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Human Experience and AI Regulation: What European Union Law Brings to Digital Technology Ethics
Get PDFAlthough nearly all artificial intelligence (AI) regulatory documents now reference the importance of human-centering digital systems, we frequently see AI ethics itself reduced to limited concerns, such as bias and, sometimes, power consumption. Although their impacts on human lives and our ecosystem render both of these absolutely critical, the ethical and regulatory challenges and obligations relating to AI do not stop there. Joseph Weizenbaum described the potential abuse of intelligent systems to make inhuman cruelty and acts of war more emotionally accessible to human operators. But more than this, he highlighted the need to solve the social issues that facilitate violent acts of war, and the immense potential the use of computers offers in this context. The present article reviews how the EU’s digital regulatory legislation—well enforced—could help us address such concerns. I begin by reviewing why the EU leads in this area, considering the legitimacy of its actions both regionally and globally. I then review the legislation already protecting us—the General Data Protection Regulation, the Digital Services Act, and the Digital Markets Act—and consider their role in achieving Weizenbaum’s goals. Finally, I consider the almost-promulgated AI Act before concluding with a brief discussion of the potential for future enforcement and more global regulatory cooperation.The Weizenbaum Institute is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF
Proceedings of the Weizenbaum Conference 2023. AI, Big Data, Social Media and People on the Move
Get PDFThe contributions focus on the question of what role different digital technologies play for “people on the move” - with “people on the move” being understood both spatially (migration and flight) and in terms of economic and social change (changing working conditions, access conditions). The authors discuss phenomena such as disinformation and algorithmic bias from different perspectives, and the possibilities, limits and dangers of generative artificial intelligence.This work has been funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research of Germany (BMBF) (grant no.: 16DII121, 16DII122, 16DII123, 16DII124, 16DII125, 16DII126, 16DII127, 16DII128 – “Deutsches Internet-Institut”)
Resiliencia de las esferas públicas en la crisis sanitaria mundial
Get PDFThe COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the "normal" modes of functioning of the public sphere and activated an experimental mode of coping that has reinvented forms of public and communicative exchanges. In this article, we conceptualize the social responses triggered by the crisis as particular forms of public sphere resilience, and assess the role of digitization and digital spaces in the emergence of different modes and dynamics of resilience. In our conception, we examine three areas of public sphere experimentation: political consumption, political protest mobilization and news consumption. We discuss the general characteristics of public sphere resilience across social sub-spheres and highlight the dynamics and hybridisations that structure emerging public spaces. Resilience practices are accompanied by dynamics of politicisation and depoliticization, as well as shifts in the boundaries of the public and the private. Our observations also reveal the dynamic interplay between resilience and resistance
Artificial muses: Generative Artificial Intelligence Chatbots Have Risen to Human-Level Creativity
Get PDFA widespread view is that Artificial Intelligence cannot be creative. We tested this assumption by comparing human-generated ideas with those generated by six Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI) chatbots: , , ChatGPT (versions 3 and 4), , and YouChat. Humans and a specifically trained AI independently assessed the quality and quantity of ideas. We found no qualitative difference between AI and human-generated creativity, although there are differences in how ideas are generated. Interestingly, 9.4 percent of humans were more creative than the most creative GAI, GPT-4. Our findings suggest that GAIs are valuable assistants in the creative process. Continued research and development of GAI in creative tasks is crucial to fully understand this technology's potential benefits and drawbacks in shaping the future of creativity. Finally, we discuss the question of whether GAIs are capable of being truly creative.This research project was partly funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (Funding Number: 16DII133
Künstliche Intelligenz zum Schutz der natürlichen Welt? Einführung in ethische und gesellschaftsfreundliche Künstliche Intelligenz (KI) mit Blick auf den Naturschutz
Get PDFMeasuring Mobile Broadband: Challenges and Implications for Policymaking
