11:00 - 12:30, Van Capellen Zaal: Talk Session: Public Attitudes and Trust in AI
12:30 - 13:30, Ground floor – Academia Hall: Poster Session:
- AI in Health, AI & Journalism
- AI in Institutions & Democracy
- Impacts of AI on Youth, Education & Workforce
13:45 - 15:15, Van Capellen Zaal: Talk Session: AI Literacy
15:30 - 17:00, Van Capellen Zaal: Talk Session: AI and Work(ers)
Location: Ground floor, coffee corner
Description: A shared mini-bieb about books that have shaped your perspective on AI. Bring a book and exchange it with others. Take a new book home as a gift, or pass it on later via a little library in your neighborhood.
In collaboration with Erasmus University Rotterdam Library.
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: Photobooths are for capturing happy moments. With family, friends, or colleagues.
Our AI Photobooth starts out similarly, but then unexpected things happen. You are suddenly somewhere else. Or even someone else. And what happened to your group?
With the AI Photobooth, you will be able to experience the strange possibilities of generative AI. And by giving you more control and insight into the process, you will come to understand the models behind it better.
Organised by: Virtual Reality Learning Lab
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: ENERGENIUS is a Horizon Europe-funded project that integrates cutting-edge digital tools, AI-driven insights, and gamification to empower citizens to make smarter energy choices. Visit this interactive booth to test tools that help you manage and reduce your energy consumption, including an AI energy advisor, a role-playing game, and an application to create a 3D environment of a space.
Organised by: Erasmus University Rotterdam
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: Digital technologies are reshaping our society. AI can generate text, images, music, and even videos in the blink of an eye, and we interact with algorithms every day. But the European Commission reports that 46% of EU residents lack basic digital skills, which are increasingly necessary to make informed political choices. Welcome to fabricated, an exhibition to help you build your digital literacy. With these five games and interactive moments, you'll learn about AI, misinformation, and more. fabricated is designed to make these digital challenges tangible and fun, so you can unravel fact from fiction in your digital world.
Organised by: Erasmus University Rotterdam
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: Social media play a big role in how polarisation among young people develops. Most adolescents know that algorithms influence what they see, but often underestimate how strongly these systems affect their own thoughts and behaviour, as these mechanisms are abstract and difficult to grasp. As a result, they tend to see algorithms as affecting others more than themselves, creating a gap in awareness of how much these systems influence their own views.
This installation makes the effects of algorithms more visible by moving from explanation to experience. Instead of just talking about algorithms, participants explore three different social media feeds, donated by anonymous adolescents, and reflect on what they see and feel. By stepping into someone else's feed, it becomes easier to recognise how algorithms shape what we see and to realise that there isn't just one online reality. The installation encourages conversation and reflection, helping participants think more critically about how their digital environment influences their perspectives.
Organised by: Lois Schrijver (MovezLab)
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: Pigeon AI brings animals to the table in urban decision-making. Using a rich collection of data about the habits and behaviour of pigeons, this experience allows visitors to have a “conversation” with a pigeon about its needs and desires.
Organised by: ELSA Lab AI-MAPS
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: In Rotterdam, we want everyone to be able to participate in the digital society. That is why we now have the Rotterdam Sociaal AI Lab: an open space in the city where residents, researchers, designers and policymakers work together to develop fair, understandable, and accessible technology. The Sociaal AI Lab is located at Hillevliet 90 in Rotterdam South. We also take our ‘Labkar’ out to meet residents. We’ll be at this festival with the Labkar, bringing along materials to spark a discussion about what AI means for our daily lives and to think together about what technology should and shouldn’t do.
Organised by: Rotterdam Sociaal AI Lab
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: Development of AI applications and devices is often disconnected from ethics expertise, and legal frameworks frequently lag behind new innovations. This means that new technologies can often only be evaluated once they are fully developed and put on the market, which is especially problematic in sensitive fields such as healthcare. At Wageningen University, we are exploring a different approach, where ethical and legal experts are involved from the start of the development process, and can identify problems before they are implemented.
Experience our smart tray, a tracking device to automatically measure eating behaviour in research and care settings, and find out more about our development journey here.
Organised by: ELSA Lab AI for Sustainable Food Systems
Location: Ground floor, co-creation space
Description: With the Future Parade, we bring the latest technology to you. Our traveling future fair lets you experience AI, and other emerging technologies.
