20107501

AI, Data, Algorithm & Power

Tanja Kubes

Additional information / Pre-requisites

Note: The teaching format does not consist of lecture & tutorial as announced in the course catalogue, but is an MA seminar in block seminar format!

Comments

There is hardly an area of our global, technological and social life in which artificial intelligence, data and algorithms do not play a role. When we talk about artificial intelligence, data and algorithms, we often focus on the ways in which these new technologies can support us. Think, for example, of how big data can help detect or even prevent certain diseases at an early stage. In the face of these great possibilities, we often forget that the technologies we are dealing with are all but neutral. They are always linked to relations of power and are loaded with sexism, racism and other forms of exclusion.

In order to conceptualise AI, data and algorithms in ways that are as non-discriminatory as possible, it is therefore crucial to consider the following questions: Who develops what (and for whom)? Who can make which decisions? Which aims are pursued in which developments and which are, in turn, excluded? In the seminar, we will look at current debates on AI, data, algorithm and power and discuss examples (facial recognition systems, social credit system, predictive policing, etc.) from an ethical, feminist, and intersectional perspective.