Weekly Talks

Join us every Wednesday…

… 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.

Winter 2025/2026 (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): tba

03.12.25
G. Howdle (Utrecht University): Relational Turn: New Approach or Change of Topic?

10.12.25
G. Liao (National Tsing Hua University): 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]

07.01.26
L. Kob (OVGU Magdeburg): Substrate-Hybrid Systems in the Context of Conscious AI

14.01.26
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

[PAIR Writing Retreat]

04.02.26
M. Hellrigel-Holderbaum (PAIR): Can you discuss your way out of meta-normative regress?

Past Seminars

(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”