Cynthia Rudin - Episode 86
From ACM ByteCast by Association for Computing Machinery (ACM)
May 28, 2026 · 41 min · Episode 86
About this episode
Cynthia Rudin discusses the importance of interpretable AI and her work in various fields.
In this episode of ACM ByteCast, Rashmi Mohan hosts 2025 ACM Fellow Cynthia Rudin, the Gilbert, Louis, and Edward Lehrman Distinguished Professor of Computer Science, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Statistical Science, Mathematics, and Biostatistics and Bioinformatics at Duke University, where she leads the Interpretable Machine Learning Lab. Her lab, which seeks to design predictive ML models that people can understand, focuses on areas including healthcare, criminal justice, and energy reliability. Among her honors, she has received the Squirrel Award for Artificial Intelligence from the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), as well as the IJCAI John McCarthy Award. Rudin was recently named an ACM Fellow for contributions to and leadership in interpretable machine learning and societal applications. In the interview, Cynthia clarifies the crucial distinction between "interpretable" and “explainable" AI and makes the argument that true interpretability is foundational to trustworthy, ethical AI. She shares her extensive field experience collaborating with Con Edison engineers on power grid maintenance, neurologists on medical diagnostics, and…
People in this episode
Host: Rashmi Mohan
Guest: Cynthia Rudin
Topics covered
- interpretable machine learning
- AI ethics
- healthcare
- criminal justice
- energy reliability
Keywords
- interpretable AI
- explainable AI
- machine learning
- healthcare
- criminal justice
- energy reliability
- trustworthy AI
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: Duke University, Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence, Cambridge Police Department, Con Edison
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