[ attention! new venue for the 27th! ]
Within the framework of the CNRS proj. named "EpistHOMME+", we are pleased to host:
Enhancing Human Experience via Emerging Technologies
Ingénierium & Salle Polyvalente, Laval France
Young and old alike believe that the human experience could gain something if better informed about up-coming technologies. Learning about them at an early stage helps in making key decisions about one's personal future. Although the approach is somewhat individual and devoted to those concerned, collectively oriented health and entertainment will gain from observing individual practices in the matter. Government policy incorporating emergent technology progress through monitoring will renew itself in a relevant way. However, in the name of progress people are increasingly willing to accept risk; the possible downfall of this movement is its ability to promote taking risks. But then again, could we or would we want to stop it? If we are to enhance the human experience, the pros and cons of each situation must be considered. Modifying or augmenting humans surely raises a certain number of issues. What are they? What aspect of life should one proceed to enhance? Which sectors or issues should become priority elements? Which academic disciplines are involved and why? What limits technological change? Does one have an acceptance threshold? If so, how would one express it? What are the long term implications of enhancement? Establishing a typology of possible applications and their contexts would be desirable for this symposium on enhancing members of our society.
The following non-exhaustive list may be used to provoke thought on this topic: Keywords & Topics:
Definitions of enhancement ▪ Robot companions for citizens ▪ Jungling multiple identities ▪ Advanced interfaces for increasing social presence ▪ Augmented health ▪ Epistemology of tech. innovation ▪ Care-giving robots ▪ Psychological analysis of acceptance ▪ Augmented Well-being ▪ Ubiquitous internet or computing ▪ Social roles in emerging tech. contexts ▪ Holistic, pragmatic and systemic approaches to resolving well-being difficulties ▪ Augmented Context-Awareness ▪ Communication enabling and enhancing tech. ▪ Incommunicability ▪ Human factors psychology and needs assessment ▪ Mind/body problem ▪ New worlds and belief revision ▪ Moral and ethical dimensions of enhancement ▪ Hybrid engineering ▪ Progress and technological obsolescence ▪ Co-constructed experiences ▪ Interventionism or Science policy issues ▪ The notions of Self or Identity in human experience ▪ Public information points and communication devices ▪ Technological Singularity success or failure ▪ Roles of otherhood in one's experiences ▪ Cognitive enhancement ▪ Theoretical controversies ▪ Emergent intentional states ▪ The intersection of the Arts, design and technology ▪ Transhumanistic stances ▪ Augmented emotion ▪ etc.
Chair: Colin T. SCHMIDT, Le Mans University & Arts et Metiers ParisTech Lab, Laval France
Assistant to the Chair: Jayesh S. PILLAI, Arts et Metiers ParisTech Lab: jayesh.spillai@gmail.com
Keynote Speakers: AUBREY DE GREY. Biomedical Gerontologist, SENS Foundation (UK); JAMES MOOR. (Confirmed.) Professor of Ethics and Philosophy, Dartmouth College (USA); KEVIN WARWICK. (Confirmed.) Professor of Cybernetics, Reading University (UK)
Aubrey de GREY (Sens Foundation USA/UK)
Postponing aging indefinitely: when fear of the unknown goes too far
It may seem premature to be discussing the medical control of human aging when so little progress has yet been made in even postponing it. However, two facts undermine this assessment. The first is that aging happens throughout our lives but only causes ill-health after middle age: this shows that we can postpone that ill-health without knowing how to prevent aging completely, but instead by molecular and cellular repair. The second is that regenerative medicine is now advancing from a futuristic twinkle in a few visionaries' eyes to a realistic strategy for addressing numerous medical conditions. In this talk I will explain why therapies that can add 30 healthy years to the remaining lifespan of typical 60-year-olds may well arrive within the next few decades. I will then discuss the likely rate of subsequent progress, the dramatic implications of that rate for the healthy longevity of those who benefit from the initial therapies, and the societal significance of that advance.
James MOOR (Dartmouth College, USA)
The Ethics of Enhancement and the Enhancement of Ethics
Ongoing human enhancement creates policy vacuums and forces us to rethink and adjust our ethical judgments about these novel applications of technology. Even more striking is that human enhancement may eventually force us to rethink the foundations of ethics itself. Ethics is typically based in one way or another on claims about what it is to be human. What becomes of the foundation for ethics given the potential radical transformations of human nature and rationality itself?
Kevin Warwick (University of Reading, England)
The Cyborg Experiments
In this presentation a practical look is taken at how the use of implant and electrode technology can be employed to create biological brains for robots, to enable human enhancement and to diminish the effects of certain neural illnesses. In all cases the end result is to increase the range of abilities of the recipients. An indication is given of a number of areas in which such technology has already had a profound effect, a key element being the need for a clear interface linking a biological brain directly with computer technology.
The emphasis is clearly placed on experimental scientific studies that have been and are being undertaken and reported on. The area of focus is notably the need for a biological/technological connection, where a link is made directly with the cerebral cortex and/or nervous system. The presentation will consider the future in which robots have biological, or part-biological, brains and in which neural implants link the human nervous system bi-directionally with technology and the internet.
