Phase 1: 2020-2024
AI as factor and consequence of societal and cultural change
The 1st project phase of the Schaufler Lab@TU Dresden, starting in 2020, addresses the question of how artificial intelligence changes cultural and societal structures and how, on the other hand, AI itself is produced and changed by these structures.
In this project, Artificial intelligence is characterised both as a technological processing form of knowledge and as an object of cultural imagination. There can hardly be any doubt about its significance for technical progress as well as for societal and cultural change - today and in the future.
All areas of human activity are permanently expanded by technology. This leads to new forms of action and new societal arrangements, which in turn require new or adapted standards, as well as an analysis of existing values and adjustments of the value systems. At the same time, the development, practicability, and spread of technologies and technical systems are influenced by societal conditions. This influence increases with the complexity of technologies and the size of technical projects.
At TU Dresden, many research units and researchers from the field of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM subjects) play a leading role in the development of Artificial Intelligence technologies. The Faculty of Computer Science has a special Institute of Artificial Intelligence. In the competitions in which TU Dresden has achieved Excellence status, special Clusters of Excellence are addressing AI, such as the Center for Advancing Electronics Dresden (cfaed), existing since 2012, and the newly approved Cluster of Excellence Center for Tactile Internet with Human-in-the-Loop (CeTI). These institutions are substantially involved in the first phase of the Schaufler Lab@TU Dresden.
With regard to TU Dresden’s Excellence Strategy, cross-disciplinary research plays a key role, combining the STEM subjects with the humanities and social sciences. The same holds true for digitalisation as the most important cross-sectional topic.
Artificial Intelligence is of great relevance to the humanities and social sciences in that technical development no longer only affects the transformation of matter and energy, but above all of information and knowledge, of consciousness and emotions. It is thus permeating all social and cultural spheres. The anthropological question about the nature of humans must be asked anew.
Questions about 'Humans 4.0'' and Artificial Intelligence are on the minds of researchers as well as the general public, and many artists are addressing this issue.