Cognizant’s Babak Hodjat Highlights Human-AI Collaboration Challenges at Cairo Summit

Babak Hodjat, Chief AI Officer at Cognizant, shared his insights on the evolving relationship between humans and intelligent systems during the inaugural AI Summit in Cairo. Hodjat emphasized the inherent tension between the desire to understand every decision made by algorithms and the practical need to design AI systems that operate efficiently while granting a controlled degree of operational autonomy.

Speaking at a panel discussion, Hodjat noted that AI discussions have shifted from theoretical debates to wide-scale practical applications, accelerated by the launch of ChatGPT in November 2022. “While AI research has been ongoing for decades, the move to everyday personal and enterprise use has intensified public dialogue and raised complex questions about governance and accountability,” he explained.

Hodjat also highlighted a critical gap between corporate discourse on AI Alignment and the actual design and training of AI models. “Humans are accustomed to post-hoc error evaluation,” he said. “But this approach is inadequate for systems making real-time decisions with potentially wide-ranging impacts, necessitating proactive safeguards before deployment rather than reactive fixes.”