IAS, Kyushu University
FRIS, Tohoku University
Speaker Lists
IAS-FRIS Symposium on Social Robots and Ethical Design 2024
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Keynote Speaker
Christoph Lütge
IEAI, Technical University of Munich
Talk Title
AI & Robotics Ethics: Challenges and Opportunities
Biography:
Christoph Lütge is a Full Professor of Business Ethics at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) and the Director of the TUM Institute for Ethics in Artificial Intelligence (IEAI). He is a Distinguished Visiting Professor of Tokyo University and has held further visiting positions at Harvard, Stockholm, Taipei and Kyoto. He has a background both in philosophy as well as business informatics. In 2007, he was awarded a Heisenberg Fellowship by the German Research Foundation. His most recent books are: “Business Ethics and Digitization” (Metzler, 2022, with coauthors), “Evolving Business Ethics” (Metzler, 2022, with M. Thejls Ziegler), “An Introduction to Ethics in Robotics and AI” (Springer, 2021, with coauthors) and “Business Ethics: An Economically Informed Perspective” (Oxford University Press, 2021, with Matthias Uhl).
Representatives for Opening Remarks
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Ryu Kojima
IAS, Kyushu University
Biography:
Ryu Kojima is a Vice President, Head of the Legal Office, and Professor of Law at Kyushu University, as well as a Vice Dean at the Kyushu University Institute for Advanced Study. He specializes in Intellectual Property Law, Cultural Policy, and Science, Technology,
and Innovation Policy, and conducts education and research on institutional design that allows us to enjoy scientific and technological achievements, as well as cultural expressions, in a diverse and inclusive manner. He received his LL.B. from the University of Tokyo Faculty of Law in 2000, and his LL.M. from Harvard Law School in 2003.
Toshiyuki Hayase
FRIS, Tohoku University
Biography:
Toshiyuki Hayase is the Director of Frontier Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Sciences (FRIS) and a President-Appointed Extraordinary Professor at Tohoku University. He received the D. Eng. degree from Nagoya University, Japan, in 1987. From 1980 to 1990, he was a Research Associate with Nagoya University. He became an Associate Professor with the Institute of Fluid Science, Tohoku University, in 1990, where he has been a Professor from 2000 to 2021, a director from 2008 to 2014. His research interests include measurement integrated simulation of complex flow problems especially in biomedical field.
Invited
Speakers
Auxane Boch
IEAI, Technical University of Munich
Interacting with Robots: Psychological Insights
Talk Title
Biography:
Auxane Boch is a cyberpsychologist and research associate at the Technical University of Munich (TUM)'s Institute for Ethics in AI, and a doctoral candidate at the TUM School of Management. Auxane's work involves human and societal-centric ethical evaluation of interactive technologies from a human-computer or human-robot interaction perspective while exploring the impact of technologies, from AI to video games and immersive realities, on humans' general health, well-being, and behaviours. She also has expertise in cultural AI ethics and AI governance. She works closely with Women in AI as the WAI Munich city lead and as Women in Games Ambassador.
Gabriele Trovato
ISchool of Engineering,
Shibaura Institute of Technology
Biography:
Gabriele Trovato is Associate Professor in Shibaura Institute of Technology and Visiting Researcher in Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan. He received his M.S. degree in Computer Engineering from the University of Pisa, Italy, and Ph.D. degree in Biorobotics in Waseda University. Within the relations between the two countries, Gabriele Trovato has been in the organising committee of Italy-Japan Workshops since 2011, and has been appointed "Ambassador of Livorno in the world" by the Municipality of Livorno, Italy. His main research interests are interdisciplinary and include Human-Robot Interaction, with focus on culture and religion related aspects, artificial emotions in humanoids, robot aesthetics, and procedural content generation. Gabriele Trovato's latest creations, such as SanTO robots, are a combination of engineering, AI, art and humanities, and raised interest among the worldwide press, including the Wall Street Journal and the BBC.
Balancing Religious Law and ELSI: Robots in Religious Contexts
Talk Title
Hilja Autto
School of Accounting and Finance, Business Law, University of Vaasa
Talk Title
Information Design for Better Privacy Communication in Human-Robot Interaction
Biography:
Hilja Autto, LL.M., is a doctoral researcher at the University of Lapland, Faculty of Law and a project researcher at the University of Vaasa, School of Accounting and Finance, Business Law. Autto's research interests include proactive contracting, contract design, information design,visualization, legal tech and AI, robotics, and sustainable development. Currently, she works as a researcher two projects. In TOIVO - Smooth and sustainable RDI with actionable contracts - Autto participates in the creation of an RDI contract toolkit and a comprehensive guide for contract drafters. In BOOST - Biodiversity offsetting as an operational tool for a just sustainability transition towards no net loss of ecosystems and biodiversity - Autto is the lead contract designer, developing offset contract templates specifically tailored for use in offset markets. In addition to research, Autto teaches proactive contracting and contract design in the University of Lapland and supervises master's theses in legal design at the Laurea University of Applied Sciences. She is the founder of Autto Law & Design.
