Five for Friday: APIs that care, chatbots that (probably) don’t, smart ventilators, and smarter teeth

Need to prep for next week’s virtual water cooler (or Slack) power chitchat? Check out these quick takes from the worlds of field service, technology, and dental hygiene.

• “In Machines We Trust” is the name of the new podcast on the intersection of AI and automation from MIT Technology Review. (And yes, the word “trust” seems to be meant in a postmodern, ironic, hipster sense that has an implied question mark at the end.)
• MIT professor Sherry Turkle has made a career of turning a mirror on technology from the dual perspective of someone perched deeply inside an incubator of innovation while still retaining the detached perspective of an independent analytical observer. Her latest subject: the chatbots we love to hate.
• Ever wondered how the ideas of iconic industrial designer Charles Eames laid the foundation for your favorite empathetic APIs? If so, the latest issue of Increment will be just your cup of tea.
• From Times of India, a new family of AI-driven ventilators offer some promising advances in the treatment of COVID-19.
• And from Engadget: AI is also ready to sink its teeth into...teeth, the final frontier.

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