Antoinette Rouvroy on ‘Algorithmic Realism’Antoinette Rouvroy on ‘Algorithmic Realism’

What does it do to our critical capacity if we leave it to computer programs to "solve" complexity that our human brain cannot comprehend? Under what conditions and using what strategies can we work toward an alternative critique that can resist algorithmic realism, with all its underlying drivers and the political reality that emerges from it?

Legal scholar Antoinette Rouvroy (permanent research associate at the Belgian National Fund for Scientific Research and senior researcher at the Université de Namur), who is known for her research on “algorithmic governmentality,” outlines how algorithmic realism permeates the techniques by which people imagine meaning, time, power and themselves, how it affects or disarms our critical capacity, and under what conditions we can imagine a different, better-equipped "new critique”.

With this, Nieuwe Instituut and the Erasmus School of Philosophy are jointly organizing a conversation at the intersection of philosophy, socio-political issues, technology, culture, policy and law; where design questions coincide, among other things, with the pursuit of communalization of the digital realm and the many ways in which people shape and furnish spaces using infrastructure and architecture.

After a welcome address by Nieuwe Instituut director Aric Chen, associate professor of philosophy Sjoerd van Tuinen (coordinator of the Human Conditions program at ESPhil) introduces the topic and speakers. Antoinette Rouvroy gives her lecture, after which Professor Yuk Hui serves as respondent and moderator of the ensuing Q&A. There will be an opportunity for questions from the audience.

According to Professor Yuk Hui, Chair of the Human Conditions research program, organizing this colloquium at the Nieuwe Instituut fits in perfectly with the "alternative modes of imagination" he is pursuing with the program. After all, the search for those other forms of imagination not only provides the issues raised in the program with possible answers, it is also directly an invitation to the audience to consider new ways of dealing with increasing challenges of digital technologies. One way the intended outreach and connection will take shape is by focusing on practices that bring art and philosophy together. Hui: "People from various disciplines became very concerned about the development related to artificial intelligence. It's important to discuss about that in a public setting, because philosophers and art and design enthusiasts who come to the Nieuwe Instituut can benefit from each other’s perspectives.'