AI Emergence and Reconstruction of Social Relations
Jul 03-2024
In the 9th edition of PKU Chengze – NIO seeds Lecture Hall, Prof. Qiu Zeqi gave a lecture on the topic “AI Emergence and Reconstruction of Social Relations”. He is PKU Boya Distinguished Professor, Director of PKU China Social and Development Research Center, Director of PKU Digital Governance Research Center, and the Ministry of Education’s Changjiang Scholar. The Lecture Hall is jointly held by the NSD and ‘seeds’, the public welfare division of new energy automaker NIO. The event was hosted by Prof. Xing Yiqing, NSD Associate Professor of Economics.
The lecture comprised three key words: AI emergence, socializing, and reconstruction, and spanned both natural and social sciences. Referring to dictionaries and various AI language models, Prof. Qiu expounded on the concept of ‘social contact’ from multiple angles and gave the definition of “AI emergence”, which means the mushrooming of all sorts of AI that impacts on a range of industries, in some cases leading to ‘squeezing’ effect or even causing collapses. He said that current tech war among different AI intelligence, especially in the field of large language models, fit the traits of AI emergence, but hasn’t caused human society to crash yet. The flourishing of data has led to the establishment of the National Data Bureau and the rollout of policy that advocates “data factor X”. Prof. Qiu said that compared with Internet+, the moves imply policy anticipation of data boom.
He continued to offer in-depth analysis of the issue by tackling four questions: Is groupness a natural quality of human beings? Is digital connection a selectable path for realizing groupness? If so, what are the differences between digital connection and connection via physical presence? If the two are are different, how will digital connection reconstruct human social relations?
AI’s rising has changed the way people conduct self-construction – instead of fully relying on others’ judgements, they are starting to care more about how external things relate to them. However, despite that people have a number of socializing options in a self-centered society, they have to deal with the momentous challenge of getting along with themselves.
A top think-tank, the NSD prides itself on the innate responsibility for promoting public discussions and enlightenment. Through the Lecture Hall, a series of lectures will be delivered by PKU professors and renowned scholars to share their thoughts and research on varied topics.
