On Wednesday, February 26th, Dr. Leonie N. Bossert (University of Vienna) will present her research on the ethical implications of using AI to decode animal communication.
🗓Date: Wednesday, February 26th, 2025
🕥Hour: 3:15 pm Helsinki Time EET, 2:15 pm Central European Time CET, 8:15 am US Eastern Time ET
📍 Venue: You can participate either in person or virtually over Zoom
✏️Registration: https://www.helsinki.fi/en/researchgroups/animal-law-centre/seminar
Dr. Bossert says:
In this talk, I will focus on a particular application and its underlying research, namely using AI to decode animal communication. I will introduce and discuss the ethical challenges aligned with that, thereby focusing on developing and using the technologies for decoding whale communication. Ethical aspects that need to be discussed are, e.g., potentially underlying anthropomorphisms, whales’ privacy rights, cultural harms done to whale populations, the technology's ineffectiveness for protecting them, and how to evaluate the spirit of ‘technological solutionism’ that could be perpetuated with using such technologies.
The talk will provide first thoughts on how AI technologies for decoding animal communication can be used responsibly, respecting animals’ interests and welfare.
About the presenter: Leonie N. Bossert is a postdoctoral Assistant at the Department of Philosophy at the University of Vienna. She is a member of the Heidelberger Young Academy of Sciences and Humanities, an associate member of the Center for Technology and Environmental Ethics Prague, and Co-Coordinator of the European network of the International Society for Environmental Ethics. Her research focuses on political philosophy and applied ethics, with a strong focus on the intersection of animal ethics with technology ethics, such as AI or geoengineering ethics.