In recent years, generative AI tools, such as AI chatbots, have created ethically controversial situations. Take the case of the American teenager Sewel Setzer III for example, whose last words were to a chatbot he had fallen in love with, before dying by suicide.
Additionally, artists and creatives are questioning the ethics and originality of works generated by using AI-platforms, such as Midjourney and DALL-E (see the controversies over Jason M. Allen’s Théâtre D’opéra Spatial). This prompts the question: what kind of ethical AI tools do we need in our digital futures and how do we shape them?
In this panel with an AI ethics expert, artist-activist, and digital performance specialist, the above-mentioned question will be discussed. Further issues that will be explored include: how to innovate AI that is not based on the concept that AI has to imitate human – where chatbots are advertised as “feel alive”, or AI platforms that create artworks – and how to avoid replicating the extractive and exploitative logic and practices of the major generative AI platforms, and the Big Tech behind them? How to create ethical AI tools that assist humans to explore new dimensions of connectivity and creativity?
HAMLET has received funding from the European Commission under the HORIZON-CL2-2024-HERITAGE-01 call under Grant Agreement number 101178362.
