In this conversation, we sit down with Dr. Michelle Morkert, a global gender scholar, leadership expert, and founder of the Women’s Leadership Collective, to unpack the forces shaping women’s relationship with AI.

We begin with research indicating that women are 20–25% less likely to use AI than men, but quickly move beyond the statistics to explore the deeper social, historical, and structural reasons why.

Dr. Morkert brings her feminist and intersectional perspective to these questions, offering frameworks that help us see beyond the surface-level narratives of gender and AI use. This conversation is less about “women using AI” and more about power, history, social norms, and the systems we’re all navigating.

If you’ve ever wondered why AI feels different for women—or what a more ethical, community-driven approach to AI might look like—this episode is for you.

💬 Guest: Dr. Michelle Morkert – https://www.michellemorkert.com

📚 Books & Scholarly Works Mentioned

• Global Evidence on Gender Gaps
  and Generative AI: https://www.hbs.edu/ris/Publication%20Files/25023_52957d6c-0378-4796-99fa-aab684b3b2f8.pdf
• Pink Pilled: Women and the Far Right (Lois Shearing): https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/pink-pilled-lois-shearing/1144991652l
• Scary Smart (Mo Gawdat – maternal AI concept)
  https://www.mogawdat.com/scary-smart

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In this episode, Jessica teaches Kimberly about the "containment problem," a concept that explores whether we can actually control advanced technologies like AI and synthetic biology.

Inspired by Mustafa Suleyman's book The Coming Wave, Jessica and Kimberly discuss why containment might be impossible, the democratization of powerful technologies, and the surprising world of DIY genetic engineering (yes, you can buy a frog modification kit for your garage).

What We Cover:

• What is the containment problem and why it matters
• The difference between AGI, ASI, and ACI
• Why AI is fundamentally different from nuclear weapons when it comes to containment
• Synthetic biology: from AlphaFold to $1,099 frog gene editing kits
• The geopolitical arms race and why profit motives complicate containment
• How technology democratization gives individuals unprecedented power
• Whether complete AI containment is even possible (spoiler: probably not)
• The modern Turing test and why perception might be reality

Books & Resources Mentioned:

• Empire of AI by Karen Hao
• DeepMind documentary

Key Themes:

• Technology inevitability vs. choice
• The challenges of regulating rapidly evolving technologies
• Who benefits from AI advancement?
• The tension between innovation and safety

Follow Women Talking About AI for more conversations exploring the implications, opportunities, and challenges of artificial intelligence.

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Contact Jessica or Kimberly on LinkedIn:

• Jessica's LinkedIn
• Kimberly's LinkedIn

On saying no to “inevitable” AI—and what we say yes to instead.

Kimberly and Jessica recently sat down with Melanie Dusseau and Miriam Reynoldson for an episode of Women Talkin’ ’Bout AI. We were especially looking forward to this conversation because Melanie and Miriam are our first guests who openly identify as “AI Resisters.” The timing also felt right. Both Kimberly and I have been reexamining our own stance on AI in education—how it intersects with learning, writing, and creativity—and the more distance we’ve had from running a tech company, the more critical and curious we’ve become.

This episode digs into big, thorny questions:

• What Melanie calls “the drumbeat of inevitability” that pressures educators to adopt AI
• Miriam’s post-digital view of what it means to live in a world completely entangled with technology; and our shared inquiry into who actually benefits when AI tools promise to make everything faster and more efficient.
• We also talk about data ethics, creative integrity, and the growing movement of educators saying no to automation—not out of fear, but out of care for human learning and connection.

It’s a thoughtful, challenging, and hopeful conversation—and we hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

About our guests: Melanie is an Associate Professor of English at the University of Findlay and a writer whose work spans poetry, plays, and fiction. Miriam is a Melbourne-based digital learning designer, educator, and PhD candidate at RMIT University whose research explores the value of learning in times of digital ubiquity.

Melanie and Miriam are co-authors of the Open Letter from Educators Who Refuse the Call to Adopt GenAI in Education, which has collected over 1,000 signatures and was featured in an article by Forbes. Melanie is also the author of the essay Burn It Down, which advocates for AI resistance in the academy. We highly recommend reading both before diving into the episode.

1. Melanie's personal website and University of Findlay profile
2. Miriam’s personal website and blog "Care Doesn't Scale"
3. Signs Preceding the End of the World by Yuri Herrera
4. Asimov’s Science Fiction
5. Ursula K. Le Guin
6. Ray Bradbury

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• Jessica's LinkedIn
• Kimberly's LinkedIn