often that is said to one person. but that's not calling one person y'all like in a bugs bunny cartoon. it's leaving the implication that there might be somebody else out in the car. it's too direct to just say you come back. so y'all is like usted in spanish, you never think of it, but no, y'all is very polite. like is very polite. people now on npr say sort of every 10 seconds. people say sort of whenever they are about to say something when it's said without an um or a like or a sort of would be pushy or dramatic. they're being nice. i'm more interested in those chivalrous sort of things than billy and i went to the store but i take your point. joshua: did you use a microaggression there with waiter and waitress.

john: i was thinking, that, but if i just said waiter, it implies they're all men. waitress? server. >> hi. nice to see you again. i have a question about they/them. so you mentioned the organic development of the language, right. but what do you think about it being demanded? when a group is demanding usage, otherwise you are impolite or even worse? john: when that happens, i think that it is poim lite to require it in such a way that if anybody slip it's considered a tort. pronouns are so deeply seeded cognitively. they are almost not words. they're signals. they're bundles of neurons. for someone, especially over that certain age, and really

that age is about 35, i know i keep changing it, but to not accept that somebody might slip is not very nice. in my experience, very few people are -- don't understand that. and most of the settings i've been in, everybody knows that, especially me is not always going to do it right. it is an incivility to not understand that when a change happen this is quickly, and it's been an unusually rapid change, that people won't be able to do it perfectly. my sense is to the extent you may have met people who are that sensors you, it's going to change as time goes by. that may be a little 2019, 2020. i hope. we'll see. >> thank you. i've been a political writer for more than half a century, i started when i was a kid. i know, i was trained, to follow the a.p. style and otherwise to not signal in any way what my

own opinions might be about someone, a subject in my writing. a lot of that has gone away over the year. one of the things i worry about, because now i can look at somebody's writing and i can, at my age, i can pretty well tell what that person's politics are just by the use of certain words instead of other words. even if they're trying to hide it, to be an objective reporter. and then that brings to one of -- brings me to one of my concerns which is in this age of a.i., if i were someone in and h.r. department in a fortune 500 corporation or someone involved in admissions to a college and i wanted to make sure that i only admitted the people who were like me who thought like me, i used to have to read through essays or applications and sort of try to figure it out. but now i can train that a.i. to

pick out which of the people that i want to discriminate in favor of and the ones i want to discriminate against. and again we're talking about, you know, these day, social credit systems and that sort of control over society. so it could be even worse than just letting you into college or into a corporation. any thoughts on that? john: that's an interesting observation. i'm afraid that's the way it's going to have to be. and there's a benefit in that people's writing is more idiosyncratic than -- and being less trained to write in a faceless way. i know what you mean and there's a certain shimmer, a certain cleanness in the way one was trained to write an op-ed. i like that writing is more like speech. i like the idea that when you learn how to write, the idea is not to learn how to do something that you don't do naturally,

based on rules that frankly somebody made up out of, you know, out of thin air a long time ago i like the idea that writing is you. i think of writing in the past, i just read, for example, "uncle tom's cabin" because who reads that now? i wonder what was it actually like. the frustrating thing about "uncle tom's cabin" is that harriet beecher stow writes in that way, it's beautiful, but almost nobody talks the way they actually would have. even when she's writing co-loak wally. i wish she had been comfortable writing the way everybody talked. and not just as linguist to me but because that reality would be part of art itself. the cloak wall. i know what you mean and i'm on the cusp. i wasn't taught to write the way you were wright. but i was definitely not taught to write at all, i didn't learn

to write in the modern culture so in between. i know a what you mean but i like people to write real. so i like it. especially the news headlines have that just and even in them. trump just doesn't show up, something like that. i get a kick out of that, but i can imagine not getting a kick out of it too. >> thank you very much. you mentioned h.l. mencken, who brought to my mind his great "on the american language" book. what do you think h.l. mencken would have made of, you know, our current situation? would he have just seen it as another american linguistic wave that we have always been going through? john: he had a bifurcated view so he loved the vernacular and touted it with detail and love, a lot of things he writes are things we would never know if he hadn't mentioned them.

