Past Event

Date: December 7, 2024 (Saturday) Speaker: Dr Karina Vold, University of Toronto Chair: Dr Frank Hong, The University of Hong Kong Organizers: AIH Lab and IDEAS-IDS Abstract: Artificial intelligence (AI) systems are increasingly able to outperform humans at specific tasks, such as beating world champions at Go and solving 50-year-old grand challenges in biology. I argue that humans can […]

Date: March 26-27, 2025 (Wednesday, Thursday) Organizer: AI & Humanity Lab Recurrence, Rational Choice, and the Simulation Hypothesis Dr Frank Hong, The University of Hong Kong What’s hidden inside predictively successful deep learning models?Prof Darrell Rowbottom, Lingnan University Counterfactual Explanations in AI: A Tension between ‘Causality’ and ‘Plausibility’ Prof Jiji Zhang, The Chinese University of Hong

Date: November 15, 2024 (Friday) Speaker: Dr Raphael Milliere, Macquarie University in Sydney Chair: Dr Frank Hong, The University of Hong Kong Abstract: Recent advancements in artificial intelligence have been largely driven by deep learning. However, deep neural networks (DNNs) are often characterized as inscrutable “black boxes”: while we can study their performance on various tasks, we

Date: December 9-10, 2024 (Monday, Tuesday) Organizers: AIH Lab and IDEAS-IDS Alien Contents and Alien Metasemantics (with Prof Joshua Dever) Prof Herman Cappelen, The University of Hong Kong Prof Joshua Dever, The University of Texas at Austin Aliens, Octopuses, and Robots, Again Prof Lawrence Shapiro, University of Wisconsin-Madison Aliens, Octopuses, and Robots, Again Prof Thomas Polger, University of

Date: November 1, 2024 (Friday) Speaker: Michael Frank, Founder and CEO, Seldon Strategies and 2430 Fellow, 2430 Group Chair: Dr Frank Hong, The University of Hong Kong Abstract: In the artificial intelligence era, national governments are going to great lengths to support their domestic AI ecosystems. But how much can governments actually achieve? In this talk, titled “Strategic

Date: November 8, 2024 (Friday) Speaker: Dr Sean Donahue, Australian National University  Chair: Dr Frank Hong, The University of Hong Kong Abstract: Political philosophers have long been concerned with how to avoid state tyranny, the condition of governments having arbitrary power over citizens. A standard response is that avoiding tyranny requires making power holders conform to

Date: October 28, 2024 (Monday) Speaker: Prof Carlos Montemayor , San Francisco State University Chair: Dr Frank Hong, The University of Hong Kong Abstract: The two prevailing paradigms of artificial intelligence, based on symbolic systems and neural networks, need further refinements in order to qualify as general artificial intelligence. I will argue that the best way to

Date: September 17, 2024 (Tuesday) Speaker: Prof David Plunkett , Dartmouth College Chair: Dr Frank Hong, The University of Hong Kong Abstract: Consider the following three familiar philosophical issues: the nature of consciousness; what distributive justice requires; and what constitutes knowledge. These issues – as well as countless others throughout many subareas of philosophy – are

Date: September 20, 2024 (Friday) Speaker: Dr Adam Bales, University of Oxford Chair: Dr Frank Hong, The University of Hong Kong Abstract: At some future point, AI systems could come to deserve moral consideration, in much the way that humans do now. It will be tempting to design these systems as willing servants, who vacuum, shop,

Date: October 17, 2024 (Thursday) Speaker: Dr Alice Wong, Chapman University  Chair: Dr Frank Hong, The University of Hong Kong Abstract: This talk explores the philosophical implications of simulating algorithms, particularly in the context of artificial intelligence and its relationship to biological cognition. I begin with a brief examination of the nature of simulating (implemented) algorithms,