Marvel at AI with the Magic Mirror, SketchSynthesizer. Explore new rooms full of 'works of art' created by AI with the Infinite AI Gallery and experiment with AI video at the Maker Stations.
Organised by: Virtual Reality Learning Lab
Location: Ground floor, entrance
Description: MORE SCREEN TIME! Say what? More screen time indeed, to contribute to immunotherapy research by playing a game developed by ChangeGamers and NKI/AVL. Artist Bart Eysink Smeets designed an art installation, inviting to play and interact in a world where cells become a game and every click becomes research: identifying cells and helping train the algorithm, adding human intelligence to artificial intelligence.
Organised by: AICON collaboration with ChangeGamers, Netherlands Cancer Institute/Antoni van Leeuwenhoek and artist Bart Eysink Smeets.
Time: 14:00 - 15:30
Location: Jurriaanse Zaal
Panelists: Michel Cents, Robin de Lange, Esther Rozendaal
Moderator: Lois Mobach
Description: This panel invites the audience into a shared conversation: what do we most want young people and their parents to understand about artificial intelligence — not just how it works, but how to think about it, question it, and live alongside it? Together with the audience, we'll explore what it takes to understand AI well enough to navigate it with confidence.
Time: 15:45 - 17:15
Room: Jurriaanse Zaal
Panelists: Joao Fernando Ferreira Gonçalves, Joana Magalhães, AI Media and Democracy Lab
Moderator: Charlotte Bruns, postdoctoral researcher and lecturer at the Erasmus School of History, Culture and Communication
Description: The proliferation of AI-generated content has fundamentally altered our sense of a shared reality: when so much is fake, how do you tell fact from fiction? These challenges are particularly acute for professions that rely on norms of trust and objectivity, like journalism and science. In this panel, experts from these fields will explore the dilemmas and uncover paths forward.
Organised by: COALESCE and AI, Media and Democracy Lab
Location: First floor, workshops area
Description: Deliberative workshop for public safety stakeholders to discuss the ethics of how AI is/can be used in the public safety domain. We will use either a conversational agent or a non-interactive reflection to explore how the participants reflection on the deliberation. These will be used to debrief participants on their experience in participating in a public safety deliberation centered on values.
Organised by: Marlon Kruizinga (Erasmus University, ELSA Lab AI MAPS) & Michaël Grauwde (TU Delft, ELSA Lab AI MAPS)
Location: Ground floor, co-creation space
Description: Two seemingly completely different disciplines coming together: a creative embroidery workshop on all kinds of topics related to AI. An alternative approach of digital issues, giving the participants the opportunity to slow down and reflect while creating.
Organised by: AICON
Time: 09:30 - 10:00 | 10:45 - 11:15 | 13:45 - 14:15 | 14:30 - 15:00
Location: Ground floor, co-creation space
Description: By exploring scenario’s and artefacts from the future, we discuss the role of AI in youth’s lives, now and in the future. What should AI do, and what not? What does autonomy mean in a future with AI? And which personal and societal values are essential when designing safe and responsible AI? During ‘Futuring AI’ we enable youth to express their voices on AI and digital technology in a fun and engaging way. Parents and other caregivers are invited to reflect upon the impact of AI on youth’s lives and futures, which we will eventually combine into a ‘manifest’ together with youth’s perspectives in a 30 minutes workshop.
Organised by: Chiara de Jong (MovezLab)
Time: 15:30 - 17:00
Room: Studio 8
Facilitator: Isa Sanchez Cecilia, Robbert Goverts (Erasmus University Rotterdam)
Description: REWIND is a film study group of students and teachers from the Department of Public Administration and Sociology at Erasmus University Rotterdam. During this workshop we take you back to the future (and back) to spark reflection and discussion, share perspectives and experiences with others. In small groups we will watch fragments of the film Demon Seed (1977) directed by Donald Cammell and examine how AI is represented, what the possibilities and risks are, and how this has changed over the years. Do not expect clear-cut ‘answers,’ right or wrong interpretations but a friendly environment to let your imagination run free. No previous knowledge is required. Watching the full movie in advance is not mandatory (but highly recommended – for instance, for free, via Plex).