but he was also somebody who crafted language very intensely. for example, the american mercury, he has dozens and dozens of people writing for it, it all sounds exactly like him because he changed the prose. he had a sense of the way one was to write, especially. and also speak. in public. and so i think it -- what would he do in terms of, i'm thinking on the fly, listening to donald trump make a speech? he wouldn't like that. he would take down the vernacularisms and say here's a sign of somebody who grew up in the 1950's in queens saying certain things. but he would think trump is supposed to keep that to when he's in private. that was the mencken-esque way. if you want to write in the old way, as in the brevity that some editors think is very important, the con six, there's nothing better than to read something by h.l. mencken. he can say in eight words that i wouldn't be able to say without at least 17.

there's an art to it. but nebraska talks like that, and he knew it. >> thanks. speaking of trump, i wonder what do you make of his speeches at rallies, the crudeness, the insult, the references to bloodbaths, the violent language, the insulting, kamala harris is mentally disabled, what does that tell us about language? do some people regard it as more authentic than a polished political speech? john: it's perfectly authentic. it's utterly unfiltered. it is utterly devoid of any kind of effort, any sense that you do something different when you're standing there than you would if you're in your kitchen. and you can do that now because the culture is more informal. and i -- thinking of reagan, reagan was a great crafter of language, even if you didn't agree with what he was saying you couldn't help but love the way he expressed himself at the podium. i used to love listening to him.

i didn't agree with anything, or very little of it. but once you have, say, george w. bush and how cloak wall he could be or would be in public, once sarah palin is taken seriously even if only for 10 minutes, you have a culture where just getting up and talking is ok. it works on a certain audience. it's funny, in the cab on the way here, my driver happened to have him, where is he today? michigan. in saginaw. and i was listening to him doing his thing. and i wasn't thinking oh good god what a sloppy speaker. i wasn't thinking oh good god he has dementia he doesn't sound like he used to. i was think, this is exactly the way people talk, including that he is not afraid of showing his less savory side in terms of the mocking. he's a towel-snapping mean camp counselor. and thro po logically it'll be interesting in a tern number of

years but i listen to him and think, he can't be bothered to make any effort. joshua: i'm going to allow myself to ask you, a few weeks ago you suggested that perhaps you were one of those english professors that he referred to. english professors think the way i talk and craft sentences is just great. did you get any followup on that? nobody has confirmed? john: i'm thinking what? i did not hear from them. nobody bothered me about it. i swear it must be. joshua: good to know. right. >> hi. so the topic is can words create justice, so i'm interested in a possible distinction and wondering if you would make this distinction between kind of the euphemism treadmill evolution of

language, where something like secretary would take on a negative connotation and then we'd say administrative assistant when there's no difference of meeping in those words but it changes the connotation potentially for late while. and then there are words like, changes like they/them for he or she. or one of my favorites, sex assigned at birth for sex. in my view, i just reread one of your "new york times" columns on pronoun change and it seems like you are pretty strong supporter of pronoun evolution and i think in that you argued that that is because it helps individuals feel greater acceptance and more aligned with their gender identity. to me this is a political view and it also has implications for

science and the impact of science, knowledge, and understanding on society and then implications potentially for policy. i wonder if you distinguish between those two types of changes and if you would say that in se the pronoun or sex assigned at birth case that that change in language is promoting justice? john: that's an important distinction. because words are one thing. what a linguist would call a full m.d. for another. pronouns are another. pronouns are deeply seeded. they're traffic cops in language. to change them, i would definitely argue, is more likely to make people aware of different ways of looking at people than say changing homeless to unhoused. and so if suddenly you're having to address someone, to refer to someone who is adroses cross the room as they rather than he or

she if there is a new way of looking at the gender binary that people are advocate, i imagine that yes, that might be something that would help to raise awareness. i think that in the alternate universe where there was no such thing as that, and yet people who were calling themselves he or calling themselves she nevertheless were pushing the gender binary, thought would change just as well because the changing gender binary manifests itself in so very many ways, but certainly when you're dealing with a piece of grammar, yes. i'm definitely, especially a piece of grammar such as a pronoun. that affects thought more directly. especially given how quickly this is happening. if it happened over 100 years, no. fit happened within one generation where all of us have to change, sure. we're thinking about things in a different way and aware in a way that we weren't before. >> to build on that point, you say that the they/them is

