RE:HUMANISM TALKS
RE:DEFINE THE BOUNDARIES
During the exhibition period, there were also a series of a series of meetings and talks, in streaming on the Re:Humanism’s youtube account, with Artificial Intelligence experts, artists and representatives of the world of art and contemporary culture.
07.05.2021
18.30 – 20.30
AI&CONFLICTS – ARTIFICIAL TRUTH
Speakers: Federico Campagna, Metahaven, Flavia Dzodan
Moderator: German A. Duarte – Curated by Krisis Publishing
In data-driven societies truth is not something to mirror anymore. Many agencies interact with its own structure, which is liquid and adversarial. The whole reality reveals itself as a battlefield, where myriads of agencies constantly fight to assert their own perspective. AI systems and their applications play a crucial role in the proliferation of facts and in the construction of “rendered” realities. In the so-called “post-truth era”, facts shatter into alternative facts, images can no longer behave as evidences, and truth increasingly becomes something to perform. How can we articulate new narratives within this epistemic earthquake? Can technology provide us effective tools to face complex phenomena through political and aesthetic interventions? Our panelists will question the role of truth in the age of artificial intelligence and the need for new languages and forms of imagination.
11.05.2021
18.30 – 20.00
SPECULATIVE ECOLOGY – IMAGINING ECOSYSTEMS THANKS TO AI
Speakers: Laura Tripaldi, Sofia Crespo & Feileacan McCormick,
Leonardo Caffo
Moderator: Arianna Forte
Faced with the technological and social challenges that await us, the ability to rethink our concept of existing in relation to others can represent a speculative exercise useful for designing new sustainability trajectories. By tightening the circle on the concepts of ecological consciousness, nature, and artificial intelligence, the speakers address the possibilities of imagining new ecosystems from different perspectives. The artists, first classified by the Re:Humanism Art Prize 2, Entangled Others – Feileacan McCormick and Sofia Crespo – in their research explore the concepts of biodiversity and the relationship between species, particularly within coral reefs. Laura Tripaldi, Ph.D. student in materials science and nanotechnology at the University of Milan-Bicocca, author of “Menti Parallele” helps us reflect on a new definition of intelligence, understood as the ability of matter to adapt to the surrounding environment. Leonardo Caffo, philosopher and co-curator of the Triennale Milano Public Program 2020, professor of Theoretical Philosophy at the Polytechnic of Turin and of Phenomenology of Contemporary Visual Arts at the NABA in Milan, carries forward in his research the themes of anti-speciesism, towards an overcoming of anthropocentrism and the construction of a new narrative for the future. The speakers discuss how, through conscious efforts, technology can be the key to the future of our species, expanding our awareness of worlds that are invisible but strongly connected to our life experience. The independent curator Arianna Forte will moderate the interventions.
19.05.2021
18.30 – 20.00
AI AND ETHICAL DESIGN – THE GREATEST CHALLENGES FOR
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
Speakers: Giada Pistilli [Filosofia in movimento], Mark Coeckelbergh,
Ivana Bartoletti
Moderator: Francesca Bufano
Artificial Intelligence has unprecedented transformation potential to reshape society, economies, and working lives but, at the same time, it involves the emergence of various issues in terms of environmental impact, gender bias, racial discrimination, problems related to privacy, and the future of work. Just recently, the regulation on Artificial Intelligence was approved by the EU Commission, which aims to regulate the functions of AI considered to be at high risk. Raising ethical and political issues, the speakers outline an overview of these arguments, intertwining a debate also on the intersectionality of inequality and the strengthening of existing stereotypes, up to the impact of some technologies on the new generations. Author of “An Artificial Revolution, on Power, Politics and AI” and founder of the network “Women Leading in AI”, Ivana Bartoletti explores the reality of the AI revolution, investigating the problems due to data discrimination: algorithms that encode racist prejudices, sexists and classists in our daily lives. Giada Pistilli (Philosophy in Movement), tech ethicist and Ph.D. student at CNRS-Sorbonne with a project in “Applied Ethics of AI (NLP), UX and data processing”, leads a research group within the start-up Parisian Les Petits Bots on the application of the ethics of AI to the design, development, and implementation of a conversational agent (chatbot) for citizens and local authorities. Mark Coeckelbergh, Professor of Philosophy of Media and Technology at the Department of Philosophy of the University of Vienna, author among his latest publications of “AI Ethics”, offers an overview of important ethical issues, including concerns about the future of work in an economy based on artificial intelligence. The talk – moderated by the innovation consultant Francesca Bufano – mobilizes the resources of political philosophy to develop an argument on the future of technology and the environment and on the impacts they have on the critical and philosophical thinking of human beings.
25.05.2021
18.30 – 20.00
VISIONARIES – NEW FRONTIERS IN ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
Speakers: Maria Enrica Angelone, Alfredo Adamo, Marco Trombetti,
Trond Wuellner
Moderator: Silvia Adamo
Artificial Intelligence has influenced every city, business and person significantly. The debate about the future of AI and what it will mean – or should mean – for humanity is a pressing question of contemporary society. How will our way of living and working change with its unstoppable diffusion and technological advances? There are already many examples of how the introduction of AI in various aspects of our lives has brought positive impacts and future applications can certainly provide unprecedented opportunities. However, numerous questions remain on its social and professional implications, unintended consequences together with the fear of a general AI that will equal or even exceed human cognitive abilities. A group of experienced AI entrepreneurs explores technological progress where AI is a key player, while the capabilities of this technology continue to expand between opportunities and threats, problems and solutions.
28.05.2021
18.30 – 20.00
BEYOND THE INTERFACE – THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN
CONTEMPORARY ART AND AI
Speakers: Daniela Cotimbo, Ruggero Eugeni, Valentino Catricalà
Moderator: Gaia Bobò
How is the relationship between contemporary art and artificial intelligence developing? What are the themes and aesthetics that characterize it? The talk in question arises from the need to identify the answers to these questions through an approach that is both historical, critical and aesthetic. Through the experience of Daniela Cotimbo, curator of the exhibition Re: Humanism 2 | Re: define the boundaries we will read the evolution of this relationship within the practices of the artists who gave life to the two editions of the prize. Valentino Catricalà, recently appointed curator of SODA Gallery Manchester, will help us to frame these practices within the wider panorama of media art and finally, Ruggero Eugeni, full professor of media semiotics at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart will offer us an overview on the subject. starting from its latest publication “Algorithmic Capital – Five post-media devices”. The independent curator Gaia Bobò moderates the interventions.
