Futuring Machines: An Interactive Framework for Participative Futuring Through Human-AI Collaborative Speculative Fiction Writing
Jordi Tost, Marcel Gohsen, Britta Friederike Schulte, Fidel Thomet, M. Kühn, Johannes Kiesel, Benno Stein, Eva Hornecker · 2024
Imagining future scenarios arising from events and (in)actions is crucial for democratic participation, but is often left to experts who have in-depth knowledge of, for example, social, political, environmental or technological trends. A widely accepted method for non-experts to think about future scenarios is to write fictional short stories set in speculative futures. To support the writing process and thus further lower the barrier for this form of participation, we introduce Futuring Machines, a framework for collaborative writing of speculative fiction through instruction-based conversation between humans and AI. Futuring Machines is specifically designed to stimulate reflection on future scenarios in both participatory workshops and individual use.