Amid the warm Manila breeze, in a university hall buzzing with intellect, renowned AI investor Joseph Plazo laid down the gauntlet on what technology can realistically offer for the economic frontier—and why understanding this may define who wins in tomorrow’s markets.
Tension and curiosity pulsed through the room. A sea of bright minds—some eagerly recording on their phones, others streaming the moment live—waited for a man revered for blending code with contrarianism.
“AI will make trades for you,” Plazo began, calm but direct. “But it won’t teach you why to believe in them.”
Over the next sixty minutes, Plazo delivered a fast-paced masterclass, intertwining machine logic with human flaws. His central claim: AI is brilliant, but blind.
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Bright Minds Confront the Machine’s Limits
Before him sat students and faculty from prestigious universities across Asia, assembled under a pan-Asian finance forum.
Many expected a victory lap of AI's dominance. Instead, they got a reality check.
“There’s a growing religion around AI,” said Prof. Maria Castillo, a respected AI ethicist from the UK. “We need this kind of discomfort in academia.”
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The Machine’s Blindness: Plazo’s Case for Caution
Plazo’s core thesis was both simple and unsettling: AI does not grasp nuance.
“AI won’t flinch, but neither will it foresee,” he warned. “It finds trends, but not intentions.”
He cited examples like AI systems freezing during the 2020 pandemic declaration, noting, “By the time the algorithms adjusted, the humans were already positioned.”
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The Astronomer Analogy
Plazo didn’t argue against AI—but for boundaries.
“AI is the vehicle—but you decide the direction,” he said. It sees—but doesn’t think.
Students pressed him on behavioral economics, to which Plazo acknowledged: “Sure, it can flag Reddit anomalies—but it can’t feel a market’s pulse.”
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A check here Mental Shift Among Asia’s Finest
The talk sparked introspection.
“I believed in the supremacy of code,” said Lee Min-Seo, a quant-in-training from South Korea. “Now I realize it also needs wisdom—and that’s the hard part.”
In a post-talk panel, regional leaders backed Plazo’s call. “These kids speak machine natively—but instinct,” said Dr. Raymond Tan, “doesn’t replace perspective.”
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Co-Intelligence: Merging Math with Meaning
Plazo shared that his firm is building “hybrid cognition models”—AI that understands not just volatility, but motive.
“Ethics can’t be outsourced to software,” he reminded. “Judgment remains human territory.”
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An Ending That Sparked a Beginning
As Plazo exited the stage, the hall erupted. But more importantly, they stayed behind.
“I came for machine learning,” said a PhD candidate. “Instead, I got something more powerful—perspective.”
In knowing what AI can’t do, we sharpen what we can.