Photorealistic image showing AI influence through subtle data streams from a computer to a human mind, symbolising conversational AI influence. Generated with Adobe Firefly
Emerging Technologies and Geopolitical Power Shifts Ethical AI Geopolitical Impact of New Technology

5 Scientific Facts About AI Influence

A silent shift is underway in how humans form opinions, build trust, and even experience emotion. While public debate fixates on deepfakes and election interference, a more pervasive force is emerging: not through propaganda, but through conversation. As millions engage with Large Language Models every day, asking for advice, explanations, and emotional reassurance, AI is no longer just informing, it is influencing. Drawing on new research from 2024–2025, this article uncovers how LLMs influence cognition and political alignment at a subconscious level, not through spectacle but through chatbot conversations. If influence is no longer loud, how do we notice it at all?

By Alissa Chmiel
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Photorealistic side profile of a humanoid figure blending human and robotic features, illuminated by warm blue and orange light reflections. The image symbolises the intersection of AI and work — the quiet fusion of human creativity and machine intelligence in the digital age.
Ethical AI

AI and Work: The Hidden Human Cost of Automation

A quiet revolution is unfolding in workplaces worldwide. From coding to content creation, automation is reshaping not just how we work — but why we work. The real danger of AI may not be unemployment, but the slow unmaking of what it means to be human. Through the story of a developer training the AI that will one day replace him, this article explores the human cost of automation. Drawing on thinkers from Aristotle to Arendt, it examines how technology erodes meaning, identity, and connection, and asks what happens when humans no longer stand at the centre of their own creation.

By Alissa Chmiel
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Photorealistic image of a military operator in a dark control room, monitoring multiple screens with satellite maps and conflict data, symbolising AI in warfare and the role of technology in modern conflict zones.
Emerging Technologies and Geopolitical Power Shifts Ethical AI

When Peace Becomes Unprofitable: Big Tech, AI and Warfare

From a silenced keynote at the UN’s AI for Good Summit to $47 billion in defense contracts, Big Tech’s entanglement with AI warfare reveals a troubling reality: the same firms promoting “AI for Good” are profiting from its use in war. Behind the glossy rhetoric of ethics and innovation lies a structural paradox, when profit depends on military AI, peace itself becomes a threat to business. This article explores how tech giants have entered the military-industrial complex, why their profit motives create a “peace trap” where conflict fuels innovation, and what it would take to realign AI with the pursuit of peace.

By Alissa Chmiel
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Europe's digital sovereignty crisis demands urgent action. A photorealistic image shows the European Union flag fractured across a digital circuit board. The golden stars are split by a deep crack in the screen, symbolising European Digital Dependency, technological fragility, and the erosion of sovereignty in the digital age.
Emerging Technologies and Geopolitical Power Shifts Geopolitical Impact of New Technology The role of social media in shaping public discourse

European Digital Dependency and the Battle for Democracy

From Musk’s vulgar dismissal of the EU Commissioner to Europe’s reliance on Google Cloud and Chinese 5G, the story of European Digital Dependency is one of sovereignty without power. This article explores how regulations like the DSA clash with harsh realities: Europe depends on the very technologies it seeks to govern. From military contracts to social media platforms shaping elections, it traces how foreign tech has become embedded in Europe’s democratic core, and what pathways exist to reclaim digital resilience.

By Alissa Chmiel
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Uncategorized

How Spyware is Rewriting the Rules of Democracy

Pegasus spyware Europe has turned smartphones into weapons of surveillance, piercing the heart of privacy and trust. What once seemed like the tool of authoritarian regimes has quietly entered Europe’s democratic core.

From Poland’s elections to Spain’s independence movements and Germany’s secret purchase, spyware is no longer just a foreign policy concern – but a domestic democratic crisis. This article explores how Pegasus spyware reshapes European democracy, undermining press freedom, competitive elections, and the citizen–state relationship itself.

