Critically evaluating the design cultures of artificial intelligence in Australia

Description:

This project aims to shed light on the specific knowledge, practices, and worldviews that shape the design of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Australia today.  

Technologies such as AI are never neutral: they embody, reflect, and grant legitimacy to specific sets of ideas and assumptions about the world, often to the exclusion of others. They are, therefore, intimately tied-up with questions of power and privilege in society (Crawford, 2010). This is something that tends to be overlooked in the case of AI technologies, where discourses focused on the speculative questions of machine autonomy and sentience often distract from the fact that these technologies are made, marketed, and sold by human beings (Broad, 2010). There is thus a pressing need to better understand the ‘design cultures’ associated with AI given the widespread adoption of these technologies in various social contexts across Australia. 

To carry out this project, we are looking for a prospective PhD candidate with a social science and humanities background (e.g., human geography, sociology, or anthropology) who also has an interest in thinking critically about AI and its impact on society and culture. The ideal candidate will have a strong grounding in the critical understanding of knowledge and its production associated with science and technology studies (STS), as well as familiarity with conversations in the related areas of new materialism, non-representational theory, and situated knowledge. The project will also require familiarity with qualitative research methodologies, including semi-structured interviews, participant observation and auto-ethnography.   

Suggested research questions for this project include:  

• Where are the key sites and spaces where the future of AI is being shaped in Australia today, and who is able to participate in these?  
• What do the design cultures of AI look like, and is there much variation and/or diversity?  
• How are the concepts of ‘artificiality’ and ‘intelligence’ understood and/or given meaning within these design cultures? What counts as ‘expertise’ in these cultures?  
• To what extent are broader ethical concerns around trust, care, harms, and public good a part of AI’s design cultures today?  

This PhD project will be based in the Cultural Geography research group at the School of Science, UNSW Canberra. The group has established an international reputation for carrying out conceptually innovative research about the affective, non-representational, and more-than-human dimensions of contemporary society. Tom Roberts, the primary supervisor for this project, is a Lecturer in Cultural Geography who is currently working on research relating to people’s experiences of trust and distrust about AI-enabled technologies.

Scholarships of AUD$35,000 are available for PhD students who achieved H1 / High Distinction in their UG program and/or have completed a Masters by Research. If you are interested, contact Tom Roberts.