Summary
[This website is a demonstration and is not currently affiliated with the Imagining The Digital Future Center nor Elon University.]
Imagining the Digital Future (ITDF) Center is an interdisciplinary research center focused on the human impact of accelerating digital change and the socio-technical challenges that lie ahead.
Imagining the Digital Future’s mission is to discover and broadly share a diverse range of opinions, ideas and original research about the likely evolution of digital change, informing important conversations and policy formation.
February 29, 2024, ITDF released its first new research report, “The Impact of Artificial Intelligence by 2040,” for which, in two separate studies, a large group of global digital life experts and the U.S. general public were asked to share their opinions on the likely future impact of AI. The global experts predicted that as these tools advance we will have to rethink what it means to be human and we must reinvent or replace major institutions in order to achieve the best possible future. The issues the Americans polled were most concerned about are the further erosion of personal privacy, their opportunities for employment, how these systems might change their relationships with others, and AI applications’ potential impact on basic human rights.
Imagining the Digital Future Center – 29/02/2024 (12:59)
Elon University President Connie Book and Lee Rainie, director of the Imagining the Digital Future Center, discuss the Center’s first report focused on the impact of artificial intelligence by 2040.
OnAir Post: Imagining the Digital Future Center
News
Elon University Webpage, – May 6, 2025
The new publication includes guidance for students using AI in their college studies and offers practical advice about preparing for careers that require AI knowledge and skills.
Elon University and the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) have released the second publication in the Student Guide to Artificial Intelligence series.
Like the widely adopted first publication, this resource is provided to students and institutions free of charge and is available for download on the Guide’s website: www.studentguidetoai.org or via the AAC&U website at aacu.org/publications.
The new publication includes guidance for students using AI in their college studies and offers practical advice about preparing for careers that require AI knowledge and skills. The content was developed with input from consulting scholars and students in 14 countries.
Students, faculty and staff at 1,900 colleges and universities around the world accessed the first Student Guide to AI when it was released in August 2024. Since then, the guide’s website has provided information to more than 36,000 users in 139 countries. The second publication supplements the first, and both are useful resources for students, faculty and staff who want to learn about AI.
“By providing a free resource written in a way all students can access, we hope to increase AI literacy and support students as they adapt to these rapidly changing technologies,” says Elon University President Connie Book. “From the outset, we knew that a second publication would be necessary, with rapid advances in AI changing the learning landscape. This current version will be especially useful as colleges and universities prepare for the upcoming academic year.”
The new Guide helps students prepare for the use of AI in their studies, with sections dedicated to five dimensions of AI skills:
- Research, information gathering and summarization
- Writing
- Creative work
- Data and numerical analysis
- Study and learning assistance
There are also chapters focused on academic integrity, AI ethics, career planning and building a portfolio of AI-assisted projects.
“AAC&U is proud to partner with Elon University on this expanded resource that helps students navigate the complexities of AI in their academic journey,” said C. Edward Watson, vice president for digital innovation at AAC&U. “This second publication directly addresses how students can develop critical AI literacy skills while preparing for a job market that increasingly demands AI competency. It represents our commitment to equipping students with the tools they need to succeed in a rapidly evolving digital landscape.”
The second publication’s content was developed using input from adopters of the first edition, student reviewers and guidance from prominent AI experts and faculty members at universities in the United States, Denmark, Egypt, Estonia, France, Germany, Japan, Morocco, New Zealand, Nigeria, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland and Venezuela.
The new Student Guide to AI is endorsed by:
- The American Library Association
- NASPA – Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education
- EDUCAUSE
- Online Learning Consortium
- AMICAL Consortium – American international liberal arts institutions
The guide is authored by Daniel J. Anderson, special assistant to the president, Elon University; C. Edward Watson, vice president for digital innovation, AAC&U; Lee Rainie, director of the Imagining the Digital Future Center at Elon University; and Janna Anderson, professor of communications at Elon University and senior researcher for the Imagining the Digital Future Center.
As with the first publication, colleges and universities may request a version of the Student Guide to AI incorporating their institution’s logo on the cover, providing a custom edition for distribution within their campus community. For details on obtaining a customized PDF of the publication, send a request along with a logo file to: imagine@elon.edu.
The Student Guide to Artificial Intelligence is an initiative of Elon University’s Imagining the Digital Future Center, in partnership with the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U). It is a continuation of a 2023 global collaboration that established a statement of principles to guide development of AI policies and practices in higher education.
