SYS 478: Fall 2026

Course Schedule

Course Schedule

A semester overview of the course topics, meeting dates, readings, and assignments.

Module 1. Humans, Intelligence, and Judgment

  1. Tue, Aug 18
    1.1 Why Does AI Matter as a Public and Ethical Issue?Framing AI as a Public, Ethical, and Contested Question
  2. Thu, Aug 20
    1.2 How Do Humans Learn? Biological FoundationsBrains, neurons, networks, and plasticity as a foundation for thinking about learning before we turn to machines.
    Readings (due before class)
    • Saplakoglu, Y. (2026, April 24). A new type of neuroplasticity rewires the brain after a single experience. Quanta Magazine. Link
    • Vignola, N. (2024). A neuroscientist's guide to reclaiming your brain [Video]. Big Think. Link
    • Sentis. (2012). Neuroplasticity [Video]. YouTube. Link
  3. Tue, Aug 25
    1.3 How Do Humans Learn? Psychological FoundationsIndividual Learning: Behaviorism and Constructivism
    Readings (due before class)
    • Sawyer, R. K. (2014). Introduction: The new science of learning. In R. K. Sawyer (Ed.), The Cambridge handbook of the learning sciences (2nd ed., pp. 1–18). Cambridge University Press. Link
      Available via the Ramsey Library. Please log in via your UNCA Account
    • Pick one
      • Wikipedia contributors. (n.d.). Jean Piaget. In Wikipedia. Link
      • Wikipedia contributors. (n.d.). B. F. Skinner. In Wikipedia. Link
  4. Thu, Aug 27
    1.4 How Do Humans Learn? Sociocultural FoundationsSocial and Political Learning: Vygotsky and Freire
    Readings (due before class)
    • Teachers College, Columbia University. (n.d.). Convocation Masters III: Medalist Luis C. Moll [Video]. YouTube. Link
      (start at around minute 6).
    • Pick one
      • National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. (2018). Context and culture. In How people learn II: Learners, contexts, and cultures. The National Academies Press. Link
      • Freire, P. (1970). Chapter 2. In Pedagogy of the oppressed. Continuum. Link
    DueCareer Module 1
  5. Tue, Sep 1
    1.5 Judgment, Ethics, and Theory of MindWhat can machines imitate, and what might they lack?
    DueCareer Module 1
  6. Thu, Sep 3
    1.6 Imagining Futures: Who Gets to Define the Desirable?What futures do technologies promise, and who gets to define a desirable future?

Module 2. Machines, Data, and AI

  1. Tue, Sep 8
    2.1 How Do Computers Compute?Materials, electricity, transistors, chips, architecture, and logic.
  2. Thu, Sep 10
    2.2 Computing Is PhysicalData centers, energy, water, minerals, and supply chains behind every AI system.
  3. Tue, Sep 15
    2.3 How Did AI Change Over Time?Rules, symbolic AI, representation, and the history of computing.
  4. Thu, Sep 17
    2.4 How Do Technological Change and Labor Markets Shape Life After College?A bridge from AI and work to your economic life after graduation.
  5. Tue, Sep 22
    2.5 What Changed With Machine Learning and Neural Networks?From programmed rules to learned patterns: training data, models, prediction, and GPUs.
  6. Thu, Sep 24
    2.6 What Are Generative AI and LLMs Actually Doing?Prediction, tokens, generation, and uncertainty.

Module 3. A Toolkit for Understanding AI in Society

  1. Tue, Sep 29
    3.1 How Does the World Become Data, and Why Is AI a Sociotechnical System?Classification, measurement, representation, and proxies as your first step toward understanding AI as a sociotechnical system.
  2. Thu, Oct 1
    3.2 What Counts as Skill and Expertise?Human judgment, durable skills, automation, and changing work.
  3. Tue, Oct 6
    Fall BreakNo class
  4. Thu, Oct 8
    3.4 How Do Predictions Become Decisions?Scores, thresholds, classifications, error, and accountability.
  5. Tue, Oct 13
    3.5 Are Predictions Ever Neutral? Norms, Bias, and Technological SolutionismNorms, bias, categories, power, and technological solutionism, and your introduction to the full anticipatory case-study framework.

Module 4. AI Enters the World

  1. Thu, Oct 15
    4.1 Domain A: How Does This Institution Already Work?Establish domain literacy before we turn to AI: values, institutions, authority, labor, and existing inequalities.
  2. Tue, Oct 20
    4.2 Domain A: What Changes When AI Enters?Apply the BRAID framework: capability, deployment conditions, and stakeholders.
  3. Thu, Oct 22
    4.3 Domain B: How Does This Institution Already Work?A second domain, paired with your own career storytelling and interview introductions.
  4. Tue, Oct 27
    4.4 Domain B: What Changes When AI Enters?Distinguish technical mechanism from institutional consequence in the second domain.
  5. Thu, Oct 29
    4.5 Transfer Lab: How Does a Different Institution Work Before AI?A comparative domain analysis: which existing tensions matter most?
  6. Tue, Nov 3
    4.6 How Are Opportunity and Professional Life Shaped by Networks and AI Tools?Social capital, networking, and emerging AI tools in your professional life.

Module 5. Patterns Across Domains: AI, Power, and Political Economy

  1. Thu, Nov 5
    5.1 What Patterns Recur Across Domains?Labor, expertise, authority, dependency, and risk across the domains you've studied so far.
  2. Tue, Nov 10
    5.2 Who Controls AI?Firms, infrastructure, data, compute, labor, concentration, and rents.
  3. Thu, Nov 12
    5.3 What Responsibilities Do People Have Inside Organizations Adopting AI?Fit, power, boundaries, and solutionism from the inside, paired with a career reflection on how you want to show up.

Module 6. Governing Futures That Do Not Yet Exist

  1. Tue, Nov 17
    University Senior SymposiumNo class
  2. Thu, Nov 19
    6.2 What Is Technically Different About Neuromorphic Computing?Ground brain-inspired hardware in its mechanism before we turn to anticipatory governance.
  3. Tue, Nov 24
    6.3 How Can We Govern an Emerging Technology Before Its Uses Are Settled?A full anticipatory case-study exercise: deployment conditions, domains, scenarios, and governance.

Module 7. Synthesis: Professional and Civic Responsibility

  1. Thu, Nov 26
    Thanksgiving BreakNo class
  2. Tue, Dec 1
    7.2 What Responsibilities Do We Have as Professionals and Global Citizens?Your career readiness synthesis presentation and closing reflection.

Module 8. Final Public Explainers and ELSI Presentations

    UNC Asheville Department of Computer Science