Pictured (l-r) at NovaUCD are, Malcolm Byrne TD, Cathaoirleach of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Artificial Intelligence; Marloes Pomp, former Vice-President of the European AI Forum; Eugenia Siapera, Professor of Digital Technology, Policy, and Society, UCD School of Information and Communication Studies and co-Director of the UCD Centre for Digital Policy and Dr John Lonsdale, CEO, CeADAR, Ireland’s Centre for AI.
Panel explored how AI can be designed and deployed responsibly to truly benefit and impact society
NovaUCD, the hub of innovation and start-up activities at University College Dublin (UCD) and the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Ireland have jointly held a Responsible AI event in front to a packed audience at NovaUCD.
The focus of the event was to gather a panel of experts and thought leaders together, moderated by CeADAR’s CEO, Dr John Lonsdale, to discuss and explore how AI can be designed and deployed responsibly to truly benefit and impact society. The panel also examined the role of regulation, in light of the EU AI Act, in guiding the development of AI-systems to support democratic principles, such as fairness, transparency and non-discrimination.
Professor Kate Robson Brown, UCD Vice-President, Research, Innovation and Impact said, “We were delighted to organise and host the Responsible AI event at NovaUCD with the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Ireland, and to hear the views of our distinguished panel on how AI can be designed and deployed responsibly to truly benefit and impact society.”
She added, “At UCD we have developed an AI ecosystem of at least 200 researchers and innovators whose work will empower society and industry to benefit from data and AI. These activities include centres such as CeADAR, Ireland’s Centre for AI and a European Digital Innovation Hub for AI, almost 20 different major AI research programmes across our 6 Colleges, the AI Ecosystem Accelerator Programme, and collaborations such as the recently announced AI Factory Antenna with ICHEC.
Later this year we will launch the UCD AI Institute to bring together these different areas of strength, and I’m delighted to say that we are currently conducting an international recruitment for the Academic Director of that new Institute.”
She concluded, “Our unique ecosystem brings together research and innovation experts from diverse disciplines and backgrounds who together are harnessing the power of data and AI to make breakthroughs that will maximise its benefits and impacts for all society while working to develop responsible, sustainable and trustworthy AI.”
H.E. Maaike van Koldam, Ambassador of the Kingdom of the Netherlands to Ireland, said, “The Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands was delighted to partner with NovaUCD in order to organise this panel discussion on Responsible AI.
Following the passage of the EU AI Act, the Netherlands, Ireland and the rest of the European Union’s members have been working to ensure that these rapid technological developments can benefit all of society while also upholding democratic principles. This fascinating discussion offered real insights into what is happening across all sectors of society, and why everyone needs to stay involved in this ongoing conversation.”
The speakers at the event were, Marloes Pomp, former Vice-President of the European AI Forum; Malcolm Byrne TD, Cathaoirleach of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Artificial Intelligence and Eugenia Siapera, Professor of Digital Technology, Policy, and Society, UCD School of Information and Communication Studies and co-Director of the UCD Centre for Digital Policy.
Marloes Pomp, former Vice-President of the European AI Forum, said, “In thinking about responsible AI, we should start with a better understanding of how the basic infrastructure works, in communications, in energy, in payments and so on. After that we can discuss how we want to make use of AI. The perception that AI has befallen us is wrong. We still have the option to make choices, we should have done so earlier, but we still can make choices to ensure that AI is used responsibly to benefit society.”
Malcolm Byrne TD, Cathaoirleach of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Artificial Intelligence, said, “Getting the balance right between supporting innovation and ensuring public trust and having necessary safeguards in place is a key challenge, and public debate on these issues is vital.”
Professor Eugenia Siapera, UCD School of Information and Communication Studies and co-Director of the UCD Centre for Digital Policy said, “Current research we are undertaking at UCD indicates that societal acceptance of AI is conditional, with some people feeling compelled to use it in order to gain a relative advantage in the workplace and others voicing broader concerns around job displacement, deepfakes and manipulation, unreliable outputs, and accountability gaps when things go wrong. To be responsible, AI must account for such competing stakeholder interests and its unequal impacts on different societal sectors.”
The event was moderated by Dr John Lonsdale, CEO, CeADAR, Ireland’s Centre for Applied AI.