essentially a harmless or polite thing to do for people who want that. who may not feel they have a gender. but what about changes that are happening quite quickly and if you don't go along there's often a cost, to people who do feel they have a gender. "the washington post" style is to say pregnant women. planned parenthood says chest feeders. there's a lot of language about reproduction that simply eliminates the idea of woman from it. and not everyone is in a position to oppose that if that's a workplace requirement. john: you know, those particular terms that many people find so very egregious as opposed to they/them, but especially these

new conceptions of what a woman is, my sense is that those are exactly the sorts of things that are going to become part of a jargon. it will be irdating to find it in, say, human resources materials, etc., though i imagine they're going to retreat them. but that is only ever going to go so far. i think 2020 is a certain kind of person hoping that saying pregnant women and people with a vaginas or something like that would spread but it won't. that goes too against what ordinary human cognition worldwide is. i think that those things are going to retreat. would you agree? do you think that they're beginning to spread and have more influence? my sense is that over the past four years, those things are more in news stories, than something that are making themselves felt beyond a certain circle in society. >> i think a lot of places are

imposing language on people. from probably around 2020, 2021, between anderson cooper and alexander, she exclusively refers to menstruating people and it's like what is she talking about? am i supposed to say that? john: she won't be using those terms in, i predict, 10 years. but 2021 was 2021 and she is of exactly the cohort i am talking about. as somebody of wider influence, watch. joshua: there's time for one last question. [laughter] >> please bear with my language but i'm trying to say something really important. i think i'm more comfortable

with the things that you guys are uncomfortable because my -- one of the latest immigrants to the country. regarding pedphilia, molestation, the spread of this book festival and such, i'm from pang lore, india, i'm from a village five hours from bangalore. india is now the biggest population. in -- 30 years ago it was considered a clean city, it's becoming something else. so whatever we are doing here which i can admire the emulation of the spread of the traditional, freedom of speech and this and that, which i'm a total believer but as i'm growing older i'm looking at it in a different lens. so it's enjoyable, i'm thankful for teaching us and letting us listen for free.

where other places they are charging hundreds of dollars to attend one of these events. what's your strength or if not later on i would like you to please think about how you can influence as a social change or like an input to make the world a better place, like in my case i'm so much -- oh, you're so negative. absolutely not. happy things don't have time to talk about that. but negative things it feels like 2024 and i'm like wow they don't address this, from my small world. i do look at youtube, a little bit of internet. i don't keep a tv but i love to watch. i pay close attention and do my best homework. nowhere else, still not addressing these things. in india.

john: which dielect of tibbett tan? ok, tibbett tan is 25 different languages, really. >> [inaudible] john: i think that the answer to your question is in terms of how to get things out there, don't write a book. that's not very 2024. you should be interested in, one, tweeting despite the atmosphere of it these days. that's a way to get people to listen to you. and then podcasting. put together a podcast, get it out there, most people, by about 10 minutes from now, will prefer to listen rather than to read. that's just the way it's going to be. put it in people's ears. >> i think i'm quite smart but i want to be like you. to be out there.

john: it doesn't matter, all you have to do is practice. you get used to sitting in front of a microphone and just be yourself. which is easier now than it used to be. and you will be able to get to people, especially people who are on the young side, but if that's what you want to do. >> [inaudible] john: as someone said to me actually -- i was at the smithsonian doing an internship in 1987 and i asked a guy, how do you know all these people and know all of that lore about this subject? and he said you hang around. i said what do you mean by that? i hung around. so you just hang around. it's not going to be today. but just hang around. keep plugging at it. and something will almost certainly happen. joshua: we're going to hang around 1 1/2 more minutes. i'll give abigail the last question.