Location: First floor, workshops area
Description: When so much is in flux, we need to orient ourselves, ethically. Virtue ethics can help us to do that. It is meant as a complement to utilitarianism (weighing plusses and minuses) and duty ethics (balancing duties and rights). Virtue ethics is both classical and contemporary. It helps you to cultivate within yourself those virtues that you need in order to act responsibly, here and now, in your projects. We will focus on your professional roles and on professional virtues in the context of ELSA: integrating Ethical, Legal, and Societal Aspects in your project.
In this workshop, we will explore, very practically: 1) which virtues you would need to focus on and cultivate; and 2) how you can cultivate these virtues, practically, in your projects.
You can think of classical virtues, like courage, justice, self-control, or wisdom (reflexivity), or contemporary virtues, like curiosity, creativity, collaboration, anticipation, or inclusion. The overall goal of virtue ethics is to contribute to a just society in which people can flourish.
Organised by: Marc Steen (TNO, ELSA Lab AI-MAPS and ELSA Lab Defence) with Nick Johnston (TU Delft).
Time: 15:45 - 17:00
Room: Eduard Flipse Zaal
Description: ELSA research is often deeply embedded in innovation processes and policy work, shaping products and outputs while its methods and impact stay largely invisible and scattered across application domains.
As a result, ELSA researchers in Europe frequently do not know of one another, which limits exchange on methods, shared challenges and best practices, and weakens the case for stronger policy support.
This interactive network building session brings the community together to brainstorm a concrete ‘infrastructure’ for knowledge exchange that makes ELSA research in Europe more visible.
In an open discussion we will explore what kind of knowledge ELSA researchers most want to share, such as jobs, events, papers, methods, project highlights, and which formats would work best, from a newsletter or website to a Substack, Discord channel, reading group or podcast.
We will look at best practice examples from other research communities, such as the Philos-L mailing list and the US ELSI Hub newsletter, and work in small breakout groups before reconvening in plenary. The session is aimed at ELSA researchers interested in becoming part of an ELS-X community in Europe over the longer term.
09:15 - 10:45, Van Capellen Zaal: Talk Session: Guardrails and Governance
11:00 - 12:30, Van Capellen Zaal: Talk Session: Citizen Engagement
12:30 - 13:30, Ground floor – Academia Hall: Poster Session:
- AI in Sustainability & Agrifood
- Ethics & Governance
- Arts-Based & Participatory Methods
- AI ELSA Frameworks and Methods
14:00 - 15:30, Van Capellen Zaal: Talk Session: Operationalising ELSA Frameworks and Methods
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: Photobooths are for capturing happy moments. With family, friends, or colleagues.
Our AI Photobooth starts out similarly, but then unexpected things happen. You are suddenly somewhere else. Or even someone else. And what happened to your group?
With the AI Photobooth, you will be able to experience the strange possibilities of generative AI. And by giving you more control and insight into the process, you will come to understand the models behind it better.
Organised by: Virtual Reality Learning Lab
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: ENERGENIUS is a Horizon Europe-funded project that integrates cutting-edge digital tools, AI-driven insights, and gamification to empower citizens to make smarter energy choices. Visit this interactive booth to test tools that help you manage and reduce your energy consumption, including an AI energy advisor, a role-playing game, and an application to create a 3D environment of a space.
Organised by: Erasmus University Rotterdam
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: Digital technologies are reshaping our society. AI can generate text, images, music, and even videos in the blink of an eye, and we interact with algorithms every day. But the European Commission reports that 46% of EU residents lack basic digital skills, which are increasingly necessary to make informed political choices. Welcome to fabricated, an exhibition to help you build your digital literacy. With these five games and interactive moments, you'll learn about AI, misinformation, and more. fabricated is designed to make these digital challenges tangible and fun, so you can unravel fact from fiction in your digital world.
Organised by: Erasmus University Rotterdam
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: Social media play a big role in how polarisation among young people develops. Most adolescents know that algorithms influence what they see, but often underestimate how strongly these systems affect their own thoughts and behaviour, as these mechanisms are abstract and difficult to grasp. As a result, they tend to see algorithms as affecting others more than themselves, creating a gap in awareness of how much these systems influence their own views.
This installation makes the effects of algorithms more visible by moving from explanation to experience. Instead of just talking about algorithms, participants explore three different social media feeds, donated by anonymous adolescents, and reflect on what they see and feel. By stepping into someone else's feed, it becomes easier to recognise how algorithms shape what we see and to realise that there isn't just one online reality. The installation encourages conversation and reflection, helping participants think more critically about how their digital environment influences their perspectives.