About the publishers of the Student Guide to Artificial Intelligence
Elon University is a mid-sized private university in Elon, North Carolina, with a national reputation for experiential learning, teaching excellence and close relationships between students and their faculty and staff mentors. Elon enrolls more than 7,000 undergraduate and graduate students from 48 U.S. states and 54 countries. Elon was founded in 1889 and includes a law school campus in Greensboro, N.C., and national campus locations in Los Angeles, Charlotte, New York City and Washington, D.C.
Elon University’s Imagining the Digital Future Center is an interdisciplinary research center focused on the impact of accelerating digital change and the challenges that lie ahead. The center’s mission is to discover and broadly share a diverse range of opinions, ideas and original research about the likely evolution of digital change, informing important conversations and policy formation. The center was established in 2000 as Imagining the Internet and renamed Imagining the Digital Future with an expanded research agenda in 2024.
The American Association of Colleges and Universities is a global membership organization dedicated to advancing the democratic purposes of higher education by promoting equity, innovation, and excellence in liberal education. AAC&U serves as a catalyst and facilitator for innovations that improve educational quality and equity and that support the success of all students. Our membership includes degree-granting higher education institutions around the world as well as other organizations and individuals.
ITDF Center Director Lee Rainie spoke recently at the Northeast Florida Library Information Network about the future of libraries.
His talk covered two studies released by the Center this spring: one about the universe of large language model users like ChatGPT and Claude, and the other covering the report about being human in the next decade.
One of the many conversations swirling around AI is the degree to which it will push humans to broadly reconsider sentience in all kinds of species, not just in humans. One of the notable contributors to the reports of the ITDF Center covering expert views about digital life is Jamie Woodhouse. His recent essay for the Center was headlined: AI will reframe what we know about ourselves; moral consideration should include all sentient beings, human, non-human animals or even sentient Als themselves. And his podcast focuses on these issues with a wide-ranging group of experts.
The following overview details a just released report from the Elon University Imagining the Digital Future Center. I just received BEING HUMAN IN 2035: How Are We Changing in the Age of AI? and am proud to have made a very small contribution to the material. I found the report to be fascinating, intellectually stimulating, and extremely informative on a diverse set of complex and challenging issues with which we must deal as the historically unique technologies of AI/Robotics transforms not only what we do but who we are. This Substack message contains an introductory explanation of the report and its aims, and the links by which the voluminous document can be accessed.
I am including immediately below a note I received from Lee Rainie, Director of the Elon Center, and it includes contact information as well as questions about how the Center could focus on subsequent issues relating to AI. Lee was founding Director of Internet and Technology research at the Pew Foundation Research Center, and before creating the Pew Internet Project, he was managing editor of the U.S. News & World Report. I am certain he would welcome your ideas on these critical issues.
Given the views and downloads I have seen on several of my postings I am aware that there is substantial interest in these matters and trust you will find the report of some interest.
Alexandra Samuel is a data journalist, speaker, author and co-founder and principal at Social Signal.
Her essay’s title: The Future Could Be Astonishing and Inspiring If Humans Co-Evolve With Open, Ethical AI. But That Vision for 2035 Can’t Be Achieved Without Change.
Noshir Contractor is a professor at Northwestern University, expert in the social science of networks and a trustee of the Web Science Trust.
His essay’s title: AI Will Fundamentally Reshape How and What We Think, Relate to and Understand Ourselves; It Will Also Raise Important Questions About Human Agency and Authenticity.
Amy Zalman is government and public services strategic foresight lead at Deloitte.
Her essay’s title: ‘We Must Have the Courage to Establish Human Values in Code, Ethical Precepts, Policy and Regulation’.
Danil Mikhailov is director of DataDotOrg and trustee at 360Giving. His essay’s title: Respect for Human Expertise and Authority Will Be Undermined, Trust Destroyed, and Utility Will Displace ‘Truth’ at a Time When Mass Unemployment Decimates Identity and Security.
Maggie Jackson is an award-winning journalist and author who explores the impact of technology on humanity. She is author of, “Distracted: Reclaiming Our Focus in a World of Lost Attention.”
Her essay’s title: AIs’ Founders Are Designing AI to Make its Actions Servant to its Aims With As Little Human Interference as Possible, Undermining Human Discernment.
Lior Zalmanson is a professor at Tel Aviv University whose expertise is in algorithmic culture and the digital economy.
His essay’s title: Humans Must Design Organizational and Social Structures to Maintain the Capacity to Shape Their Own Individual and Collective Future or Cede Unprecedented Control to Those in Power.
Dave Edwards is co-founder of the Artificiality Institute, which seeks to activate the collective intelligence of humans and AI.
