Between Extinction and the Singularity: A Co-Productionist Take on AI Ethics

Speaker: Sheila Jasanoff, Harvard University

Location: RD Watt Building (A04), Seminar room (203), Science Road, Camperdown Campus

Seating is limited – please register to attend

STS has set itself up to be the critical field that puts the social production of science and technology under its lens, much as sociology studies society, anthropology studies culture, or political science studies politics. Yet, when “studying up,” with two of humankind’s most powerful instruments in its sights, STS runs the risk of capture, of fetishizing and celebrating the very analytic objects it seeks to critique. In this talk, I will trace an arc from the attacks on scientific self-regulation of the 1970s to today’s seemingly greater acceptance of locating ethical responsibility within—not outside—the centers of innovation. I will reflect on ways in which the co-productionist framework enables a wider understanding of the scope and purposes of STS critique.

Sheila Jasanoff is Pforzheimer Professor of Science and Technology Studies at the Harvard Kennedy School. A pioneer in the social sciences, she explores the role of science and technology in the law, politics, and policy of modern democracies. Her books include The Fifth Branch, Science at the Bar, Designs on Nature, The Ethics of Invention, and Can Science Make Sense of Life? She founded and directs the STS Program at Harvard, where she also formed the Science and Democracy Network; previously, she was founding chair of the STS Department at Cornell. In 2022, she received the Government of Norway’s Holberg Prize for law, humanities, and social sciences. Her other honors include the SSRC’s Hirschman prize, the Humboldt Foundation’s Reimar-Lüst award, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Jasanoff has held distinguished visiting professorships at leading universities in Europe, Asia, Australia, and the US. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society, foreign member of the British Academy and the Royal Danish Academy, and member of the Council on Foreign Relations. She served on the AAAS Board of Directors and as President of the Society for Social Studies of Science. She holds AB, JD, and PhD degrees from Harvard, and honorary doctorates from the Universities of Twente and Liège.