The PAIR Distinguished Lecture delivered by Turing Award Laureate Prof. Joseph SIFAKIS, Emeritus Senior CNRS Researcher at Verimag Laboratory, was successfully held on 3 March 2023. The webinar attracted about 800 participants from more than 50 countries and regions, including Australia, Belgium, China, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, India, Italy, Malaysia, the Netherlands, Pakistan, the Philippines, Singapore, Spain, Taiwan, the United Kingdom and the United States. It was also broadcasted live on multiple social media platforms, including Bilibili and Weibo, and viewed by an online audience of over 12,000 in total.
The webinar was kick-started by Prof. CHEN Qingyan, Director of PolyU Academy for Interdisciplinary Research (PAIR) and Chair Professor of Building Thermal Science in the Department of Building Environment and Energy Engineering at PolyU, followed by a welcome speech by Prof. Christopher CHAO, Vice President (Research and Innovation) and Chair Professor of Thermal and Environmental Engineering at PolyU, and a speaker introduction by Prof. CHEN Changwan, PAIR Management Committee Member and Chair Professor of Visual Computing at PolyU.
Prof. Sifakis shared his major work on the formalisation of system design as a process leading from given requirements to trustworthy, optimised and correct-by-construction implementation. He first presented an analogy between human and machine intelligence, followed by a review of the transition from automation to autonomy in the development of trustworthy autonomous systems. He concluded the lecture by discussing the impacts of artificial intelligent systems.
A question-and-answer session moderated by Prof. Chen Qingyan and Prof. Chen Changwen followed. The audience was inspired to engage in a fruitful exchange with Prof. Sifakis.
