From the Corriere del Mezzogiorno
by Edoardo Imperiale
Dear Editor,
The debate on artificial intelligence is current these days. The alarm raised by Elon Musk and leading scientists, about a ‘moratorium’ to be adopted pending regulation, and then the decision of the Privacy Guarantor to ‘block’ ChatGPT, the digital service that is able to simulate and process human conversations, have turned a spotlight on the issue.
Public opinion questions, discusses it, and it is then appropriate to frame the issue in a more scientific framework. Campania has, for several reasons, the cards to claim leadership in the discussion.
Artificial intelligence, as far as I am concerned, and it is good to clear the air, represents a growth opportunity for the business system and for public administration. It is a great revolution that must be governed without fear and by telling benefits and risks. It makes no sense to side with the ‘Luddites 4.0’; they were the ones in Britain in the 19th century who reacted violently to the use of machines in industry. Need to relaunch.
Concerns, especially when argued, are legitimate and of great value, but they should be read as a call to do better and well and not as a stop to a technology that can and should represent a great opportunity. It needs to be told.
As head of the Regional Digital Innovation Evolved Hub, which is part of the network of EDIHs, European Digital Innovation Hubs, I will try, with the help and support of key stakeholders in the field, to make a contribution in this direction. The initiative, for Italy, was selected and admitted for funding by the European Commission among the 13 European Digital Innovation Hubs (EDIHs) evaluated downstream of the European Digital Europe Program tender and is co-financed by the Ministry of Enterprise and Made in Italy under the PNRR.
We will play our part because on artificial intelligence-it’s one of the assets we will have to develop and make available to businesses and PA-a strategic game will be played and we will promote, we have already started, moments of reflection, we will build solutions. We will let people touch the benefits, the opportunities for growth. Businesses, public and private, should be accompanied, supported, encouraged.
The ‘traveling companions’, may I say, are a guarantee. The Edih PRIDE project is led by the Campania Digital Innovation Hub – Rete Confindustria and relies on an industrial and scientific partnership composed of the Consortium “Meditech – Mediterranean Competence Center 4 Innovation,” Cerict – Regional Competence Center in ICT, and ICAR- Institute of High Performance Computing and Networks of the CNR. There is, therefore, the potential to do well and better than others.
We are equipped for technological solutions and to offer, at this historical moment, our contribution to the creation of paths and programs capable of holding together the need to open up to modernity and ethics. The two always travel together when an area has to grow.
We will dismantle, ad we will need the fundamental role of the press, the clichés about artificial intelligence replacing humans or reducing work, and we will indicate a direction of travel to the productive fabric of Campania and the Mezzogiorno.
Edward Imperial
Coordinator Regional Pole for Digital Evolved Innovation.
European Digital Innovation Hub
