Kantian Philosophy in the Age of Technology

Last year, the world of Kantian scholarship commemorated 300 years since the birth of the German philosopher. Although throughout his adult life Kant manifested an avid interest in the latest scientific, political, social, cultural and economic developments in the world, he could not have anticipated the technological progress our world has been making since the middle of the 20th century. This progress has led to many radical changes in the way we learn, communicate, work, travel, look after our health, and perceive ourselves and the world around us. It would not be an exaggeration to suggest that our age of technology has been leading to a deep change in the way in which we understand our humanity. The impact of technology on our lives is visible in the increased use of artificial intelligence, the almost irreplaceable character of our smartphones, the development of biotechnology and the gradually more tangible consequences that climate change has on our societies. (Clarke 2024) In this context, in which technological innovation radically transforms our societies and questions our understanding of what it is to be human, Kantian philosophy has provided a valuable framework for the understanding of some of these changes and for the evaluation of their significance and consequences. Kantian scholars have engaged with various questions concerning artificial intelligence (e.g., Schönecker and Kim 2022), information disorder (Baiasu 2020; 2022), media ethics (e.g., Saunders, 2020; 2023), the ethics of robotics (e.g., Kadar and Palatinus 2022), the ethics of space exploration (e.g., Frammartino Wilks 2016), environment (e.g., Varden 2022), sustainability (e.g., Vereb 2022), health (e.g., Hanisch 2019), war (e.g., Hamourtziadou 2024) or more generally politics and technology (e.g., Morgan 2007). This section is designed to include papers and panels in all areas of Kant’s philosophy and contemporary Kantian thought, insofar as they bear on the question of technology and humanity, particularly on those topics with legal, political and policy-related implications. We anticipate eight panels, both on themes that explore relevant questions in Kant’s philosophy and on topics that extend Kant’s philosophy to approach contemporary issues specific for our digital age. Possible panel topics include: 1. Kant, artificial intelligence, and political agency; 2. The Moral Law and developments in robotics; 3. Health, autonomy and privacy in the age of technology; 4. Kantian approaches to climate change and environmental disasters; 5. Cosmopolitanism, space exploration and colonisation; 6. Kantian ethics and policy in a time of information disorder; 7. Kant, just war theory and hybrid wars; 8. The social contract in the digital age. References Baiasu, S. (2020) “Sincerity in politics: How much is too much?”, in S. Baume et. al. (eds) Misinformation in Referenda. London: Routledge. Baiasu, S. (2022) “Is Boris Johnson lying? A philosopher on why it’s so hard to tell”, in The Conversation: https://theconversation.com/is-boris-johnson-lying-a-philosopher-on-why-its-so-hard-to-tell-181508. Clarke, S. (2024) “Reimagining Humanity in the Age of Technology”. Lecture for the “Translational Health Sciences” Series, Oxford University: https://podcasts.ox.ac.uk/reimagining-humanity-age-technology. Frammartino Wilks, A. (2016) “Kantian Foundations for a Cosmocentric Ethic”, in J. S. Schwartz and T. Milligan (eds) The Ethics of Space Exploration. Berlin: Springer. Hamourtziadou, L. (2024) The Ethics of Remote Warfare. Cardiff: University of Wales Press. Hanisch, C. (2019) “Universal Health Care and Enforced Beneficence”, in Ethics, Politics & Society. 2: 7-31. Kadar, E. E. and Palatinus, Z. (2022) “Reinventing Kantian Autonomy for Artificial Agents: Implications for Self-driving Cars”, in M.I. Aldinhas Ferreira and M. O. Tokhi (eds) Towards Trustworthy Artificial Intelligent Systems. Berlin: Springer. Morgan, D. (2007) “Kant, cosmopolitics, multiperspectival thinking and technology”, in Angelaki 12(2): 35-46. Saunders, J. (2020) “Dark Advertising and the Democratic Process”, in K. Macnish & J. Galliott (eds) Big data and democracy. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Saunders, J. (2023) “The Ethics of Social Media: Being Better Online”, in C. Fox & J. Saunders (eds) The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy and Media Ethics. London: Routledge. Schönecker, D. and Kim, H. (2022) Kant and AI. Berlin: De Gruyter. Varden, H. (2022) “Kant and the Environment”, in Studi Kantiani. 35(1): 27-48. Vereb, Z. (2022) “Sustaining the Individual in the Collective: A Kantian Perspective for a Sustainable World”, in Kantian Review. 27 (3): 405-420.