In the media
Artificial Intelligence is growing fast, are jobs at risk?
Last year, AI (Artificial Intelligence) experienced a breakthrough in the public eye. From art and portraits made by AI to articles and columns: the computer does it all with ease. But is AI already good enough to completely replace humans? Piek Vossen, VU Amsterdam professor of Computational Lexicology, talks about this in RTL News.
Photo: Piek Vossen by Riechelle van der Valk
Did people in the Middle Ages only drink beer and no water?
Contrary to popular belief, people in the Middle Ages did not only drink beer. The quality of drinking water between 1000 and 1500 was actually not that bad. Professor of Water and Environmental History at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Petra van Dam, tells EenVandaag about this.
Photo: Petra van Dam by Bert Brouwenstijn
The city is getting congested. What now?!
The city is crowded. We live, work and relax in the city. And the residents want everything within reach, preferably as soon as possible. Can that be sustained? What are the solutions to the problems created by all the vans, flash delivery couriers and fast e-bikes? Bob Pierik, postdoctoral researcher at VU Amsterdam on the ‘Flash City’ at the Universiteit van Nederland.
Photo: Bob Pierik by Joy Hansson
The Franco-German axis from past to future
After Brexit, the war in Ukraine and the German Zeitenwende (turning point), the focus is once again on the Franco-German axis. Can they still provide direction to the future of Europe and has the gap from their shared past been definitively bridged? Maarten Doorman's new book Een jager in het woud (A hunter in the forest) is a historical X-ray of the way France and Germany view each other. Maarten Doorman is an endowed professor of the history of German culture and is on behalf of the Germany Institute at VU Amsterdam.
Read the book reviews on Trouw.nl and Volkskrant.nl
Photo: Maarten Doorman by Joshua Rood
magazine for humanities alumni june 2023