Specialist conference “Generative AI unleashed: control, creativity, crisis?”

Almost three years ago, an inconspicuous chatbot caused turmoil in the digital ecosystem: ChatGPT sparked a “Cambrian explosion” of digital services that has since spread and conquered many areas of life and work.

Generative AI is currently considered the driving force behind technological progress – it raises hopes, shapes expectations for the future, but also fuels fears and concerns about profound upheaval.

While generative AI has paved the way for new opportunities in a wide variety of domains as a basic technology, it also brings with it unknown problems.

Philosopher Nick Bostrom, for example, says: “The biggest problem with AI is not malice, but the mismatch between its goals and ours.” Communication expert Miriam Merkel criticizes “the threat of text incest!” referring to the flood of synthetically created content that threatens to overwhelm us.

Generative AI is already having a serious impact on knowledge, creativity, and even entire information ecosystems. At the same time, it promises unprecedented leaps in performance, for example in robotics, and provides previously unimaginable capabilities for learning and acting in real time.

This conference invites decision-makers, researchers, and experts from various disciplines to pause and reflect after nearly three years of rapid developments in this area. We want to identify the current challenges and explore their medium- and long-term implications.