The Anthill Model of collective intelligence in AI systems: some critical concerns for social justice and democratic education

This contribution is focused on the concept of “collective” intelligence and its reinterpretation in the contexts of digital platforms. I will claim that today’s AI systems, and the tech companies that control them, in most cases appear to embody a conception of collective intelligence that could be defined as “Anthill Model”. This model consists in a system that as a whole exhibits an intelligent behaviour, even though the individual participants contribute to it mainly being unaware of the way the systems functions and of the role they play in it. Such a model entails some deeply problematic implications in terms of social justice and democratic education: firstly, it appears in contrast with the promotion of critical and autonomous thinking. Secondly, appears to be in line with an educational ideal aimed at providing quality education only to a privileged minority, reducing investment in the education of the majority of the population. I will conclude proposing some questions: is the presented scenario an inevitable doom, or is it still possible to act trying to promote a different future? Is it possible to use digital technologies to design forms of collective intelligence which are not conceived as an anthill, but rather as a dialogic community?