Get PDFMobile broadband networks constitute essential infrastructure to enable a wide range of innovative services and use cases anticipated for our digital economy future. Measuring performance is essential in many ways. First, to allow service providers to manage and develop their networks. Second, for the efficient operation of markets, and third, for evidence-based policymaking. In the rapidly evolving digital economy, capabilities for collecting more fine-grained measurements and analytics that deliver insights to enable real-time network management and localized control are expanding. As the fundamental methods used to collect measurement data are changing, the ecosystem of stakeholders with strategic interests in mobile measurement is growing and becoming more complex, posing challenges and opportunities for policymakers. Against the background of this growing complexity, this paper aims to discuss some basic features of a capable and reliable measurement ecosystem for mobile broadband. We document how the mobile broadband measurement ecosystem has changed and discuss its implications on a number of important broadband policy issues.Volker Stocker would like to acknowledge funding by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research of Germany (BMBF) under grant no. 16DII131 (Weizenbaum-Institut für die vernetzte Gesellschaft — Das Deutsche Internet-Institut
TechDo Digest 1x3: July 2023
No full textThe TechDo Digest is the literature overview of the research group "Technology, Power and Domination" at the Weizenbaum Institute. Every two to three months, the group curates a list of relevant new publications within their field, focussing on analyses of structures of power and domination in digitalized societies, changes to democratic processes, regulation of and through technology, and the contestation of digital technologies. This edition features articles that appeared between May and July 2023.The Weizenbaum Institute is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF
Weizenbaum Panel’s Literature Digest: August 2023
No full textDer Literatur Digest ist eine monatlich erscheinende Zusammenstellung des aktuellen Forschungsstandes zu Themen an der Schnittstelle zwischen Digitalisierung und Politik. Er präsentiert die neuesten Erkenntnisse zu Fragen der politischen Partizipation und guter Bürgerschaft in Zeiten der Digitalisierung.
Zusätzlich zum PDF bieten wir den Digest im BibTeX-Austauschformat an.The Literature Digest is a monthly compilation of the current state of research on topics at the nexus of digitalization and politics. It presents the latest findings on issues of political participation and good citizenship in times of digitalization.
In addition, we provide this Literature Digest as BibTeX file.This work has been funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research of Germany (BMBF) (grant no.: 16DII111, 16DII112, 16DII113, 16DII114, 16DII115, 16DII116, 16DII117 – „Deutsches Internet-Institut“
The effects of narratives and popularity cues on signing online petitions in two advanced democracies
Get PDFOnline petitions have become a widespread vehicle for contemporary political participation. While research tends to focus on individual factors for potential petitioners that influence signing, less attention has been paid to the influence of the actual text of petitions. This paper uses data from an original web-based survey experiment in Australia and Germany to test the influence of content factors: narratives (i.e., stories based on individual experiences and emotions) and popularity cues (i.e., high numbers of signatures) across two issues: climate change and welfare policy. We find that narratives within petition texts involve readers through the mechanism of transportation and motivate them to sign petitions, as do popularity cues. The effects of narratives were found across both countries but tended to be stronger in Germany than in Australia. We argue that our novel framework can be used for future research on how the presentation of issues shape contemporary political participation.This work was supported by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research under Grant 16DII125; Australian Research Council Discovery Project Grant, DP16010255
A Democratic Approach to Digital Rights: Comparing Perspectives on Digital Sovereignty on the City Level
Get PDFThis article will be drawing on two cases to reflect on the impact of different ways of practicing civic engagement in urban digitalization policy. Both cases reflect on the importance of cities playing an active role in the promotion of digital rights, obligation of public participation in digital policy making, and need for political digital education to enable democratic conversations on digital transformation. From a democratic theory point of view, the shifts happening through the digitalization of societies raise interesting questions regarding what modes of governance should be implemented for improving digital sovereignty, which could be in line with “locally” grounded politics. Theoretically, the article will frame these issues of governance and civic participation within the literature on “digital sovereignty,” understood as going beyond national territory toward issues of independence, democratic control, and autonomy over digital infrastructures, technologies, and content