Events

Epistemologies of AI: Imagining the Social World in and through AI Research

Speaker: Ruth Müller, Svenja Breuer, Michael Holohan

Location: 370 Jay Street, Room 825

Date: Wednesday, January 10, 2024

The pervasive influence of emerging AI technologies on diverse aspects of our lives places researchers and engineers in a pivotal role as shapers of these advancements. In this panel, we shed light on the role of engineer’s understandings of the social worlds that make up the application contexts for AI-enabled technologies. The panel includes two presentations: the first explores how engineers’ understandings of healthcare intricately influence design and user engagement within robotics research and discusses how domain-specific knowledge can get incorporated into robotics research. The second presents the example of AI-enabled chatbots in psychotherapeutic contexts, examining how this technology reimagines clinical psychotherapeutic practice and AI development alike. Emphasizing questions of responsibility, the panel explores the ethical and social considerations inherent in AI research and application.