In a rare keynote that blended technical acumen with philosophical depth, famed AI strategist Joseph Plazo confronted the beliefs held by the academic elite: judgment and intuition remain irreplaceable.
MANILA — The applause wasn’t merely courteous—it carried the weight of contemplation. Within the echoing walls of UP’s lecture forum, future leaders from NUS, Kyoto, HKUST and AIM anticipated a celebration of automation and innovation.
But they left with something deeper: a challenge.
Joseph Plazo, the architect behind high-accuracy trading machines, refused to glorify the machine. Instead, he opened with a paradox:
“AI can beat the market. But only if you teach it when not to try.”
The crowd stiffened.
It wasn’t a sermon on efficiency—it was a meditation on limits.
### Machines Without Meaning
Plazo systematically debunked the myth that AI can autonomously outwit human investors.
He displayed footage of algorithmic blunders— trades that defied logic, machines acting on misread signals, and neural nets confused by human nuance.
“ Most of what we call AI is trained on yesterday. But investing happens tomorrow.”
It wasn’t alarmist. It was sobering.
Then came the core question.
“ Can your code feel the 2008 crash? Not the price charts—the dread. The stunned silence. The smell of collapse?”
No one answered.
### When Students Pushed Back
Bright minds pushed back.
A doctoral student from Kyoto proposed that large language models are already detecting sentiment and adjusting forecasts.
Plazo nodded. “ Yes. But knowing someone is angry doesn’t mean you know what they’ll do. ”
Another student from HKUST asked if real-time data and news could eventually simulate conviction.
Plazo replied:
“You can simulate storms. But you can’t fake the thunder. Conviction isn't just data—it’s character.”
### The Tools—and the Trap
Plazo warned of a coming danger: not faulty AI, but blind faith in it.
He described traders who no longer read earnings reports or monetary policy—they just obeyed the algorithm.
“This is not evolution. It’s abdication.”
Still, he wasn’t preaching rejection.
His firm uses sophisticated neural networks—but never without human oversight.
“The most dangerous phrase of the next decade,” he warned, “will be: ‘The model told me to do it.’”
### Asia’s Crossroads
The message hit home in Asia, where automation is often embraced uncritically.
“Automation here is almost sacred,” noted Dr. Anton Leung, AI ethicist. “The warning is more info clear: intelligence without interpretation is still dangerous.”
During a closed-door discussion afterward, Plazo urged for AI literacy—not just in code, but in consequence.
“Make them question, not just program.”
Final Words
His final words were more elegy than pitch.
“The market,” Plazo said, “is messy, human, emotional—a plot, not a proof. And if your AI doesn’t read character, it’ll trade noise for narrative.”
The room held its breath.
What followed was not excitement, but reflection.
It wasn’t about the tech. It was the tone.
He didn’t offer hype. He offered warning.
And for those who came to worship at the altar of AI,
it was the wake-up call no one anticipated.