The Generative Revolution
Ethics in the New Wave of AI
This post is part of the EQUATION publication. Follow the link below to access the full issue.
Dear Reader,
What do you fear most about generative AI?
Is it the privacy concerns about data sourcing and security? The bias embedded in the training processes? Or maybe the agency challenges in the questions around IP and patenting? All of these, and many more, are all very real and very valid risks - this is emerging technology, and there will always be risks when you introduce something new to the market.
But as those of you who know and work with me, I am not one to dwell on fear. As an ethicist, I will acknowledge and safeguard against the multitude of risks -but my focus has always been drawn to the opportunity we have as people to collaborate with the machines we are creating.
Generative AI applications like ChatGPT and Midjourney offer new and exciting avenues for growth. As you will find in this issue, we’ve embraced this new technology on a limited scale, using it to generate cover images and article titles - although the articles are exclusively human creations.
However, no matter the number of opportunities generative AI may open, with each new scandalous misuse of the technology, our mis- trust continues to exponentially grow. We are quickly creating a deep-seated fear of generative AI, a fear that very well may cripple the technology altogether.
We will only ever see the full potential of generative AI actualized if we are able to trust how the technology is being built and used. And we will only ever be able to trust the technology if we ensure ethics has been embedded from the very beginning and that applications are being deployed responsibly.
So, if I had to answer my own question, my biggest fear of generative AI is that we will never see the full potential of the good we can do with it - simply because we have become too afraid of our own creation.
It is this fear that has inspired this issue of the EQUATION. Our hope is that, if the right information - such as that found in these pages - gets into the right hands, then we might be able to make even the smallest of dents in the course of this expanding technology.
Happy reading,
Olivia & The EI Team
This post is part of the EQUATION publication. Follow the link below to access the full issue.
