Conference: Irrationality and the Age of AI: Language, Ethics, and the Future of Human Expression

2nd Desirable AI Conference at the University of Bonn

The AI revolution has accelerated in recent years, propelled by the widespread use of large language models (LLMs). Today, AI systems are not only transforming technical environments but also shaping our thoughts, emotions, and everyday linguistic practices. Increasingly, AI research and industry are shifting their attention from rational problem-solving toward aspects of human life once considered the last bastions of humanity. We can contrast this approach to AI as a simulation of ‘rationality’ with the expansion of applications into the realm of the expression of emotions and other aspects of human life often seen as ‘irrational’.

Our conference will explore the role of affective computing, emotionally laden human-machine interaction, conversational AI models, reinforcement algorithms, and recommender systems in the wake of the LLM revolution. In this light, we will discuss what we can learn about language—both in its explicit, logical, grammatical structure and in its emotional, expressive dimension—when AI accesses these depths of human expression. We also ask what it means for humanity when even the ‘irrational’ aspects of life are no longer beyond the reach of digitalization. This raises the important question of how emotions and their various forms of bodily and linguistic expression are related and what it means for AI to detect and mass reproduce patterns in human behavior that are closely correlated with the emotional depth dimension of human life.

We will address a paradox of technological progress: the deeper AI mirrors the structural layers of the human mind through interdisciplinary breakthroughs, the more actually existing human irrationality becomes visible as social and political collateral damage. Simulating this irrationality, in turn, provides AI with new behavioral data, generating a non-rational feedback loop alongside the rational one—bringing both novel opportunities and risks.

These developments have profound normative consequences for social, political, and ethical thought and action. They raise urgent questions about the design of ethical AI that goes beyond regulatory compliance. Addressing these questions requires us to account for the transcultural differences that shape AI as a sociotechnological phenomenon. To this end, the conference will convene interdisciplinary expertise, industry perspectives, practical approaches, policy insights, and fundamental reflections in AI politics, ethics and philosophy. Our discussions will highlight technical dimensions of AI, its impact on human experience, culture, and society, and the philosophical, ethical, and normative frameworks for shaping desirable futures.

The full conference schedule will be updated soon.

For questions or further information, please contact: desirableai@gmail.com

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