UNE staff are invited to: Against AI? ‘Artificial Intelligence’, Universities and UNE

• Date/Time: Thursday 23 October / 9am – 5pm
• Location: A2 Lecture Theatre, Arts Building, UNE Armidale Campus

Talk of ‘artificial intelligence’ is everywhere. The technology is often hailed as the technocratic solution to overcoming both life’s mundane hurdles and some of the more pressing collective problems of our time: it supposedly has the potential to solve the climate crisis, cure our cancers, and free us from the shackles of laborious and meaningless work. Forms of AI are increasingly integrated into all our information technology, and marketed as making us more efficient, productive, and free. AI will supposedly revolutionise our lives and benefit humanity. 

Universities, including our own, are necessarily implicated in this technical revolution since our business is information; and while there may well be justifiable and valuable uses for AI in universities, such uses can create serious problems and risks. Academic integrity, intellectual freedom, academic governance, job security, work satisfaction, and meaningful student and teacher relationships are all troubled by technology that simulates human language and thought. 

This one-day conference aims to consider the implications of AI for universities. It is a critical symposium on the benefits and burdens of AI and our current and potential approaches towards its use. 

We wish to invite all UNE staff who are interested in AI use in general and what it means for institutions like our own. No RSVP or ticket booking is required, simply turn up on the day at the Arts Building A2 Lecture Theatre and come and go as you wish. 

Programme

Conference Opening: 9h-9h30

Panel 1: 9h30-11h

• Julie Shearer: Riding the Tiger: AI Tools and the Changing Landscape of Student Assessment
• Richard Jordan: Digital Muse or Damp Squib?: A Sample of Australian Playwrights’ Views on AI-Human Playwriting Practices
• Eric Livingston: Generative AI and the Crisis of Disciplinary Expertise

Morning Tea: 11h-11h30

Panel 2: 11h30-13h

• Robert McDowell: Telos of AI
• Felicity Joseph: What would the Existentialists say?  Encounters with authenticity and responsibility in university pedagogy
• Harrison Munday: The New Age of Epistemic Injustice: Universities and the Just Distribution of Epistemic Burdens in an AI era

Lunch: 13h-14h

Panel 3: 14h-15:30

• Trent Wakeham: The Hidden Exploitation Behind AI
• Tristian Taylor: Large Language Models in Academic Governance: A Failure to Launch

Afternoon Tea: 15h30-16h

Panel 4: 16h – 17h

• Alina Kozlovski: GenAI: Just a tool and the future of apparently everything
• Matt Allen: Referencing as transparency: generative ‘AI’ and the provenance of ideas

Conference Closing: 17h