When AI Meets The Blockchain

Although both AI and blockchain are probably at the peak of the'hype cycle' at the moment, that is where their similarities end; these two technologies actually represent contrasting ways of understanding and ordering the world. "In a way, blockchain is about certainty and transparency; a permanent and publicly verifiable way to record transactions," said Professor Steven Miller, Vice Provost of Research at Singapore Management University (SMU). "AI, on the other hand, involves making probabilistic statements and in that sense can be said to be about uncertainty." Professor Miller made these comments as moderator of a panel discussion titled'When Blockchain & AI Come Together: Possibilities & Impacts,' held on 24 January 2018 at SMU. Organised by SMU in conjunction with the National Research Foundation's Global Young Scientists Summit, the panel comprised three distinguished speakers: Mr Sopnendu Mohanty, Chief Financial Technology Officer of the Monetary Authority of Singapore; Professor John Hopcroft, IBM Professor of Engineering & Applied Mathematics in Computer Science at Cornell University (Turing Award recipient, 1986); and Professor Efim Zelmanov, Professor of Mathematics at the University of California, San Diego (Fields Medallist, 1994). Never the twain shall meet?