By Alissa Chmiel
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Close-up digital artwork of a human face made of binary code, split into blue and red halves, symbolizing AI bias, data-driven influence, and polarized information.
Emerging Technologies and Geopolitical Power Shifts Ethical AI

Rewriting Truth – the AI Manipulation Era Has Arrived

AI is becoming an unseen editor of reality itself. With US oversight dismantled and “anti-woke” neutrality redefined, political agendas can now guide what AI says, what it omits, and how billions worldwide come to understand the world. From curated search results on Truth Social to loosened safeguards on Elon Musk’s Grok, we are entering an age where AI shapes opinion one private conversation at a time. This article traces how deregulation in Washington is setting the stage for a global wave of AI systems that claim impartiality while quietly rewriting truth.

By Alissa Chmiel
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Abstract digital artwork showing distorted text with words like “create,” “harmonize,” and “disrupt” – symbolising the conflicting forces at play in peace influencing and digital communication.
Information and Cognitive Warfare The role of social media in shaping public discourse

Rethinking Influence in the Age of Algorithmic Warfare

In today’s landscape of information warfare, where war influencing has become a prevalent force, using digital communication to divide, manipulate, and destabilise; peace influencing could serve as a vital counterstrategy. This article explores digital peace through the lens of peace journalism and media theory, tracing how narratives shape conflict and cohesion alike. It examines the historical role of media in war, the transformation brought by social platforms, and how strategic communication is now being reclaimed to foster dialogue, empathy, and democratic resilience. From global grassroots efforts to evolving norms in digital communication, it argues that influencing for peace is no longer idealistic, but necessary.

By Alissa Chmiel
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Blurred human face partially obscured by strands of glowing lights, symbolising cognitive overload, digital entanglement, and the loss of mental clarity in the age of algorithmic influence.
Information and Cognitive Warfare Uncategorized

The Hidden Democratic Cost of Cognitive Offloading 

We increasingly let machines think for us, not just in everyday choices, but in how we navigate reality itself. Cognitive offloading describes this process of delegating mental tasks to external systems. What begins as a tool for convenience can quietly erode our ability to notice, remember, and decide for ourselves. As artificial intelligence mediates how we access information, make decisions, and even perceive the world, this quiet handover of our cognitive autonomy is not only convenient, but becoming dangerous. This article explores how cognitive offloading undermines our ability to think critically, and why that erosion poses a structural threat to our democracies.

By Alissa Chmiel
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Person holding up a rectangular mirror that replaces their face, reflecting only blue distortion. The background shows a metallic shutter in digital blue tones. A metaphor for emotional loss of self in the age of social media.
Information and Cognitive Warfare

Why Emotional Intelligence is a Democratic Skill

In an age where outrage is monetised and emotional manipulation is engineered at scale, emotional intelligence is no longer a wellness trend, but becoming a democratic necessity. This article explores why individual emotional resilience should be recognised as a key pillar of democratic resilience in the 21st century and how developing it could be the most overlooked defence against digital polarisation and political manipulation.

By Alissa Chmiel
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A black-and-white photo of a lamppost covered in worn stickers, one of which reads “BIG DATA IS WATCHING YOU.” The blurred city lights in the background create a dystopian feel, underscoring the urgent need to reclaim digital sovereignty.
Emerging Technologies and Geopolitical Power Shifts Emerging Technologies and Geopolitical Power Shifts

Why We Need to Talk About Data Again.

Data is the defining resource of the 21st century, but the question of who owns, controls, and benefits from it has become strangely opaque. This article revisits the idea of digital sovereignty in light of three technological frontiers: the Internet of Things, Brain-Computer Interfaces, AI and its acceleration through quantum computing. It traces how regulatory retreat and public disengagement have opened the door to unprecedented forms of data extraction, including from the human brain itself. The fight for data rights may well be the defining democratic struggle of our digital future. This article calls for a renewed public conversation about data as the foundation of democratic self-determination.

By Alissa Chmiel
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