Following the recent passing of Abhishek Gupta, I had the honor of moderating an #AI #Ethics panel this morning at #ElevateFest24 in #Toronto.
It was a moment to reflect on Abhishek’s legacy, his impact, and the important work we’ve done at the Montreal AI Ethics Institute and the global community he led. The conversation around our collective responsibility—across government, industry, and civil society—in shaping a world transformed by #AI is more urgent than ever.
Here are my opening remarks (check against delivery). The full video of the panel will be shared once available.
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"Hello and welcome to this panel on ethical AI guardrails for safe AI deployment. My name is Renjie Butalid, and I am the co-founder and director of the Montreal AI Ethics Institute, also known as MAIEI.
Before we begin, I want to take a moment to honor the life and legacy of my co-founder, Abhishek Gupta, who sadly passed away two days ago in India. It would be an understatement to say that the #AIethics and #ResponsibleAI communities has lost one of its brightest minds.
Abhishek and I founded MAIEI almost 7 years ago with one key question: What is humanity's role in shaping a world increasingly driven by algorithms?
This question has always been at the core of our work at MAIEI, but in the wake of his passing, it feels more profound than ever.
This conversation we're having on the role of governments, industry, and, the often overlooked #civilsociety, on the very societal impacts of AI, is not just a nice to have at conferences like this—it is a must have, and it needs to be an ongoing conversation.
What is our collective role in defining our place in a world transformed by AI? And how do we ensure that it serves the greater good?
In this room, we have students, entrepreneurs, academics, policymakers, developers, and creatives. We’re all stakeholders in this future—not one that’s 5, 10, or 15 years away, but one that is happening now.
Governments are adopting national AI strategies and setting regulations, and industries have a responsibility to integrate ethical practices into AI development and deployment across its lifecycle.
But ultimately, it’s the choices we make as a society that will determine the impact AI has on our lives.
This is what Abhishek saw almost a decade ago now at McGill University, when he envisioned the need to hold space to have these types of conversations.
In this session, I'll touch briefly upon national AI frameworks and regulations. We'll then hear from leading experts, who have joined me on stage today, Manav Gupta, Joe Greenwood, and Shingai Manjengwa, from both established companies like IBM and Mastercard, as well as rising #startups like Theoriq.
With that, let’s dive into the panel and explore the balance between innovation, safety, and ethical AI responsibility.
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Thank you to Marium and the Elevate team for an outstanding conference, and to Melissa for the warm intro and excellent hosting of the AI stream.
