Join us every Moday...

… for our weekly PAIR Research Seminar! It provides a platform for members of PAIR and external speakers to engage in dialogue on contemporary developments in the philosophy and ethics of AI.

Summer 2026 (organized by M. Gorr)

13.04.26
Samuela Marchiori (TU Delft): Conceptual disruption in AI governance

20.04.26
Joshua Hatherley (University of Copenhagen): Postmortem avatars in grief therapy: Prospects, ethics, and governance 

27.04.26
Carlos Zednik (TU Eindhoven)

04.05.26
Philip Haueis (University of Bielefeld): AI as Metabolic Technology? 

11.05.26.
Markus Pantsar (RWTH Aachen): Towards an epistemology of artificial mathematical reasoning 

18.05.25
Ian Robertson (PAIR): The Limitation Game: Can embodied cognition limit cognition to the living? 

25.05.26
Silvia Milano (TU Munich)

01.06.26
Mona Simion (Oxford University): Artificial Epistemic Agency (online)

08.06.26
Erasmus Mayr (FAU Erlangen-Nuremberg)

15.06.26
Sabrina Coninx (Vrije University Amsterdam): Rethinking Disruptive Technologies: The Benefits, Harms, and Injustices of Human Niche Construction (online)

22.06.26
Leonard Dung (Ruhr-University Bochum): Roleplay in language models: A challenge for AI agency and deception? 

Past Seminars

(organized by M. Gorr)

  • 15.10.25
    Linus T. Huang (Chinese University of Hong Kong | PAIR Visiting Fellow): Dynamic Value Alignment: Enhancing User Autonomy Through Multiagent, Moral Foundations Theoretical Framework
  • 22.10.25
    A. Seaboyer (PAIR): Challenges of Ethical AI-enabled Government Influence Operations
  • 29.10.25
    R. Ye (Ruhr University Bochum | PAIR Visiting Fellow): Measuring Artificial Sentience
  • 05.11.25
    I. Titz (Ruhr University Bochum) & B. Lundgren (PAIR): LLMs, Autonomy, and Narrative
  • 12.11.25
    T. Sterkenburg (LMU Munich | PAIR Visiting Fellow): Values in machine learning: What follows from underdetermination?
  • 19.11.25
    A. Kirkeby-Hinrup (Lund University | PAIR Visiting Fellow): What If Consciousness Can Be Generated in More Than One Way?
  • 26.11.25
    Silvia Milano (LMU Munich & University of Exeter): AI and relationship norms
  • 03.12.25
    G. Howdle (Utrecht University): Relational Turn: New Approach or Change of Topic?
  • 10.12.25
    NN: From AI Consciousness to Artificial Consciousness: Tracing a Philosophical and Empirical Trajectory
  • 17.12.25
    E. Catena (PAIR): The Impact of Personalized AI on Personal Autonomy
  • [Christmas Break]
  • 14.01.26
    Cancelled: M. Facchin (University of Antwerp): The Hard Problem of Vehicles
  • 21.01.26
    R. Waelen (Bonn University): Towards a Theory of Recognition From Artificial Others
  • 28.01.26 [PAIR Writing Retreat]
  • 04.02.26
    L. Kob (OVGU Magdeburg): Substrate-Hybrid Systems in the Context of Conscious AI

(organised by S. Fink, I. Jaja, & H. Naeem)

  • 23.04.25 – [SENSOR conference, Erlangen]
  • 30.04.25 – Q. Wu (Chinese Academy of Sciences | PAIR Visiting Fellow): The Threat of Over-conceptualization
  • 07.05.25 – M. Mahlberg (Erlangen): Climate stories – why language matters
  • 14.05.25 – J. Hauser (Barcelona | PAIR Visiting Fellow): AI am I: AI Personal Assistants and the Self
  • 21.05.25 – A. Mannino (Berkeley): Suffering, Desire, and Moral Status in AI Systems
  • 28.05.25 – S. B. Fink (PAIR/Glasgow): Emerging Technologies and their Epistemic Risks
  • 04.06.25 – A. Helliwell (Northeastern | PAIR Visiting Fellow): AI Art and Responsibility
  • 11.06.25 – S. Nyholm (Munich): The Ethics of AI Agents: Advanced AI Assistants, the “Next Big Thing” in AI Ethics?
  • 18.06.25 – D. Shottenkirk (CUNY/Brooklyn College | PAIR Visiting Fellow): Mournful Angels: AI in artmaking and the particularities of perception
  • 25.06.25 – David Gray (University of Memphis|PAIR Visiting Fellow): If we gain knowledge from Generative AI, how do the outputs have to be produced?
  • 02.07.25 – [IACAP, Twente & Covey Prize]
  • 09.07.25 – M. Gorr (PAIR): Considering The Interests of Intelligent Machines
  • 16.07.25 – C. Rathkopf (Jülich): Latent Competence in LLMs
  • 23.07.25 – Ian Robertson (PAIR): AI, Trust & Expertise

