What strikes me is how cognitive warfare is becoming something more than “just propaganda”.

Alger

This feels different. More personal. More precise.

Not only about misleading us, but about wearing us down — cultivating ignorance, fatigue, and passivity in the face of rights, injustice, and responsibility.

This report helped me put words to that shift.

#cognitivewarfare #weaponizingAI #digitalethics #ethics #digitalrights #democracy

https://www.kas.de/en/web/canada/event-reports/detail/-/content/new-publication-wired-for-war-how-authoritarian-states-are-weaponizing-ai-against-the-west-with-migs-1

Lupposofi

@asanpin My humble excursion around the topic almost two years ago, regrettably only in finnish, https://mementomori.social/@Lupposofi/112409631517968878. Might contain some useful links.

CW is a real threat, happening right now, and on "both sides", jeopardizing epistemic security, without which there aren't healthy societies in the furure.

Alger

@Lupposofi Hi! Thanks for sharing this thread, even at a quick glance it’s clear it’s been carefully developed. I’m familiar with the paper you’re starting from, it’s genuinely strong and very timely.

Cognitive warfare isn’t just a threat to epistemic security and cognitive integrity, it’s also a strategic interest aimed at shaping opinion and creating vulnerabilities in narratives, ultimately where values are articulated and societies take form. This is especially relevant around democracy itself, where, as you know, the very notion of knowledge carries a particular meaning.

I’m looking forward to reading from you more and staying in touch. And don’t worry about Finnish, language isn’t really a barrier to communication anymore.

Lupposofi

@asanpin Done. Mixed feelings. To concentrate solely on FIMI does not sound wise. In the USA DIMI is at present the most urgent problem (Domestic Information Manipulation and Interference), which has already halted research necessary for informed citizens in a democracy, and IMI in general is dangerous, no matter its source.

In Finland, we don't usually speak about "democracies", because the actual distribution of political power is more important itself, and comes in degrees. Some NATO-countries, e.g, are not democratic, and some even oligarchic, or at least act like ones. There is no "West" or "the democratic world" but in some not so democratic ruler's and marketer's jargon. That jargon manifests itself maybe too much in the WFW-report. Some parts of it were educational, some clearly outdated, superficial, and/or unnecessarily fear-mongerous. The Alan Turing report is on quite another level with its delailed scenarios for influence in Ch. 5, https://www.turing.ac.uk/sites/default/files/2020-10/epistemic-security-report_final.pdf

With respect to the AI-danger there have been proposals for an IPCC-like body to steer and regulate at least something, https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-01606-9, but guess which former "democracy" just dissociated itsef from even the original IPCC? And referring to, e.g, the dual-use problem, guess who frustrated at least part of the EU AI-Act, https://corporateeurope.org/en/2023/02/lobbying-ghost-machine

My advice for most everybody would be to stop using tools which use you, and maybe instead start to read real texts, preferably more than 10 pages long. Important things don't come easily, and the hustle we constantly feel, isn't ours.

I go back to my primary reading, thanks for the opportunity to think aloud, https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/attention/

#cognitiveWarfare #information #ai #democracy #usa #ipcc #aiAct #propaganda #disinformation