Speakers

Molly Wright Steenson

    Senior Associate Dean for Research, College of Fine Arts, K&L Gates Associate Professor of Ethics & Computational Technologies and Associate Professor, School of Design
    Title: AI and Stories of Autonomous Landscapes
    Abstract: Part myth, part imaginary, part reality, there are numerous visions of how AI is changing the landscape around us. Yet these ideas have a longer history—one that directly implicates architects and architecture back to the 1960s. In this talk, Molly Wright Steenson traces the history of AI in architecture and looks ahead to its contemporary and future implications.
    Time: 6PM - 7.30PM, Thursday, October 18, 2018
    Location: 301 Crosby Hall, UB South Campus (Co-hosted with the School of Architecture and Planning)

Lenore Zuck

    Research Professor, Computer Science, University of Illinois at Chicago
    Title: Code Should Not Be Law Checks and Balances in Human-machine Systems
    Abstract: Autonomous systems, smart contracts on block chains, and even social networks encode decisions and ethical policies that they impose on their users and their environments. This talk will present analysis of some cases where abdicating the responsibility of ethical decisions and delegating them to software resulted in measurable problems. I will also discuss instances where systems are designed to have built-in mechanisms for humans to monitor, and sometimes override, their decisions. The (somewhat subjective) conclusion the talk will lead into is that human-intervention has to be built into any system that impacts a large enough organization or the environment.
    Time: 10.00AM - 11.00AM, Friday, November 09, 2018
    Location: 113A Davis Hall, UB North Campus (Co-hosted with the Computational and Data-enabled Science and Engineering (CDSE) program)

Azim Shariff

    Associate Professor, Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia
    Title: Moral Machines - The Ethical Dilemmas of Self-Driving Cars
    Abstract: With the rapid approach of self-driving cars, we are poised to yield autonomy to millions of machines that will have the power over life and death. The road to this future has a bright promise, but as we are beginning to see, there are numerous psychological roadblocks. Many of these involve thorny ethical challenges that come when the moral decisions that are today made by individual drivers are turned over to preprogrammed algorithms. How should these cars be programmed to mete out risks to the various people on road? Who determines the ethics of these algorithms? I will discuss the recent work with my collaborators on the social psychology and legal implications of these moral machines.
    Time: 10.00AM - 11.00AM, Friday, March 08, 2019
    Location: 108 O'Brian Hall, UB North Campus (Co-hosted with the Computational and Data-enabled Science and Engineering (CDSE) program)