To be honest, this happened quite unexpectedly. Yet it was in Vienna that I found myself seriously reflecting on a question that had long been on my mind: Why is humanity so determined to build humanoid robots? The answer turned out to be remarkably simple. Because virtually the entire infrastructure of our civilization has been designed for human beings. Staircases.…
This time I’m attending the joint Digital Humanism Summer School and ESSAI (European Summer School on Artificial Intelligence)—the largest summer school on Artificial Intelligence in Europe—hosted by TU Wien (Vienna University of Technology), one of Europe’s oldest and most respected technical universities. The school has brought together more than 400 researchers, engineers, philosophers, lawyers, AI ethics experts, and representatives from…
The central question here is how to place the human being at the heart of the digital age and the age of artificial intelligence. It is fascinating to observe how Austria 🇦🇹 has, for several years now, been trying to claim a very particular place in the world. Not like Silicon Valley, which became a symbol of technological breakthroughs, AI,…
The first is a German-language conference, Bildung im Zeitalter der KI (Education in the Age of AI), where teachers, educators, professors, and experts are discussing how AI is transforming schools and universities, the opportunities it creates, and the risks it brings. The second is the international Digital Humanism Conference 2026, organized by Austrian Academy of Science and dedicated to one…
I spoke about how, in the age of AI, we are gradually outsourcing our mental, creative, and even ethical capacities. We increasingly delegate thinking, decision-making, and even the search for meaning to external systems. As a result, there is a quiet but very real risk of losing authorship over our own lives. I presented my approach to preserving and strengthening…
For decades, it seemed that philosophy had been pushed aside by technology, business, and the applied sciences. Yet something unexpected has happened: with the rise of artificial intelligence, philosophy has become one of the most relevant and sought-after fields of inquiry once again. And here I am in Venice, where I will spend the coming week at the international Philosophy…
But I think the opposite is now starting to happen. Recently, I received a proposal for building a new website. The offer was good, the price was reasonable, and the person seemed to know what he was doing. But as I read it, I didn’t see a single mention that the website would be built using AI tools. And I…
Several professors from the University of Munich were on stage discussing a problem that universities everywhere are now facing: students are increasingly writing essays with the help of generative AI. And, honestly, many professors seem genuinely uncertain about what to do next, because the essays often turn out to be remarkably good. Then one of the professors said something very…
People from business, academia, government and civil society have gathered here to discuss how artificial intelligence is already changing our world — and what kind of future we are moving into. The conversations range from AI governance and regulation to ethics, trust, security, transparency and the growing impact AI is having on societies and human behavior. What I especially like…
Very soon, the world will divide into two camps. The first will consist of people who want to simplify their lives as much as possible through artificial intelligence. They will increasingly delegate not only work to AI, but thinking itself. It will seem to them that there is no longer any need to go deeply into things, to analyze, to…