Schedule, structure and other important info

Slide with tutorial organisers, presented by Jim — Photo: Yueh-Hsuan Weng

Tutorial purpose:

The tutorial presents some of the most pressing ethical and legal issues robots and AI systems pose to society. The organizers will exemplify the challenges by showcasing research conducted at the University of Oslo and Kyoto University covering topics ranging from privacy, safety, responsibility, diversity, accessibility and inclusion (responsible robotics), and dignity. To engage the community in thinking about new research avenues in this area, the tutorial will involve the participants in discussing some of the challenges in small groups in a workshop-like format. Further, to avoid the talks being "one-way” presentations, we´ll in general encourage interaction and questions both during and at the end of each presentation.

The organizers will collect the audience's opinions using an interactive tool (e.g., using Kahoot!). The audience will be able to respond using their smartphone to answer multiple-choice quizzes. If the event is organized virtually (or in a hybrid format), the interaction will be in digital format with attendee questions through chat, polls collected among the attendees and potentially also using small break-out rooms for discussion, if available.

At the end of the tutorial, we will have a dedicated session for wrap-up and future directions, where the participants will be asked to fill in a survey related to the tutorial’s theme. During this last session, the participants will have the possibility to engage in lively discussions around the questions asked in the survey, which will be facilitated by the tutorial’s organizers.

The target audience and why the tutorial topic is relevant and innovative: There is increasing attention on the ethical implications and legal issues related to robots and systems. The tutorial will give the audience insight into the main ethical implication and legal issues currently being discussed and also how that can open up for new directions in research related to robots and systems.

Prerequisite knowledge needed: There is no specific prerequisite knowledge required. Thus, the tutorial will be targeting all attendees of the IROS-2022 conference.

Tutorial history: Jim Torresen has given several well attended conference tutorials on a similar topic in the recent years, see an overview his of past invited talks and tutorials here. The tutorial here proposed is given for the first time together with colleagues from law that will cover legal and regulatory questions.

Earlier given tutorials have been well received and with a majority of attendees among PhD students. The tutorial proposed here will be an updated and extended version while, at the same time, the topics covered are mostly not rapidly changing. However, the relevance and need to address ethical concerns change with how one progresses and moves into new application areas. Thus, we think the proposed tutorial will be relevant for both past and new attendees.

Expected attendance: 50-100. Earlier experience from tutorials and workshops on the topic has shown that there is in general, a wide interest in the theme of the tutorial.

Schedule 23 October 2022

Time	Talk	Comments
9:00 – 09:15	Intro	Introduction and motivation (who are attending + intro to the tutorial)
9:15 – 10:00	Talk session 1: Ethical and technical perspectives	Ethical and Technical Challenges and Considerations (Jim Torresen – physical) incl Q & A
10:00 – 10:15		Interactive session with participants
10:15 – 10:30	Break
10:30 – 11:15	Talk session 2: Standardization and regulation	Overview of standardization activities, and with an example from the IEEE 7007-2021 standard “Ontologies for Ethically Driven Robotics and Automation Systems Working” (Edson Prestes – remote or video) incl Q & A
11:15 – 12:00	Talk session 3A: Regulation and legal perspectives	Proposals for regulating robots and AI: Soft Laws and HRI Governance (Yueh-Hsuan Weng – physical) incl Q & A
12:00 – 13:00	Lunch
13:00 – 13:45	Talk session 3B: Regulation and legal perspectives	Proposals for regulating robots and AI in the EU incl two poll questions (Tobias Mahler– video)
13:45 – 14:30	Talk session 4A: Human perspectives	Psychological foundation and applications of human affects and human-to-human interactions which are valuable for future HRI (Atsushi Nakazawa – physical) incl Q & A
14:30 – 15:00	Break
15:00 – 15:45	Talk session 4B: Human perspectives	Ethical challenges and opportunities with (care) robots - Universal Design as an ethical charter for inclusive robot design and interaction (Diana Saplacan – remote or video) incl Q & A
15:45 – 16:45	International Perspectives	What are the international similarities and differences across the world on the view on important perspectives on the relation between humans and future robots and systems? (multiple speakers/discussion)
16:45 – 17:00		Wrap-up, concluding remarks and future directions.
17:00	End

Contact info:

Jim Tørresen: jimtoer@ifi.uio.no;

Diana Saplacan: diana.saplacan@ifi.uio.no