Vazquez, Sergio

Period 3
Weekly Vocabulary Response

Lesson 26: Words Relating To People Often Mentioned on the SAT

1. Adversary 2. Orator 3. Advocate 4. Pariah 5. Artisan 6. Raconteur 7. Ascetic

8. Skeptic 9. Charlatan 10. Virtuoso 11. Hedonist

Ford and AI

Ford has recently announced that they will invest $1 billion dollars in the next five years

on Argo AI, a new artificial intelligence company. Ford has been known to be an advocate3 for

mobility services as they see it more profitable than the making and selling of cars. The unique

virtuoso10 in automaking is now moving towards creating self-driving cars that will act more as a

ride-hailing service such as Uber and Lyft. Ford also stated that Argo AI will act as an artisan5

that will develop the autonomous vehicle technology for their cars and will also serve as a

subsidiary shareholder. Ford has acted as an orator2 for technology and efficiency in the past

being the first to practice the assembly line in factories in the early 20th century and mass

produce automobiles. With Fords newest plans; however, the idea of a self-driving car seems

part of the near future and makes for a great story for any ranconteur6 to tell his family at the

next dinner. If all goes well, within a couple of years any hedonist11 will be able to summon a

self-driving car as their personal taxi.

Big plans like these come with a lot of adversary1 leaving a lot of skeptics8 questioning

the future of Ford and the safety of a self-driving car. An ascetic7 for instance might view the

concept of a car having a mind of its own as something demonic and diabolical which might

result in a loss of profits for Ford if more people start to obtain this kind of mindset. Despite this
kind of opposition from pariahs4, companies like Google, Uber, Chrysler, and General Motors

are also striving to create autonomous vehicles of their own. In response to this competition and

to avoid being called a charlatan9, Ford has already acquired Chariot (a shuttle bus service),

invested in Civil Maps (develops 3-D mapping technology), and purchased SAIPS (a company

that develops machine learning and computer-vision technology). Ford is hard as work and

consumers should expect to see more updates on Fords progress in the upcoming months.

Sources:

1)https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/10/technology/ford-invests-billion-artificial-intelligence.ht

ml?_r=0

2) http://www.businessinsider.com/ford-invests-1-billion-argo-ai-for-self-driving-cars-2017-2