"GAI: Pro&Contra 2025": section "Ethics and values of GAI", moderated by Yuri Petrunin

Dear colleagues! We continue to introduce you to the topics and experts of the international conference "GAI: Pro&Contra 2025" (https://gai-procontra.ai/).

Section "Ethics and Values of GAI". Moderator ➡️ Yuri Petrunin, Head of the Department of Mathematical Methods and Information Technologies in Management at the Faculty of Public Administration of Lomonosov Moscow State University.

About the conference
«There are more and more AI conferences around the world every year, including in our country. Our conference is interdisciplinary (mathematicians, philosophers, economists, natural scientists, engineers, doctors, sociologists, political scientists, lawyers, management practitioners, and other specialists are going to speak), international, and networked (it takes place offline, online, and in several cities at once). Of course, sometimes (or rather, very rarely) a combination of interdisciplinarity, participation of foreign scientists, including online participation, is found in scientific events on the topic of AI.

The main difference of our conference is that it openly meets representatives of two opposite scientific points of view: for or against GII. Does GII bring good or evil for humanity? Is it a new step towards real/operational AI or a dead-end branch of science and technology? We (the organizers) are supported by the hope that this will not be a conversation between the deaf and the mute, but rather a search for mutual understanding and the foundation of a new synthetic paradigm. The 2024 conference we organized on the same topic showed that this is quite possible."

On the benefits and risks of GII in science
"Scientific discoveries and technical inventions often have both positive and negative consequences. For example, the discovery of nuclear reactions led to the creation of atomic bombs that could destroy all humans and even life on planet Earth; however, nuclear reactions also led to the development of nuclear energy, which has opened up endless possibilities for humanity. Or, to give a simpler example, the invention of the internal combustion engine has expanded communication to global levels, both real and virtual; however, it also poses a threat to the environment and, consequently, to our lives and health. The challenge is to find a balance between supporting positive outcomes and containing harmful ones.

GII is perhaps the most controversial discovery/invention in history. The contribution of GII varies in different fields. In the natural sciences (physics, chemistry, genetics, and medicine), I believe that the benefits of GII are more evident. In the humanities, discussions about the usefulness of GII are ongoing. Some studies suggest that GII performs certain tasks better than humans, such as writing an article abstract or an additional article review. On the other hand, there have been attempts to write articles using GII instead of humans. This is already going beyond the boundaries of scientific ethics."

About the topics of the section "Ethics and Values of GII"
"The contradictions of GII, which are denoted by the words "pro et contra" in the conference title, necessitate that we control, manage, and regulate the processes of its creation and application. In this case, ethical regulation plays a special role among other forms of regulation.

Legal and technical regulation cannot keep up with the rapid development of GII. Every month (or maybe every week – look at such well-known international journals as Artificial Intelligence and Ethics, Artificial Intelligence and Education, Futurism, Wired), legal conflicts are described that no one expected. Ethics is the basis of law, the culture of responsibility, and is focused on good. It is no coincidence that AI (robot) ethics appeared earlier than AI research.

Of course, GII raises new moral issues, and the importance of ethics increases even more. The main question of the section is whether it is possible to talk about GII ethics. Or about the ethics of its creators and consumers/users of GII?"