His essay’s title: We Can Be Transformed If the Integration of Synthetic and Organic Intelligence Serves Human Flourishing in All its Unpredictable, Creative and Collective Forms.
Jerry Michalski is a well-known emerging technology speaker, writer and trends analyst.
His essay’s title: The Blurring of Societal and Cultural Boundaries Is Shifting the Essence of Being Human in Many Ways, Further Disrupting Human Relationships and Mental Health.
Charles Ess is professor emeritus of ethics at the University of Oslo, Norway.
His essay’s title: ‘We Fall in Love With the Technologies of Our Enslavement. … The Next Generation May Be One of No-Skilling in Regard to Essential Human Virtue Ethics’.
Evelyne Tauchnitz is senior fellow at the Institute of Social Ethics at the University of Lucerne, Switzerland.
Her essay’s title: We May Lose Our Human Unpredictability in a World in Which Algorithms Dictate the Terms of Engagement; These Systems Are Likely to Lead to the Erosion of Freedom and Authenticity.
Gary Bolles is author of “The Next Rules of Work,” chair for the future of work at Singularity University and co-founder at eParachute.
His essay’s title: AI Presents an Opportunity to Liberate Humanity but New Norms in Human-Machine Communication Seem More Likely to Diminish Human-to-Human Connections.
Esther Dyson is a serial investor-advisor-angel for tech startups and founder of Wellville (community well-being, 2015-2024). She is now working on a new book, “Term Limits: A Design for Living in the Age of AI.”
Her essay’s title: We Must Train People to be Self-Aware, to Understand Their Own Motivations and to Understand that AIs’ Goals Are Those of the Organizations and Systems That Control Them.
Imagining the Digital Future Center, – March 20, 2025
The recent report from Imagining the Digital Future Center sketched the lay of the land for large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT, Copilot, Claude and Gemini. It was particularly notable for mapping the size of and shape of the LLM user population and the way they were employing these artificial intelligence tools. Half of American adults use the models and many more use these artificial intelligence (AI) systems for personal enrichment and fun than use them for work-related purposes.
Understandably, those big and surprising data points got a wave of attention. Still, there are a number of other insights in the survey findings worth surfacing because they have important implications:
The omnipresence and diversity of LLMs and generative artificial intelligence: The models are not just standalone tools with separate interfaces and APIs for many LLM users. They are also built into digital apps they already use. Here are the contours of that:
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President Book & Lee Rainie discuss the AI2040 report
(12:59)
By: Imagining the Digital Future Center
Being Human in 2035
How are we changing in the age of AI?
A majority of global technology experts say the likely magnitude of change in humans’ native capacities and behaviors as they adapt to artificial intelligence (AI) will be “deep and meaningful,” or even “fundamental and revolutionary” over the next decade.
Many global tech experts are concerned that our adoption of AI systems will negatively alter our sense of purpose and affect how we think, feel, act and relate to one another. Some hope for a positive influence on humans’ curiosity, decision-making and creativity.
Source: ITDF Webpage
Close encounters of the AI kind
The increasingly human-like way people are engaging with language models
Artificial intelligence large language model (LLM) users say they often have human-like encounters with these tools; they say the models have personality traits that are both pleasing and dismaying. About half of Americans living in households earning less than $50,000 (53%) use the tools.
These are among the results gleaned in a national survey conducted in January 2025 by Elon University’s Imagining the Digital Future Center. ChatGPT, Gemini and Copilot are the most commonly used AI “brands.” Half of LLM users (49%) say the models they use are “smarter” than they are, including 26% who think their LLMs are “a lot smarter.” Some 54% say their use of LLMs has improved their productivity a lot or somewhat. Some 50% say their use of LLMs has improved their ability to learn new skills and concepts a lot or somewhat.
Source: ITDF Webpage
OnAir Post: Close encounters of the AI kind
The Impact of AI by 2040
A New Age of Enlightenment? A New Threat to Humanity?
In a two-pronged Fall 2023 research initiative, Elon University’s Imagining the Digital Future Center completed a U.S. national public opinion poll and a canvassing of more than 300 technology developers, business and policy leaders, researchers, analysts and advocates. It explores the potential impact of AI on individuals’ personal lives and on bedrock aspects of society, such as politics and elections, health care delivery, education and others.
The research findings reveal a wide range of views, with many expressing concerns over serious challenges to human well-being and worry over unprepared human systems, others looking optimistically to great advances in quality of life and a great number in the middle who are uncertain and uneasy about the changes ahead.
Source: ITDF Webpage
OnAir Post: The Impact of Artificial Intelligence by 2040
