Philosophy of Technology and Space Travel

Subproject: Digital Design and Human Experience

How are new digital methods changing both design processes and our experience? This project is about how artificial intelligence and machine learning can be used to design new objects - in disciplines and at scales as diverse as pharmacy and architecture. And it is about the possibilities and consequences this has for human processes of perception and experience.

This project is being pursued in particular with the Singapore-ETH Centre and through collaborations such as "AI-Augmented Architectural Design".

Subproject: Space Travel

What can we learn in space that we could not learn "at home" on Earth? What is so interesting about Mars in contrast to what we can study in terrestrial laboratories or what we can still study on Earth (such as the deep sea)? Why should something be interesting(er) just because it is far away? As theoretical philosophers, we are particularly interested in such epistemic questions about space travel - never, of course, in complete isolation from the exciting ethical, anthropological, and techno-philosophical questions that arise in the course of space travel. We do philosophy of spaceflight in particular in the context of the Bremen research initiative "Humans on Mars".

Publications on the Subprojects:

up2date (08.2024): Philosophy for Another Planet. Report on our space travel research project.
M. Jüttner, E. Ostertag, und N. Sieroka (2023): Ritual und Experiment – Versuch einer Annäherung an die Natur. In: Angst.Ekel.Scheitern. Ein Austausch zu den blinden Flecken der Nachhaltigkeit, hrsg. von Y. Siegmund, I. Jessen und U. Bildstein. Urbanophil, Berlin, S. 148-152.
Safdari, A. (2023): From Basic Empathy to Basic Trust in Human-Robot Relation: A Phenomenological Proposal. In: ALIFE 2023: Ghost in the Machine: Proceedings of the 2023 Artificial Life Conference.
Safdari, A. (2023). Review of Person, thing, Robot: a moral and legal ontology for the 21st century and beyond by David Gunkel. Ethics and Information Technology 25(53).
Sieroka, N. (2022): Neues Wahrnehmen. Manege für Architektur (Heft 2: Automationen), 36-37.
Avila, M. et al. (2022): A Vision for Human Mars Exploration Made in Bremen. 73rd International Astronautical Congress (IAC), September 2022, Abstract IAC-22-B3.8.11.
Safdari Sharabiani, A. (2021): Genuine Empathy with Inanimate Objects. Phenom Cogn Sci 20, 831–846.
Sieroka, N. (2020): Philosophy of AI and the Role of Digital Design. In: Rethinking Design with Artificial Intelligence, Blog-Serie des ETH Think-and-Do-Tanks RETHINK, 28.09.2020.
Schneider, P. et al. (2020): Rethinking Drug Design in the Artificial Intelligence Era. Nature Reviews Drug Discovery 19(5), 353-364.
Sieroka, N. (2019): Human-induced or Natural? – Some Philosophical Considerations and Concepts. Abstract Book 3rd Induced Seismicity Workshop, p. 18.