Infinity Book: Speculating Literary Expressions in the Age of Generative AI

Abstract

This paper explores the ethical, social, political, and philosophical implications of generative AI (GenAI) on human creativity, contributing to the current discussions on the impact of AI. We use speculative and critical design as our approach to avoid abstract guesswork and provide more nuanced and concrete insights into the matter at hand. We conducted five speculative design workshops centered on Infinity Book, a fictional system capable of generating any kind of literary work. Participants used brainwriting, the Future Ripples method, and dialogue-labs to explore potential futures and socio-material impacts of such technology. Reflexive Thematic Analysis was employed to analyze the results from the workshops, and we developed twelve design fictions that illustrate diverse uses and societal implications of GenAI. Based on these results, we formulated three strong concepts, Authenticity, Creative Agency, and Liveness, that link concrete design considerations with broader philosophical discussions.