On April 28th, Hainan Tropical Ocean University and the Hainan Provincial Committee of China Democratic League hosted a special lecture titled “Media Literacy in the ChatGPT Era,” featuring Professor Bi Yantao from the School of Public Administration of Hainan University and the Deputy Director of the Culture Committee of the Hainan Provincial Committee of China Democratic League.
Professor Bi called on experts in related fields to study and update media literacy education as soon as possible to help netizens understand the underlying logic and potential hazards of generative AI. He emphasized that journalism students have a dual mission as news gatekeepers and information providers, and they must update their media literacy in a timely manner to lead society in adapting to the communication ecology of the AI era.
Professor Bi analyzed the risks of generative AI from three levels: domestic, international and human survival. He introduced the concept of cognitive security and epistemic injustice to help listeners understand the risks of generative AI. In 2020, Professor Bi defined cognitive security as “the operational state of human intelligence and artificial intelligence that is not subject to deliberate interference and manipulation.”
Epistemic injustice refers to unfair treatment of cognitive subjects, which experts divide into three categories: discriminatory, distributive and formative. By mastering these theoretical analytical tools, people can easily understand the enormous risk that generative AI poses to cognitive security. To help understand these concepts, Professor Bi reinterpreted the fables of “The Blind Men and the Elephant” and “The Allegory of the Cave” to vividly illustrate the specific manifestations and main causes of epistemic injustice.
After detailing the basic characteristics of the current communication ecology, Professor Bi proposed that, to adapt to the information society of the AI era, people urgently need to upgrade their beliefs about knowledge and knowing, further understand epistemic principles, the nature of knowledge and its construction, and timely detect, effectively monitor and adjust their cognitive activities. Only in this way can people understand the necessity, urgency and basic path toward optimizing the configuration of information sources, and effectively enhance their information and communication literacy.
This lecture was part of the Hainan Provincial Committee of China Democratic League’s Cultural Lecture Hall tour in 2023. Dr Li Su, the head of the journalism curriculum group of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Hainan Tropical Ocean University, presided over the lecture and urged students to closely monitor the potential impact of AI development on the news industry. The College of Humanities and Social Sciences will continue to organize lectures and activities related to media literacy and AI education to promote the development of a society that is better equipped to understand and adapt to the ChatGPT era.
Zhang Zhouxiang, China Daily
