Published on February 7, 2023–Updated on October 4, 2023
Dates
from March 22, 2022 to March 23, 2022
IA and responsibilities: How are ethical standards integrated in technical systems? Examples from finance and smart cities.
How should we consider, or reconsider, the forms of responsibilities that arise from the phenomenal development of AI and algorithms that permeate all social, economic, scientific, and cultural practices?
Séminaire IA responsabilité
22 - 23 March 2022
Location: Online and at Université Laval
A first aspect of this question is to examine the ethical standards that serve as a foundation for or influence the development of algorithms, the design of technical tools, and how they are used by professionals, citizens, or consumers of these technical systems. A second aspect of the question is to understand how they engage or challenge our shared conceptions of responsibility. The complexity of these technical systems, their levels of organization, the scenarios they include, the forms of mathematization used, and the purpose they seek to achieve, make it essential to investigate how ethical standards are currently taken into account.
The relationship between AI and responsibilities will be the topic of several international conferences and workshops, and the first of these will be held in Quebec. Two examples of complex technical systems, smart cities and finance, were chosen to try to understand these systems, to challenge them and to address the phenomenon of the integration of ethical standards. This international and interdisciplinary workshop is divided in two specific workshops.
FIRST WORKSHOP
Cities as Technical Systems: What this means for life, living, and livelihoods?
March 22, 8:45AM to 4:30PM
The first workshop examines the ethical, psychological, sociological and political challenges of smart cities. The smart city model seems a priori more complex, but above all, more heterogeneous with different mathematical models, multiple added technological devices (connected objects) and the integration of political scenarios and ethical standards. Political scenarios such as “the sustainability of cities” and ethical standards such as “citizen engagement” play a role both in preparing and implementing smart city projects. Yet, there are various understandings of what a smart city is for the individual dweller, life and livelihoods in the neighborhoods, and the city (and city-state) as a whole. What are the causes of these different understandings, and how do they affect the city from its governance to its everyday life? How should we understand the changes that the smart city brings to the consciousness of collective living, the character of life in city neighborhoods, and responsibilities of the individual, community and state?
9:00 to 9:20 Jennifer Ang, philosophy, Singapore University of Social Sciences : “Technologization and the place of human autonomy”
9:20 to 9:40 Shin Koseki, UNESCO Chair Professor in Urban Landscape at the University of Montréal and co-head of Environment, Smart Cities, Territory and Mobility research theme’s OBVIA: “Smart cities as tailored dynamic fields of affordances”
9:40 à 10:00 Nina Powell, psychology, National University of Singapore: “What does it mean to be a free and autonomous moral person in a smart city?”
10:00 to 1:30 Discussion
10:30 to 10:55 Pause
10:55 to 11:15 Rita Padawangi, sociology, Singapore University of Social Sciences: “Whose Smartness? Whose City? Making Sense in the Everyday Life of a “Smart City”
11:15 to 11:35 Paul Rabé, political science, International Institute for Asian Studies, Erasmus University, Rotterdam: “Smart cities and governance”
11:35 to 12:15 Discussion
12:15 to 1:45 Lunch break
1:45 to 2:45 Roundtable: Ethics and Recommendations
Stéphane Roche, professeur au Département des sciences géométriques, Université Laval Mario Marosan, doctorant, Faculté de philosophie, Université Laval Philippe Girard, étudiant à la maitrise, Faculté de philosophie, Université Laval
2:45 to 3:00: Pause
3:00 to 3:20 Closing Remarks, Marie-Hélène Parizeau, philosophe, Université Laval: “Ethical and Political Issues concerning Smart Cities Governance”
SECOND WORKSHOP
Mathematical models, algorithms and ethical standards integrated in the financial system
March 23, 9:00AM to 12:30PM
The second workshop will focus on the mathematical models used upstream of the financial system and which underpin the algorithms used in current financial practices. These algorithms do not play a neutral role in the way risks are calculated or in the way professionals comply or not with the management framework. This situation contributes to a form of epistemic responsibility that values certain ethical standards over others. As a result, the dominant financial model seems to reveal an integrated or even closed system made of mathematical models, algorithms, and types of management with ethical standards that ensure its efficiency and predictability. This second workshop will question the very foundations of this model.
PROGRAM
9:00 Opening Remarks
9:15 to 9:45 Conference Christian Walter, actuaire, co-titulaire de la Chaire Éthique et Finance (FMSH, ISJPS), chercheur associé Université de Paris 1
9:45 to 10:15 Conference “AI ethics and systemic risks in finance”, Ekaterina Svetlova, economist, associate professor, University of Twente, The Netherlands.
10:15 to 10:30 Pause
10:30 to 11:00 Conference “Banal Political Economy”, Donald MacKenzie, sociologist, professor, School of Social and Political Science, University of Edinburgh, UK
11:00 to 12:20 Roundtable
Louis Adam, professeur à l’École d’actuariat, Université Laval Raul Dumitras, analyste investissement, BDC Capital de risque Dimitri Obama, doctorant, Département de sciences politiques, Université de Montréal
ORGANIZATION
This event is organized by Marie-Hélène Parizeau, professor at Faculté de philosophie, Université Laval, and researcher member of OBVIA, with support from Jennifer Ang, Singapore University of Social Sciences, and Vanessa Nurock, Université Nice-Côte d’Azur, for the firs workshop and Christian Walter, co-titulaire de la chaire Éthique et Finance (FMSH, ISJPS), for the second workshop.
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