Being human in the time of neuroscience and artificial intelligence involve carefully exploring the nexuses of complexity where valid ideas are nevertheless in tension, manifesting subtleties and challenges that must not be overlooked. Each page expresses the existing tension(s) between ideas and within each theme, which emerged in the collective discussions, and are then complemented by insights from NHNAI network researchers.

Complexity on democracy #2: AI at the service of human collective intelligence

Many participants point that policy and decision making must remain based on human interaction and collective reflection and deliberation. There is a large consensus against government by machines (technocracy), a large consensus on the fact that AI should not replace humans in decision making, in particular in the key field of collective political decisions. On the contrary, human relationships and empathy are key for collective decision making and should be preserve and reinforced.

In this respect, digital tools already provided tremendous possibilities for information exchange and collective debates at unprecedent geographic scales and temporal pace. With internet and social networks, information sharing became extremely liberalized.

Nevertheless, this liberalization of our collective information landscape also triggered the problem of having too much information available and the need to editorialize it more efficiently. In this respect, discussions reflect serious worries about recommendation algorithm that can reinforce biases and isolation of given groups by creating echo chambers and information bubbles. These processes can even be exploited for voluntary manipulation. In any case, this leads to weakening of our collective relationship to truthfulness in policy and societal debates, thus diminishing instead of enhancing our collective intelligence capacities, our ability to be genuine persons in our citizen life with autonomy.

Some participants highlight in this respect the problem of mediatic hypes and the tendency to fall for sensationalism (including hypes and sensationalism about AI itself) which reinforces the problem of information editorialization while more responsible journalism is more necessary than ever.

In general, participants insist upon the need for fostering critical thinking to better navigate our information landscapes and to support our collective intelligence and policy- and decision-making abilities. AI could be of great help in this respect, for instance by contributing to improve the quality of information or by supporting the fight against (deep) fakes news and their dissemination (social networks moderation).

The following ideas can be found in the global and local summaries downloadable here

  • Governing should remain a human activity, with decision-making based on human interaction;
    • (Global – Democracy) Privileging AI cooperation and support instead of human replacement
    • (Global – Democracy) Preserving empathy, human contact and relationships
    • (Global – Democracy) Preserving human responsibility on ethical choices/decision-making
  • AI put our collective intelligence and decision-making capabilities at risk:
    • (Global – Democracy) Preventing AI from undermining humans’ critical thinking, decision-making abilities, and collective intelligence
  • Need to foster critical thinking:
    • (Global – Democracy) Fostering literacy and critical thinking to preserve and strengthen democracy
  • AI supporting our collective intelligence and decision-making processes:
    • Privileging AI cooperation and support instead of human replacement
    • Acknowledging the positive (potential) impact of AI on human life while asking the right questions
Insights from NHNAI academic network:

The debate between Hugues Bersini and Antoinette Rouvroy in Belgium is particularly enlighting for this nexus of complexities:

Bersini: “My definition of algorithmic governmentality is in fact the implementation of an algorithmic executive, only in the social spheres that are most threatened by the evolution of the world (environment, inequality, etc.) and whose legitimacy would emerge from a new form of legislative power based largely on a new practice of citizen coding, transparent, flexible and constantly adaptable. »[1]

Rouvroy: “For algorithms, the only ‘facts’ are the data, rendered amnesiac of the conditions under which they were produced. Yet facts, or data, are never more than the reflection or effects of power relations, domination, discriminatory practices or the stigmatisation with which social reality is riddled. (…) The regimes of enunciation, veridiction and justification (Foucault’s regimes of truth) are replaced by a regime of optimisation and pre-emption. The categories or forms (ideologically contestable, subjectively biased, always a little ‘inadequate’, etc.) through which we are socially, culturally, politically or ideologically predisposed to perceive and evaluate the events of the world and its inhabitants are thus replaced by the detection of signals in ‘real time’ and an anticipatory evaluation not of what people or events ‘are’, but, in the mode of ‘credit’, of the opportunities, propensities, risks, etc. that their forms of life ‘carry’. The aim of algorithmic modelling is no longer to produce ‘knowledge’, but to provide operational information that is neither true nor false, but sufficiently reliable to justify pre-emptive action strategies. »[2]

About the war of AIs: https://www.latribune.fr/opinions/tribunes/lutte-contre-la-desinformation-la-guerre-des-intelligences-artificielles-997066.html

[1] https://www.pointculture.be/articles/focus/gouvernementalite-algorithmique-3-questions-antoinette-rouvroy-et-hugues-bersini/

[2] https://www.pointculture.be/articles/focus/gouvernementalite-algorithmique-3-questions-antoinette-rouvroy-et-hugues-bersini/