Category: News

Keynote by Hannah Star Rogers at the Materializing Methods Symposium

On February 20, 2025, KHK c:o/re Fellow Hannah Star Rogers will deliver the keynote at the Materializing Methods symposium at Durham University.

Materializing Methods is a one-day symposium hosted by the Discovery Research Platform for Medical Humanities at Durham University, in collaboration with The Cultural Negotiation of Science research group (Northumbria University) and Hannah Star Rogers (Medical Museion, University of Copenhagen).

What can practice-based research tell us about working with disciplinary cultures that are not our own? With a focus on how contemporary art practices engage with expert cultures in health and biomedicine, this symposium foregrounds questions of method, practice and process in relation to interdisciplinary inquiry. Critical art practices are knowledge-producing practices that shape interdisciplinary research agendas.

“Art’s Work in the Age of Biotechnology” main exhibition gallery, Gregg Museum of Art and Design, NCSU.
Photo credit: Molly Renda

If you are interested in participating, please visit the event website.

Get to know our Fellows: Sam Selma Ducourant

Get to know our current fellows and gain an impression of their research. In a new season of short videos, we asked them to introduce themselves, talk about their work at the KHK c:o/re and the research questions that fascinate them.

How does lifelikeness function as a mechanism of control? In this video, Sam Selma Ducourant, who works on the history and philosophy of sciences involved in animal production, discusses her research on the history of battery cages for chicken.

Check out our media section or our YouTube channel to have a look at the other videos.

Freedom of Research Summit: Call for Contributions

On November 5 and 6, 2025, the second edition of the Freedom of Research Summit will take place in Aachen, jointly organized by the Charlemagne Prize Foundation, RWTH Aachen University’s Knowledge Hub, and the Käte Hamburger Kolleg: Cultures of Research (c:o/re).

Panel Discussion “Conflict in Europe’s Academic Landscape and Their Impact on Freedom of Research: What’s New About It?” durng the Symposium 2024, f.l.t.r. Prof Dr Carsten Reinhardt, Miranda Loli, Frank Albrecht and Prof. Dr Stefan Böschen

With the topic “Europe in Times of Division”, the Summit aims to address the complex challenges facing our continent today – ranging from political polarization and geopolitical tensions to economic disparities and environmental divides. How can we navigate these challenges and create a resilient framework for future developments?

This year, we invite you to take an active role in shaping the Symposium. We encourage you to participate in our Call for Contributions to explore the role of science as a bridge-builder in Europe within your specific research field or area of work and to reflect on the importance of academic freedom in this context. The Summit’s Symposium will take place on November 6, 2025 at the SuperC of RWTH Aachen University.

Please have a look at the Call for further information.

The application deadline is March 31, 2025.

If you are interested in a recap of last year’s symposium, here is a blog post.

Lab-Talk: KHK c:o/re meets E.ON Energy Research Center

On January 29, 2025, a group of fellows and staff members visited the Institute for Automation of Complex Power Systems at the E.ON Energy Research Center at RWTH Aachen University.

Professor Ferdinanda Ponci and her team gave us insights into their research topics and we learned about exciting EU projects such as EnerTEF. We also enjoyed a tour of the ACS lab and discovered many common interests ranging from AI and AI bias to hardware-in-the-loop topics.

As part of the Lab-Talks, KHK c:o/re fellows and staff visit various institutes at RWTH Aachen University to promote networking and interdisciplinary collaboration between STEM projects and the social sciences and humanities.

photo credits: Jana Hambitzer

Get to know our Fellows: Nathalia Lavigne

Get to know our current fellows and gain an impression of their research. In a new season of short videos, we asked them to introduce themselves, talk about their work at the KHK c:o/re and the research questions that fascinate them.

In this video, art researcher, writer and curator Nathalia Lavigne shares insights from her work on alternative networks and different models of connection in human communication. She explores what we can learn from artists and activists who are imagining alternative forms of connection and finding other ways to communicate and build communities.

Check out our media section or our YouTube channel to have a look at the other videos.

Gabriele Gramelsberger Honored With K. Jon Barwise Prize

Gabriele Gramelsberger, Professor of Philosophy of Science and Technology and Director of the Käte Hamburger Kolleg: Cultures of Research (c:o/re) at RWTH Aachen University, was awarded the K. Jon Barwise Prize 2023 by the American Philosophical Association (APA) last Thursday, January 9, 2025, in New York.