Jim Tørresen
Faculty of Informatics, University of Oslo
Ethics Integrated in Human-Robot Interaction Research
Talk Title
Biography:
Jim Torresen is a professor at the University of Oslo, where he leads the Robotics and Intelligent Systems research group. He is also a PI at the interdisciplinary Centre of Excellence for Interdisciplinary Studies in Rhythm, Time and Motion (RITMO). He received his M.Sc. and Dr.ing. (Ph.D) degrees in computer architecture and design from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, University of Trondheim in 1991 and 1996, respectively. He has been employed as a senior hardware designer at NERA Telecommunications (1996-1998) and at Navia Aviation (1998-1999). Since 1999, he has been a professor at the Department of Informatics at the University of Oslo (associate professor 1999-2005). Jim Torresen has been a visiting researcher at Kyoto University, Japan for one year (1993-1994), four months at Electrotechnical Laboratory, Tsukuba, Japan (1997 and 2000) and a visiting professor at Cornell University, USA for one year (2010-2011). His research interests now include artificial intelligence, ethical aspects of AI and robotics, machine learning, robotics, and applying this to complex real-world applications. He has also acted as an evaluator for proposals in EU FP7 and Horizon2020 and is currently project manager/principal investigator in four externally funded research projects/centres. He is a member of the Norwegian Academy of Technological Sciences (NTVA) and the National Committee for Research Ethics in Science and Technology (NENT), where he is a member of a working group on research ethics for AI.
Joshua C. Gellers
Department of Political Science, University of North Florida
Consider the Xenobot: Moral Considerability for Intelligent Machines Revisited
Talk Title
Biography:
Joshua C. Gellers, PhD, is a professor in the Department of Political Science and Public Administration at the University of North Florida, expert with the Global AI Ethics Institute and member of the IEEE working group on design-centered human-robot interaction and governance. Josh’s research focuses on the intersection of environmental governance, rights, and technology. He has published over two dozen articles or chapters, edited a special issue of Earth System Governance Journal on AI and Digitalization, and written two books, The Global Emergence of Constitutional Environmental Rights (Routledge 2017) and Rights for Robots: Artificial Intelligence, Animal and Environmental Law (Routledge 2020). He is currently co-editing a unit on environments for the AI in Society series published by Oxford University Press. Josh holds a BA in political science from the University of Florida, MA in climate and society from Columbia University, and an MA and PhD in political science from the University of California, Irvine.
Juliana Bowles
School of Computer Science, University of St. Andrews
Talk Title
Perspectives on Safe and Ethical Human-Robot Interactions
Biography:
Juliana Bowles (née Küster Filipe) is a full professor at the School of Computer Science, University of St Andrews, Scotland, and a research manager for trustworthy systems at SCCH, Austria, where she is currently partially supported by an FWF Meitner fellowship. Her recent research combines formal methods and symbolic AI for health applications. She coordinated the EU H2020 project Securing Medical Data in Smart Patient-Centric Healthcare Systems (Serums) which dealt with security and privacy aspects of future-generation healthcare systems. She was awarded a project from the Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation to explore safe and ethical human-robot interactions with Dr Yueh-Hsuan Weng, University of Kyushu, Japan. Bowles received her PhD (Dr.rer.nat) from the Technical University of Braunschweig, Germany, in 2000.
Melanie Sarantou
Faculty of Design, Kyushu University
AI Codesign and Creativity: Legal and Ethical Considerations
Talk Title
Biography:
Melanie Sarantou (PhD) is a professor of Social Design at Kyushu University in Japan. Her interests span the role of improvisation in arts and design practices when the unsuspected emerges. She seeks to understand how haptic and tactile qualities of arts and narrative practices can sustain marginalised communities. Her recent research explored how the arts can mitigate societal challenges.
