Tag: University of Oxford

Oslo lecture: “Hardly getting over it: death, dying, and afterlife in the age of AI”

Mechanical Dolphin

I’m very pleased to be back at the University of Oslo next month to contribute to the humAIn initiative, a hub for interdisciplinary research and education which focuses on how the humanities can critically and creatively engage with the ideas, stories, and imaginaries of AI.

In “Hardly getting over it: death, dying, and afterlife in the age of AI“, I’ll be talking about posthumous posterity, digital representation, and machine autonomy – connecting Oslo scholars to the foresight work I lead at Oxford’s TORCH Humanities research centre and the Uehiro Oxford Institute for practical ethics.

Memorial

TORCH Talk: “Failure” @ the University of Oxford

Mechanical Dolphin

So: a lifetime of missing the mark, going astray, stumbling, fumbling, stuffing up, and overcooking it finally pays off – along with economist Séverine Toussaert and digital studies scholar David De Roure, I’m on the panel for the final TORCH Talk of the academic year at the University of Oxford, taking an interdisciplinary look at failure.

'Dreaming Spires', by Flickr User JJBullock - Copyright JJ Bullock 2010
‘Dreaming Spires’, by Flickr User JJBullock – Copyright JJ Bullock 2010

Come join us at the Schwarzman Centre for the Humanities, 12.30pm-1.30pm on Wednesday, 10th June.

Register on Eventbrite

Humanities @ Oxford: Death, dying, and afterlife in the age of AI

Mechanical Dolphin

Alongside my other duties, I’m pleased to take on a new role leading the project “Death, dying, and afterlife in the age of AI” at Oxford University – a collaboration between the Uehiro Oxford Institute and TORCH – The Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities.

The prehistoric Newgrange mound, one of the world’s oldest extant funerary monuments, by Flickr user Ron Cogswell – CC BY 2.0

Emerging capabilities in artificial intelligence create the possibility of new relationships between the living and the dead.

After physical decease, what digital entities might live on in our stead? What agency will they have? How will the underlying technologies be developed, deployed, and managed? How will identity be authenticated?

What will be the impact on how individuals, families, communities, and societies approach the end of life, its associated rituals, and the ways in which we remember those who are gone?

Our team will use scenario planning to explore these questions and more, envisaging different future contexts for the relationship between AI and the afterlife, encompassing all aspects of memorial culture, funerary practices, and posthumous existence in the digital world.

Learn more at the TORCH website.

Navigating the sea of uncertainty: Global Youth Climate Summit Recording

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One of my contributions to the 2025 Global Youth Climate Summit, hosted by the University of Oxford, has just gone online at the Oxford Climate Change Challenge site.

In the newly-released talk “Navigating the sea of uncertainty: challenging assumptions about what the future holds“, we consider ways to address times of turbulence, when the context in which we operate seems to be unsteady and unpredictable.

You can also see a previously released talk from the same event, “The black box of action: how to make your climate project count“, at the same site.