  Natural language processing based on large language models (LLMs) is a
booming field of AI research. After neural networks have proven to outperform
humans in games and practical domains based on pattern recognition, we might
stand now at a road junction where artificial entities might eventually enter
the realm of human communication. However, this comes with serious risks. Due
to the inherent limitations regarding the reliability of neural networks,
overreliance on LLMs can have disruptive consequences. Since it will be
increasingly difficult to distinguish between human-written and
machine-generated text, one is confronted with new ethical challenges. This
begins with the no longer undoubtedly verifiable human authorship and continues
with various types of fraud, such as a new form of plagiarism. This also
concerns the violation of privacy rights, the possibility of circulating
counterfeits of humans, and, last but not least, it makes a massive spread of
misinformation possible.
