Fairfield University’s Regina A. Quick Center for the Arts will welcome XLabs CEO Radhika Dirks on Thursday, Oct. 26 at 7:30 p.m., for a timely discussion on the impact of Artificial Intelligence on our lives.

Her lecture, titled “The Future is Here: The Promise and Peril of Artificial Intelligence,” is part of the Quick Center’s Open VISIONS Forum series, designed to build community engagement and to encourage academic integration of timely topics brought to campus by distinguished lecturers and leaders. Through the Charles F. Dolan School of Business's Waide Center for Applied Ethics, this event is made possible with the generous support of Patrick J. Waide ’59.

Radhika Dirks is the CEO and co-founder of XLabs, a “moonshot factory” for AI innovations to solve significant problems, such as getting closer to a cure for cancer. She believes in the power of these “moonshots”— bold ideas that change everything — and sees AI as the key to making moonshots a reality. At the same time, Dirks understands that innovative technologies can do harm, and her presentation will explain both risks and benefits.

“Moonshots have always been seen as projects that take decades and billions of dollars to accomplish,” Dirks has said, “but with the power of this automated, open-source creativity in your hands, the cost of access becomes very low.” 

“Artificial intelligence is changing business, the arts, medicine, really everything in our lives,” noted Peter Van Heerden, the Quick Center’s executive director. “This is an opportunity to hear directly from an industry pioneer who is deeply entrenched in the world of AI, and can impart valuable guidance to all of us.”

Dirks’ Artificial Intelligence leadership also includes co-founding Seldn, an AI start-up that accurately predicted the rise of ISIS two weeks before The New York Times coined the term. She was also a founding member of Shell’s $1.5B venture capital group and was COO of Rotary Gallop, a game theory-based fintech firm. She holds a PhD in quantum computing and an MS in nanotechnology from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

This OVF lecture is sponsored by Moffly Media, Delamar Southport, Delamar Spa, Artisan, Moffly Media, and Westport Journal. Tickets are now on sale on quickcenter.com for $35, or $25 for Quick Members; $50 includes ticket to lecture as well as a cocktail reception with the speaker prior to the event. For more information, contact the Quick Center Box Office at 203-254-4010, Monday through Friday, from 12 to 5 p.m.