Gabriele Gramelsberger together with the philosopher Oron Shagrir, Barwise Prize winner 2024, from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and Amy Ferrer from the American Philosophical Association during the award ceremony.
Photo credits: American Philosophical Association

The award ceremony took place during the 121st annual meeting of the Eastern Division of the American Philosophical Association (the APA also has Central and Western Divisions). The prize, named after the American philosopher K. Jon Barwise, has been awarded since 2002 for significant and sustained contributions to philosophy and computer science.

Gabriele Gramelsberger is the third woman to receive the K. Jon Barwise Award. In her work, she develops a conceptual framework for the Philosophy of Computational Science as well as an open science infrastructure for Computational Science Studies. In 2018, she founded the Computational Social Systems Lab in Aachen, supported by the NRW Digital Fellowship 2017. Together with her team at the KHK c:o/re, Gabriele Gramelsberger will organize the History and Philosophy of Computing conference in Aachen in December 2025.

Event announcement: Competition Law in the Digital Era: AI and other new challenges

Professor Stefan Böschen, Director of the KHK c:o/re, and the Exploratory Research Space (ERS) of RWTH Aachen University invite you to another lecture of the “ERS invites…” series, this time featuring Dr. Pēteris Zilgalvis, Judge at the General Court of the European Union, to discuss how AI is reshaping the legal landscape from various perspectives.

AI has the potential to increase effectiveness and foster innovation in the public sector, including courts. At the same time, its development, implementation, and governance must take into account the threats it might pose to fundamental rights. Furthermore, AI has significant implications for competition law.

Dr. Pēteris Zilgalvis is a Judge on the General Court of the European Union and serves on its Management Board as well as the Artificial Intelligence Management Board of the Court of Justice of the EU. Previously, he headed the Digital Innovation and Blockchain Unit in the European Commission’s Digital Single Market Directorate and co-chaired the European Commission FinTech Task Force.

The lecture will take place on Friday, 24 January 2025, from 12 to 1.30 pm in the Generali Saal at Super C, located at Templergraben 57 in Aachen. To register and for further information, please visit the event website.

Get to know our Fellows: Grit Laudel

Get to know our current fellows and gain an impression of their research. In a new season of short videos, we asked them to introduce themselves, talk about their work at the KHK c:o/re and the research questions that fascinate them.

How do institutional research conditions such as funding, evaluation or national career systems affect the way in which researchers produce contributions to scientific knowledge? In the latest video, Grit Laudel, sociologist of science, gives insights into her work comparing research in different fields.

Check out our media section or our YouTube channel to have a look at the other videos.

Special Issue: From Automation to Autonomy: Human Machine Relations in the Age of Artificial Intelligence

Together with Frank Piller (RWTH Aachen University), Caja Thimm and Maximilian Mayer (Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn), KHK c:o/re director Gabriele Gramelsberger co-edited a special issue of the journal “Human Machine Communications” on the shift from automation to autonomy. The guest-edited issue just appeared online.

As machines today gain capabilities that resemble autonomous agency (think of AI agents, for example), the line between human and machine autonomy is blurring, challenging traditional concepts of agency, control, and independence.

In this special issue, the authors explore the complexities of attributing autonomy to machines and AI systems. Philosophical, sociological, and technical approaches converge to explore how emerging forms of machine autonomy impact human agency, freedom, and decision-making, with applications ranging from autonomous vehicles to digital assistants and military drones.

The central topic is the growing tension between viewing autonomy as a positive attribute and the concerns about diminishing human authority in the face of increasingly independent technologies.

In the opening essay, the authors ask for an integrated understanding of autonomy as both an individual and collective construct, reflecting the highly complex and quickly evolving nature of current societal, ethical, and technological challenges.

You can find the paper on this website, the full issue follwing this link.

Lecture Series: Change of Date – Sabina Leonelli

The lecture “What Role for History and Philosophy of Science in STS? Critical Engagements with Empirical Inquiry” by Sabina Leonelli, part of our Lecture Series Expanding Science and Technology Studies in the winter semester 2024/25, will take place on Tuesday, January 21, 2025 instead of Wednesday, January 22, 2025.

To take part either online or in presence, please write a short email to events@khk.rwth-aachen.de.