What policy-makers think about AI
The Project
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is undeniably a topic of increasing importance, becoming part of many people’s daily lives with a huge scope for heightened usage in the near future. The opportunities of AI use are nearly limitless, so much so that it is easy to get lost in the potential applications of AI. This study aims to consider what we (the public, policy makers, technologists) actually want from AI and digital technology and what the future looks and feels like when we have it.
Working across social and computer sciences, this study critically explores the challenges posed by the growth of AI both in real-life and in science fiction. AI Futures aims to optimise our awareness of the positive impact of AI and the future of humanity by gathering rigorous narratives about its implications for digital creativity.
The research
By gathering and analysing qualitative data from interviews with leading academics, decision makers and thought-leaders, this project aims to help inform policy and the identification of potential avenues for future, socially beneficial AI research. As part of the Digital Creativity Labs summer school programme, and the wider AI Futures research project, a pilot survey to explore the views of policy makers towards AI over a nine week period was created. The results, summarised in this report: What policy-makers think about AI_ preliminary impressions (PDF 
, 1,175kb), highlight a sense of uncertainty towards what AI means and what is capable of doing. Despite this hesitancy, the study also found that a majority of decision makers believe that it is important for the UK to have AI-specific regulations in some form, highlighting a contradiction between attitudes towards AI and suggesting that regulation and education will become of increasing importance.
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the study produced the following report: Documenting moments in AI futures in a time of crisis (PDF , 527kb) which explores AI possibilities and priorities in order to think about how a shifting present creates a changing sense of the technological future. Through analysing the thought of leaders and scholars during the COVID-19 pandemic 2020, the report comes to the conclusion that crisis impacts AI ‘imaginaries’ and future sense-making is shaped by the stories we tell about AI, as reflected in the increased focus on urgency seen in interviewee’s consideration of implementing AI in the near future.
People
Dr Darren Reed, University of York, Co-Investigator
Dr Jenn Chubb, University of York, research fellow
Prof Peter Cowling, Queen Mary University of London, Co-Investigator