IPT Talk Series 2022-23
Monday, 17 October 2022, 20.00-21.00 (Greece time) (Online)
Rafael Capurro
The Age of Artificial Intelligences
The paper aims at presenting some issues that arose when dealing with societal and ethical implications of AI since the seventies in which the author was involved. It is a narrative on how the understanding of AI dealt firstly with the question whether machines can think. With the rise of the internet in the nineties the perception of AI turned, secondly, into an issue of what AI as distributed intelligence means with an impact at all levels of social life no less that at basic ethical issues of daily life. In a breath-taking use of AI for all kinds of societal goals and contexts, the awareness grew, thirdly, that all natural and artificial things might be digitally connected with each other and to human agents. In the conclusion some challenges relating to the development and use of artificial intelligences are mentioned as well as results of recent research done in academia, scientific associations and political bodies concerning the possibilities for good life with and without artificial intelligences.
Rafael Capurro was born 1945 in Montevideo (Uruguay). Dr.phil. in Philosophy from Düsseldorf University (1978). Postdoctoral teaching qualification (Habilitation) in Practical Philosophy (Ethics) from Stuttgart University (1989). Professor (em.) of Information Science and Information Ethics at Hochschule der Medien Stuttgart and Lecturer in Ethics at the University of Stuttgart. (1986-2009). Director of the International Center for Information Ethics (ICIE) (1999 to present). Editor-in-Chief of the International Review of Information Ethics (IRIE) (2004 to present). Distinguished Researcher in Information Ethics, School of Information Studies, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, USA. Distinguished Researcher at the African Centre for Information Ethics, Department of Information Science, University of Pretoria, South Africa. Former member of the European Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies (EGE) to the European Commission (2000-2010).