(organised by I. Robertson)

  • 16.10.24 – Björn A. Lundgren (PAIR), “What is informational autonomy?”
  • 23.10.24 – Elena Walsh (U Wollongong), “Does a face speak for itself? Emotion recognition technologies and explainable AI”
  • 30.10.24 – Eleonora Catena (PAIR), “Generative AI and Human Autonomy: Autonomy Gaps”
  • 06.11.24 – Ibifuro R. Jaja (PAIR), “Surveillance Capitalism, the Shift to the Subscription Model: The Trade-offs”
  • 13.11.24 – Hadeel Naeem (PAIR), “Bridging Gaps”
  • 20.11.24 – Stephanie Evert (FAU Erlangen), “Is ChatGPT intelligent? Understanding the foundations of conversational AI”
  • 27.11.24 – Claudio Castellini (FAU Erlangen), “Making Artificial Intelligence (really) intelligent?”
  • 04.12.24 – Gregor Schöner (RU Bochum), “How higher cognition may emerge from the dynamics of strongly interacting neural populations”
  • 11.12.24 – Brandon Ashby (PAIR), “The Laws of Appearance and the Syntax of Consciousness”
  • 18.12.24 – Anthony Seaboyer, (PAIR & Royal Military College of Canada) “Iranian AI-Enabled Information Exploitation”
  • [Winter break]
  • 15.01.25 – Jonne Maas (U Delft), “Freedom in the Digital Age: Designing for Non-Domination”
  • 22.01.25 – Kritika Maheshwari (U Delft) “Algorithmic deep deference & the right to human decision”
  • 29.01.25 – Max Hellrigel-Holderbaum (PAIR),  “Beyond Questionnaire-Style Assessments: Rethinking AI Safety Benchmarks”
  • 05.02.25 – Wanja Wiese (RU Bochum) “Artificial Consciousness: criteria for the absence of phenomenal consciousness”

  • 17.04.24 – Eleonora Catena, V. G. Santucci, & L. Tummolini, “Human autonomy with AI in the loop”
  • 24.04.24 – [cancelled for Philosophy of Science @ Inter-University Centre, Dubrovnik]
  • 01.05.24 – [Labour Day]
  • 08.05.24 – Hayate Shimizu (Hokkaido University), “Respect for the human-robot relationship”
  • 15.05.24 – Chris De Weerd & Leonard Dung, “Evolutionary approaches to consciousness reconsidered”
  • 22.05.24 – Ian Robertson, “Artificial intelligence and representation”
  • 29.05.24 – Andreas K. Maier (FAU, Informatik) – AI Singularity (indicative text here)
  • 05.06.24 – Sascha Benjamin Fink, “Structural approaches to consciousness: An overview”
  • 12.06.24 – Anthony Seaboyer, “Ethical AI-enabled influence operations”
  • 19.06.24 – Richard Matschke, “Addressing Existential Risks through Education”
  • 26.06.24 – Gerhard Ernst (FAU, Philosophie), “Two kinds of rationality
  • 03.07.24 – Vincent C. Müller, “The problem of method for AI ethics: A minimal ethics for a universal technology”
  • 10.07.24 – Oleg Vasilchenko, “Ethnography of AI in law”
  • 17.07.24 – Bernhard Kainz (FAU, AIBE), “Diagnosing the Diagnosers: Challenging the Role of Machine Learning in Modern Medicine” [postponed]

  • 18.10.23 – V. Müller & PAIR, “AI Philosophy”
  • 25.10.23 – [cancelled]
  • 01.11.23 – [All Saints’/Allerheiligen]
  • 08.11.23 – [A. Dewey & L. Dung Presentations @ AIBE Research Workshop: room 03.17]
  • 15.11.23 – L. Dung, AI agency
  • 22.11.23 – [postponed]
  • 29.11.23 – [cancelled]
  • 06.12.23 – A. Dewey, task-optimised modelling
  • 13.12.23 – V. Müller, “How to do AI ethics”
  • 20.12.23 – [PhAI 2023]
  • 27.12.23 – [Christmas]
  • 03.01.24 – [Christmas]
  • 10.01.24 – [PAIR retreat Waischenfeld]
  • 17.01.24 – L. Dung & F. Kamerer, “Illusionism and non-human consciousness research”
  • 24.01.24 – A. Dewey, “Why cognition can’t be reverse engineered”
  • 31.01.24 – B. Lundgren, “Ethics of autonomous vehicles”
  • 07.02.24 – M. Hellrigel-Holderbaum, “A basic account of AI agency”