects of climate change on the state.” State support to OCCRI has yielded an approximately 12-fold financial return on investment.

  
  

  Speaker

  Our speaker, Dr. Erica Fleishmann, Professor, College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences, is the Director of the Climate Change Research Institute. Dr. Fleishmann will walk us through the important work of OCCRI and how legislators and Oregonians can use it to best prepare and adapt to the impacts of climate change in Oregon and the region.  To meet its charges from the Legislature, OCCRI serves roles that include the following.

  • Facilitate research on climate change and its effects on natural and human systems in Oregon.
  • Serve as a clearinghouse for climate change information.
  • Provide climate change information to the public in integrated and accessible formats.
  • Provide technical assistance to local governments in developing climate change policies, practices, and programs.
  • Produce a biennial assessment on the state of the science of climate change as it applies to Oregon and the likely effects of climate change on the state.

  Website: Oregon Climate Change Research Institute (OCCRI)

  Research Interests

  • Ecological responses to environmental change and the management of natural resources in the western United States
  • Applications of remote sensing to environmental sciences and ecological modeling

  Education

  • 1991, B.S., Biological Sciences, Stanford University
  • 1992, M.S., Biological Sciences, Stanford University
  • 1997, Ph.D., Ecology, Evolution, and Conservation Biology, University of Nevada, Reno

  
  

  Registration Details

  Members: Free

  Non-members: $10.00

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