Ruth Lewis
Standards Committee, IEEE SSIT
Talk Title
Advancing Technology for Humanity through Best Practices Socio-Technical Standards
Biography:
Ruth Lewis, Director of Technology Foresight Consulting, Bachelor of Engineering (Electrical), Graduate Diploma Digital Communications, Master of Strategic Foresight, National Engineering Register. Ruth is an experienced strategic IT consultant, academically qualified futurist and professional engineer based in Melbourne, Australia, with a particular focus on introducing new technologies to business, creating managed services and creating innovative governance models. Ruth’s passion is to work towards the ethical and sustainable development and use of emerging technologies such as AI for the good of society, enabling her clients to make wise and informed decisions and investments today to enable their preferred futures. Ruth is the Chair of the IEEE Society on Social Implications of Technology (SSIT) Standards Committee, Board Member of SSIT, a contributor to many ethically aligned AI technical standards, and was awarded the IEEE SA 2022 Standards Medallion for leadership in promoting the development of IEEE technology and society standards.
Satoshi Narihara
Faculty of Law, Kyushu University
Personal Autonomy in the Age of Social Robots.
Talk Title
Biography:
Satoshi Narihara is an associate professor of information law at the Faculty of Law, Kyushu University. After completing the Graduate School of Interdisciplinary Information Studies, at the University of Tokyo, he served as an assistant professor at the Interfaculty Initiative in Information Studies, the University of Tokyo, and as a senior researcher at the Institute for Information and Communications Policy, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications. He was visiting the Harvard-Yenching Institute as a visiting scholar from August 2023 to May 2024 and the Department of Innovation and Digitalisation in Law, the University of Vienna as a professional guest researcher from June to September 2023. He has been studying information law, cyber law, and media law, comparing US law, EU law, and Japanese law. His research focuses on freedom of expression, privacy and data protection, and legal issues of Artificial Intelligence. He has published his book, Freedom of Expression and Architecture (Keiso Shobo, 2016), and many other academic books and papers.
Religious or Spiritual Robots?
Trent Leopold
The IEEE P7017 Working Group
Biography:
Trent Leopold is an active, professional Sr. Business Analyst with more than 30 years’ experience in the private and public sectors. His experience includes serving in various governance roles. Leopold's experience includes serving as an advisor to two U.S. Presidents, a U.S Vice-President and two Texas Governors. Trent is an “IEEE” officer, involved with creating international professional standards including those endorsed by the "ISO" most recently pertaining to AI governance. He is also an active member of the "IIBA" and "PMI," and serves to establish international Business Analysis standards. Leopold received a lifetime achievement award from "Who's Who." He is a longitudinal research participant with a major U.S. University in an international study exploring human brain function. Trent’s education includes a MSc. degree in Managerial Science and he's a licensed airplane pilot.
Talk Title
Yasuhisa Hirata
Graduate School of Engineering, Tohoku University
Talk Title
Empowering the Human Mind through Robotic Physical Assistance
Biography: Yasuhisa Hirata is a Professor in the Department of Robotics at Tohoku
University, Sendai, Japan. He received his B.E., M.E., and Ph.D. degrees in mechanical engineering from Tohoku University in 1998, 2000, and 2004, respectively. He has been conducting research on Human-Robots Interaction, Multiple Robots Coordination, Factory Automation Robots, etc. He is serving as a project manager of the Moonshot R&D program in Japan. He is also serving as an AdCom member of the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society (RAS) and chair of the IEEE RAS Technical Committee Cluster on The Health and Medical Robotics.
Yueh-Hsuan Weng
Institute for Advanced Study, Kyushu University
Talk Title
Ethical Design and Standardization for Robot Governance
Biography:
Dr. Yueh-Hsuan Weng is an Associate Professor at the Inamori Frontier Program, Institute for Advanced Study (IAS), Kyushu University and Associate Professor (Cross-appointment) at the Frontier Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Sciences (FRIS), Tohoku University. He has been an Assistant Professor at FRIS, Tohoku University (2017-2023), Visiting Assistant Professor at Faculty of Law, The University of Hong Kong (2018) and TTLF Fellow at Stanford Law School (2018-2021). He received his Ph.D. in Law from Peking University and his M.S. in Computer Science from National Chiao Tung University, Taiwan. He is strongly interested in interdisciplinary studies, especially in issues concerning the interface between Artificial Intelligence and Law, including Robot Law, Social Robotics, and Legal Informatics. During his Ph.D. studies, he has founded ROBOLAW.ASIA and CHINA-LII, which are China’s first initiatives in AI Law and Free Access to Law.
Zonghao Dong
Graduate School of Engineering, Tohoku University
Talk Title
Enhancing Quality of Life Through Physical Interactions with Assistive AI Robot
Biography:
Zonghao Dong (Member, IEEE) received the B.E. degree in Mechatronics Engineering from Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing, China, in 2018 and the M.E. and Ph.D. degrees in Robotics from Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan, in 2020 and 2023. He is currently a specially appointed assistant professor in the Department of Robotics at Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan. His main research interests include mobile robots, mobile manipulation, system integration, physical assistive devices, and physical human-robot interaction.