AUB Open Lecture: Future Authorship in the Age of AI

Future Authorship: existential threats and creative expression in the Age of AI by Dr Kevan Manwaring In the breathless acceleration, uncritical adoption, and escalating threat level of Generative AI, where does the modern writer stand? In the face of such changes is the 'death of the author' becoming a real prospect? What of copyright? Intellectual Property? A sustainable income? Are we entering a posthuman age in which the viability of being a sole author is redundant? Do we need to reframe our thinking around authorship? Could the act of creation and the application of craft still exist and be of intrinsic value in this new paradigm? And how sustainable is such a paradigm predicated on infinite growth in a world of finite resources? This talk dares to ask difficult questions, and is designed to prompt further discussion and encourage critical thinking around the impact of emergent technologies. About your speaker: BBC New Generation Thinkers finalist, Dr Kevan Manwaring is the MA Creative Writing programme leader at Arts University Bournemouth. He is the winner of the AHRC 10 Essay Prize 2016, with ‘The (Re)imagined Book’ (in competition with phD candidates across the UK). His science fiction novel, Black Box, won the Gollancz/Literature Works SF manuscript competition. He is the author of The Nature of Fantasy (Routledge), Writing Ecofiction (Palgrave Macmillan), and Desiring Dragons (Compass Books), and editor of Ballad Tales (The History Press) and Heavy Weather (British Library Tales of the Weird). A contributor to Free Thinking on BBC Radio 3, he was an Academic Consultant for BBC 4’s The Secret Life of Books. He is a member of the Climate Fiction Writers League and Editor of the British Fantasy Society Journal. Location Address: Arts University Bournemouth, Fern Barrow, Wallisdown, Poole, BH12 5HH. This event will take place in SH001. There'll be signage to direct you to the lecture theatre from AUB's main car park – look out for the A-frames. Alternatively, you can familiarise yourself with our campus and the location of the room before you arrive using our MazeMap. Or, view the walking route from the car park on Google Maps. Getting to AUB There is free parking available at AUB, or alternatively you can easily reach our campus by public transport (Morebus routes 6, 6a, 15, 17 and 36, as well as UniBus routes U1, U2, U3 and U4).