Subscribe now

Technology

Why algorithms love giraffes and create hilarious recipes

Chop your flour and peel some rosemary. Recipe instructions like this say a lot about AI intelligence, says Janelle Shane – and that's not to mention the giraffes

18 December 2019

New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Jess Kornacki

As a child, what did you want to do when you grew up?

I wrote my first science book when I was 5. I decided the world needed to know about horses and that, as I had once seen a horse in real life, I was uniquely qualified to write about them.

Your book is about why AI is making the world weirder. What do you mean?

AIs sometimes do things that reveal how very different they are from human-level intelligences, like when they delete a list of numbers instead of sorting it because their job was technically to…

Sign up to our weekly newsletter

Receive a weekly dose of discovery in your inbox. We'll also keep you up to date with New Scientist events and special offers.

Sign up

To continue reading, subscribe today with our introductory offers

Piano Exit Overlay Banner Mobile Piano Exit Overlay Banner Desktop