>> so in some cases progressives throw bad or offensive terms on the euphemistic treadmill and try to replace them. in other cases they reclaim these bad words and try to give them a new spin and a new positive connotation. and do you see any sort of consistency or trend or any political or moral framework to why sometimes a linguistic activist will take one rut over the other? john: that's just a matter of old days versus new days. taking a slirk claiming it and making it positive, the examples are all pro feign but we all know what they are. that is -- that's what people used to do. and i always thought of it as very psychologically healthy, including the n word thereunder there are -- and there are some female versions. lately is the idea that you say don't use that word or change it to something else that you weren't aware of before if you don't say that something else you're not ahead of the curve. that's exactly it. they're reclaiming what is normal -- the reclaiming was

normal and i think what psychologists would expect. and is also something you see in languages all over the world. the world for countrymen in italian -- thed were for peasant in russian, men of a certain class and time called each other bas cards or -- bastards in affection. that's normal. it's the modern way which one might have some questions about, versus the old way which was to take it and make it something funny and warm. joshua: thank you all very >> great. well, thank you all very much for turning out. and let's give thanks to joshua. [applause] ♪ ♪ ♪

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>> next a forum on how the justice department is using artificial intelligence and law enforcement. the center for strategic and international studies is a host of this event which includes discussion of an international treaty for using ai a isos te challenges in preventing and enforcing penalties for ai crime. >> my name is jim lewis. thanks to come to csis this morning on a rainy washington day, tail end of hurricane i think. i was preparing for this and i found a quote by alfred north whitehead, ocu never heard of but was a big philosopher in 1900 and he wrote, we make advances by extending the number of important operations we can perform without thinking of them. that was more than a century ago

so automation is not particularly new. this is new flavor of automation and in some ways very different. if we had named artificial intelligence advanced software tools, which is really what they are, but no one wants to make a movie starring arnold schwarzenegger about advanced software tools, so we'll call it ai for the rest of the day. we have a full schedule, and so i think my colleagues from the department of justice for proposing this and for organizing it and looking forward to the speakers. let me go through the list real quickly. we're going to talk about crime, civil rights, facial recognition which is my own pet topic, , and governance, ai governance. we have three panels, ai in crime, ai and governors at doj, and international on ai. we have three lightning talks. this is shorter talks than usual on cryptograms and civil rights. also topics that are really want to hear about.

we have four four keynotes. this is an ambitious program. ambitious but were going to make it work and you're going to help. thomas schneider, chair of the committee on ai at the council of europe. so we appreciate him coming. jacqueline maguire, fbi chief ai officer. congressman don beyer, my congressman so all we do is by little. one thing about don, i was at another event on ai scores and it was closed. he said is taking courses on ai at george mason university. how many of the congressman kean of who are studying the stuff they're doing? amazing. he will be here for lunch. and finally we have nicole argentieri principle deputy attorney general. nicole has a long and distinguished career. her bio will be on our website. she comes initially run for prolonged and then came to the eastern division, eastern district which is the exciting district, right?

and now is at the department of justice as the principal -- i was going to say -- principle deputy attorney general for the criminal division, which is always close to our hearts. what we will do is we will have nicole come up and then we will move to the first panel and take it from there for what should be a fun day. nicole, please come up. thanks for doing this. >> thanks so much. great to be here. good morning. i'm nicole argentieri, principal deputy assistant attorney general for the criminal division. i would like to thank the center for strategic and international studies and our very own computer crime and intellectual property section ctip for the opportunity to address the symposium. this is such a timely discussio discussion. the promises and perils of artificial intelligence are top of mind for the criminal

division and for the department of justice more broadly. as i expect others will discuss today, these new technologies offer important opportunities to enhance our investigation and for law enforcement to become more effective and efficient, carrying out our core mission, to protect the public and uphold the rule of law. the department has always diploid ai to triage reports about potential crimes, to connect the dots across larger data sets, and identify the origin of seized narcotics. as with any transformative technology, ai also present risks for misuse, especially as generative ai makes it easier for criminals to commit crimes, and harder for all of us, law enforcement and civilians alike, to know what is real and what is not. ..