Doha, May 16 (QNA) - A symposium was convened as part of the cultural salon activities at the 35th Doha International Book Fair (DIBF).

The event plainly called for the establishment of specialized national councils tasked with monitoring knowledge flows and addressing challenges related to digital media and artificial intelligence.

Coming under the theme of building knowledge through culture and media, the symposium featured the remarks of Qatari writer Maryam Yassin Al Hammadi, who highlighted the importance of building societal awareness capable of dealing with the rapid transformations in the era of technology and algorithms.

It is very significant to formulate upper echelon consultative commissions that comprise experts in media, culture, AI, and national security, with the objective of identifying knowledge gaps before they turn into real threats, Al Hammadi suggested, noting that building media sovereignty has become an imperative amid global digital transformations.

The panel tackled global realignments in the post-globalization era and the ascension of the digital economy, highlighting that humans have shifted from being consumers of knowledge to being a commodity handled by algorithms that direct their options.

The session warned of the menace of algorithms' control over the daily knowledge flow, emphasizing that "the algorithm does not lie, but it chooses, and in this choice lies the danger."

Furthermore, the panel drilled down on the knowledge future in the era of AI, indicating that current models are based on past data and wield the biases of the entities that developed them, making Arabic content in a vulnerable position in the face of the dominance of Western content in training data.

As such, Al Hammadi advocated launching major cultural and educational projects to be trained on AI, foremost of which is the [Arab and Islamic digital memory] with the objective of building an enduring Arab database that supports the development of domestic AI models and enhances the presence of Arab content globally.

What matters most here is to launch the [Critical Citizen Project] in pursuit of deepening critical thinking skills among students and society, she underlined, emphasizing that this project would teach individuals how to consciously handle AI outputs and not solely rely on already produced information.

Saudi academic and critic Dr. Manal Al Qathami said during a symposium on knowledge and the making of renaissance: the role of reading in shaping nations, at the cultural salon of the fair, that reading represents a core pillar in building individuals and driving development, noting that reading societies are more capable of confronting intellectual and media misinformation.

Reading not only generates knowledge but also helps build a critical mindset and fosters individual and collective awareness, Al Qathami noted, cautioning against the growing [superficiality of knowledge] arising from reliance on fast and short content, and the resulting decline in deep thinking and analysis.

She stressed the criticality of reading in safeguarding cultural identity and the Arabic language, confirming that thriving reading contributes to building a common cultural reference that fosters dialogue and understanding in society, whose decline leads to frailty of thought and cultural belonging. (QNA)