WebSci'24: Keynote by Hannes Werthner

Hannes Werthner is a retired Computer Science Professor at the TU Wien, Austria, where he also served as the Dean of the faculty of Informatics. Prior to joining TU Wien, he had professorships at Austrian and international Universities. His research is in fields such as Decision Support Systems, E-Commerce and Recommender Systems. Besides research and teaching he founded several initiatives such as the Vienna PhD School of Informatics or the i2c / Informatics Innovation Center. He carefully observes how computer science and information technology are changing the world and us. This is his motivation for Digital Humanism, whose Vienna Manifesto he initiated in 2019. Since then he is active in this field - see also his latest contribution: “Introduction to Digital Humanism” (link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-45304-5)
Information Technology changes ourselves and the world, from the individual level up to the ongoing geo-political powerplay. From an ontological point of view, it influences how we perceive the world and how we think about it. This transformation process took place in an extremely short period of time, at a very high speed. We highlight some features of this process, which, besides its enormous achievements, shows also serious shortcomings. The question posed is not a simple one: IT (including AI) may help solve the world’s multiple crises and make it a better place, but at the same time it is part of the problem (some even see it as the cause). We understand Digital Humanism as an answer to this question, as an approach to developing and regulating digital technologies so that they are used for the benefit of people and nature. It is a proactive approach that focuses on the integration of technical and social innovation.

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Very nice and profound Talk. Thanks Hannes and Thanks for ACM for sharing this publically on UA-cam.