Program
Tuesday 27/03/2012 - Ethics meets Well-being
Ingénierium - 4, rue de l'Ermitage - 53000 Laval
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Chair: Colin Schmidt, Arts et Metiers ParisTech, Presence & innovation, LAMPA (EA1427), Laval
3:30pm Welcome at Laval Ingenierium (4 rue de l’Ermitage)
4:00pm Keynote Speaker: Aubrey de GREY Biomedical Gerontologist SENS Foundation (UK)
5:00pm (44) What is Transhumanism today in France? (Marc ROUX, Association Française Transhumaniste - Technoprog! France)
5:30pm Keynote Speaker: James MOOR Professor of Ethics and Philosophy, Dartmouth College (USA)
6:30pm – End of symposium (Part 1) (Part 2 will take place at Laval Virtual Exhibition Hall, Place de Hercé)
Wednesday 28/03/2012 - Enhancing Human Experience via Emerging Technologies
Salle Polyvalente, Place de Hercé, Laval
Chair: Colin Schmidt, Arts et Metiers ParisTech, Presence & innovation, LAMPA (EA1427), Laval
2pm Keynote Speaker: Kevin WARWICK, Professor of Cybernetics at the University of Reading, England
3pm Social enhancement: re-thinking the role of emerging technologies (Laura Cabrera, Institute of Biomedical Ethics Basel, Switzerland)
3:25pm What does it Mean to be Enhanced? (Ryan Wittingslow, University of Sydney, Australia)
3:50pm Singularity and Catholic Spirituality (Adriana Mihaela, Macsut, PHD Candidate University of Bucharest, Department of Philosophy; Graduated, Master Of Theology, Specialization Biblical Exegesis And Christian Hermeneutics, The Catholic Theological Institute Of “Sfânta Tereza”, Bucharest, Romania)
4:15pm Poster session: The treatment of hypersexuality using the psychotherapy and the virtual reality (Adina Cismaru Inescu, Université de Liège, Faculty of Medicine, department of Public Health, Belgium)
4:30pm Coffee break
4:50pm Better than well-being (David Lewin, Liverpool Hope University, United Kingdom)
5:15pm Substantial Life Extension and Quality of Life (Christopher Wareham, European School of Molecular Medicine (SEMM) & European Institute of Oncology (IEO) & Faculty of Medicine, University of Milan, Italy)
5:40pm Panel session with the speakers animated by Colin Schmidt, Arts et Metiers ParisTech, Laval
6pm – End of symposium
8pm – Gala Dinner, Salle Polyvalente
Program Committee
Jean-Claude ANDRE. Scientific Advisor to the CNRS (Risk Assessment and Nanotechnologies) & Institute of Engineering and Systems Sciences for forecasting, Socially Responsible Research (FR)
Jean-Michel BESNIER. CNRS Research Director in Philosophy, Centre for Applied Epistemology (CREA) Ecole Polytechnique & University of Paris 4 (FR)
Paul BOURGINE. CNRS Research Director in Complex Systems, Centre for Applied Epistemology (CREA) Ecole Polytechnique Paris (FR)
Nicole D’ALMEIDA. Professor of Communication, CELSA University of Paris 4 (FR)
Marcelo DASCAL.Emeritus Professor Dept. of Philosophy, Faculty of Humanities, Tel Aviv University & President of the International Association for the Study of Controveries; Founder and editor of the interdisciplinary journal of Pragmatics and Cognition; Humbolt Prize 2002 and ISSA Prize 2006 (IL)
Jérôme GOFFETTE. Philosophy of Science, University Lyon 1—Claude Bernard & ENS, currently authoring "Human Enhancement - An Interdisciplinary Inquiry" (Palgrave) (FR)
Aubrey DE GREY. Biomedical Gerontologist and Chief Science Officer, SENS Foundation & Editor-in-Chief of Rejuvenation Research, advisor to Humanity+, Maximum Life, Alcor and the Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence (USA, UK)
Edouard KLEINPETER. iscc-CNRS Scientific Officer, Specialist of Utopias, Human Enhancement and Communication, Paris (FR)
Lorenzo MAGNANI. Professor and Director, Computational Philosophy Lab, Pavia University & Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou (P.R.China, IT)
James MOOR. Professor of Ethics, Dartmouth College NH USA, Barwise Prize 2006, Former Editor-in-chief of Minds and Machines (USA)
Vincent MULLER. Professor of Philosophy, American College of Thessaloniki & Future of Humanity Institute -FHI-, University of Oxford (GR, UK)
Jacques PERRIAULT. Emeritus Professor of Social Informatics, University Paris 10 (Nanterre-La Défense), Senior advisor to the issc-CNRS, Honorary President of the French Society for Information and Communication Sciences -SFSIC- (FR)
Serge PROULX. Professor of Social Informatics, UQAM Montréal & Télécom ParisTech (CA, FR)
Marc ROUX. President of the French Society for Transhumanism (‘L'Association Française Transhumaniste : Technoprog) (FR)
Natasha VITA-MORE. University of Plymouth & Chair Humanity+ (UK)
Shunji YAMANAKA. Industrial Designer, President of Leading Edge Design corp., Professor at the Graduate School of Media and Governance, Keio University, Japan (JP)
Ingénierium
Ensam-ParisTech
4 rue de l’Ermitage
53000 Laval France
+33 (0)2 43 67 05 76
+33 (0)6 26 26 66 48
&
La Salle Polyvalente,
Place de Hercé
53000 LAVAL FRANCE
A WORKSHOP SPONSORED BY ARTS ET METIERS PARISTECH and
SUPPORTED BY THE FRENCH NATIONAL SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH CENTRE's COMMUNICATION SCIENCES INSTITUTE, FRANCE
