Panel 6

Social, Cultural and Ethical Consequences of new Human-Machine Interactions (in german)

Chair: Johanna Seifert (Hagen/München)

12:00–12:40 pm
Janina Loh (Wien): Responsibility in Human-Robot Interaction 

In my presentation I will proceed in three steps: In the first part, I will outline the traditional concept of responsibility with its five relational elements and summarize the conditions that must be met to call someone potentially responsible. In the second part of my talk, I will outline the three fields of research in the discipline of robot ethics by distinguishing between (2.1) robots as potential moral agents, (2.2) robots as moral patients, and (2.3) inclusive approaches. Finally, in the third part of my talk, I will analyze the phenomenon of responsibility within these three fields of robot ethics – (3.1) robots as responsible agents, (3.2) robots as objects of responsible actions, and (3.3) responsibility within inclusive approaches. For obvious reasons, I will focus on moral responsibility and cannot talk about other important responsibilities such as criminal or political responsibility. 

Janina Loh (born Sombetzki) is a university assistant (postdoc) in the field of philosophy of technology and media at the University of Vienna. They studied at Humboldt University Berlin and wrote their dissertation (2009-2013) on the issue of responsibility as a fellow at the graduate school Verfassung jenseits des Staates: Von der europäischen zur Globalen Rechtsgemeinschaft? From 2013-2016, Janina Loh was a postdoc at the Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel. They published the first German Introduction to Trans- and Posthumanism (2018) and an Introduction to Robot Ethics (2019). Janina Loh is pursuing a Habilitation on an Inclusive Ethics of Companionship (working title). Their main research interests lie in the fields of trans- and posthumanism (especially critical posthumanism), robot ethics, feminist philosophy of technology, responsibility research, Hannah Arendt, theories of judgment, and ethics in the sciences.

My first observation is that technical systems are increasingly anthropomorphized in daily language and in human perception.

12:40–1:20 pm
Armin Grunwald (Karlsruhe): Robots as Colleagues – The Anthropomorphization of Digital Technology and the Self-Technicalization of Humans

Fast advances in AI technologies and robotics are leading to new HMI. My first observation is that technical systems are increasingly anthropomorphized in daily language and in human perception. These systems are perceived as counterparts of humans “on equal footing” in many programmatic papers. For example, this is a widespread use of language in the context of the so-called Industry 4.0.” Vice versa, tendencies toward an increasing self-conceptualization of humans as technical systems can be observed. Following digital models, humans are seen as data-based calculation machines, so to speak, as “computers on two legs.” In my presentation, I will explain and underpin both observations and draw conclusions in ethical and anthropological respect. 

Armin Grundwald is Full Professor of Philosophy at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). He is Director of the Institute for Technology Assessment and Systems Analysis at KIT (ITAS) and Director of the Office of Technology Assessment at the German Bundestag. In his professional work, he is a member of several advisory commissions and committees in various fields of the technological advance. In his research work, he is developing a theory of technology assessment in conjunction with applications in the fields of the transformation of the energy system, the ongoing digitalization, and new and emerging technologies such as synthetic biology and human enhancement. He is the author and editor of multiple professional and research publications, among them Technology Assessment in Practice and Theory(2019) and The Hermeneutic Side of Responsible Research and Innovation (2016). Hisprofessional backgrounds include technology assessment, ethics of philosophy, theory of sustainable development, and the epistemology of inter- and transdisciplinary research

With the performance of cyborgs as (universally conceived) humans, gender, class, race and ethnicity markers are renegotiated on the one hand, and new forms of desire and political needs are generated on the other.

1:20–2:00 pm
Irina Gradinari (Hagen): The Cyborg’s Gaze. On Embodied Technologies

Cyborgs in film are located between cinematic traditions, the capitalistic system, and digital technologies (e.g. morphing software), which have now been developed to such an extent that the genre of sci-fi is undergoing fundamental changes. The future has now arrived: We live in a pluralistic world in which artificial intelligence acts as humans and humans as machines. With the performance of cyborgs as (universally conceived) humans, gender, class, race, and ethnicity markers are renegotiated on the one hand, and new forms of desire and political needs are generated on the other. Against the background of feminist debates on New Materialism and STS research as well as feminist film theories, I will show how classical concepts of gaze and identification shaped by film have been shifted: Cyborgs no longer function as “the other,” but as acting subjects and subjects of gaze.

Irina Gradinari (PhD) is Assistant Professor of Gender Studies in Literature and Media Studies at the FernUniversität in Hagen. In 2011, Irina Gradinari completed her doctorate with a dissertation on Genre, Gender und Lustmord. Mörderische Geschlechterfantasien in der deutschsprachigen Gegenwartsprosa, followed in 2019 by her Habilitation on Film als Medium kollektiver Erinnerungen. Geschichtspolitik und Diskurstransfer zwischen Ost und West. Her research focuses on gender studies, theories of violence, cultures of memory, war film and the interaction of genre and gender. Recent publications: Filmisches Erinnern. Zur Ästhetik und Funktion der Rückblende (2020, ed. with Michael Niehaus), Kinematografie der Erinnerung. Bd. 1. Filme als kollektives Gedächtnis zu verstehen (2020).