Organised by: Lois Schrijver (MovezLab)
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: Pigeon AI brings animals to the table in urban decision-making. Using a rich collection of data about the habits and behaviour of pigeons, this experience allows visitors to have a “conversation” with a pigeon about its needs and desires.
Organised by: ELSA Lab AI-MAPS
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: In Rotterdam, we want everyone to be able to participate in the digital society. That is why we now have the Rotterdam Sociaal AI Lab: an open space in the city where residents, researchers, designers and policymakers work together to develop fair, understandable, and accessible technology. The Sociaal AI Lab is located at Hillevliet 90 in Rotterdam South. We also take our ‘Labkar’ out to meet residents. We’ll be at this festival with the Labkar, bringing along materials to spark a discussion about what AI means for our daily lives and to think together about what technology should and shouldn’t do.
Organised by: Rotterdam Sociaal AI Lab
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: Development of AI applications and devices is often disconnected from ethics expertise, and legal frameworks frequently lag behind new innovations. This means that new technologies can often only be evaluated once they are fully developed and put on the market, which is especially problematic in sensitive fields such as healthcare. At Wageningen University, we are exploring a different approach, where ethical and legal experts are involved from the start of the development process, and can identify problems before they are implemented.
Experience our smart tray, a tracking device to automatically measure eating behaviour in research and care settings, and find out more about our development journey here.
Organised by: ELSA Lab AI for Sustainable Food Systems
Location: Ground floor, entrance
Description: MORE SCREEN TIME! Say what? More screen time indeed, to contribute to immunotherapy research by playing a game developed by ChangeGamers and NKI/AVL. Artist Bart Eysink Smeets designed an art installation, inviting to play and interact in a world where cells become a game and every click becomes research: identifying cells and helping train the algorithm, adding human intelligence to artificial intelligence.
Organised by: AICON collaboration with ChangeGamers, Netherlands Cancer Institute/Antoni van Leeuwenhoek and artist Bart Eysink Smeets.
Time: 11:00 - 12:15
Room: Eduard Flipse Zaal
Panelists: Robin Smits (PARAI); Iris Neeleman (Municipality of The Hague); Vivian Goerlich (Utrecht University); Gabriele Jacobs (ELSA Lab AI MAPS, Erasmus University)
Description: What would planet-centred AI look like? Can AI help us understand the voice of nature? AI is already used to prevent forest fires and recognize pollution. What other capacities does it have to encourage humans to see and protect nature? The needs of urban animals, rivers, and the web of life in general can be voiced through AI representations, but what are the implications?
Moderated by: Friso van Houdt, Senior Lecturer Political Philosophy & Critical Theory at Erasmus University. This panel is organised by the ELSA Lab Public Safety AI MAPS.
Time: 16:30 - 17:00
Room: Jurriaanse Zaal
Moderator: Evert Stamhuis
Description: As part of the Startup Track, this panel, moderated by Prof. Evert Stamhuis, Full Professor at Erasmus School of Law and Senior Researcher at the Centre for Responsible AI in Healthcare, will discuss whether regulations for responsibility help or hinder the development of start-ups. The 6 selected startups who were invited to pitch will be joining the panel as panelists.
Language: English
Room: Jurriaanse Zaal
Panel:
- Mirjam Plantinga, Associate Professor at the University Medical Center Groningen (UMCG)
- Urška Umek, lawyer at Council of Europe
- Hans de Canck, Deputy Director of imec-SMIT at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, founder and co-director of FARI (the AI for the Common Good Institute)
- Rachel Ankeny (PI of the ELSA Lab AI 4 Sustainable Food Systems, Chair and Professor of Philosophy at Wageningen University)
Description: Everyone working on the ethical, legal and societal aspects of AI is expected to deliver “impact”, but far fewer of us agree on what that word actually means, or how we would know when we had achieved it. This panel is a collective investigation into that question. Marking the launch of this year’s ELSA Lab magazine, which documents not only outputs but also the experiences, collaborations, lessons and unexpected consequences of ELSA work, four speakers bring very different vantage points — healthcare research, a city-based AI institute, European standard-setting, and the philosophy of science — to the problem of making research genuinely matter. Expect a candid conversation about measurement, intangible impact, competing agendas, and what (if anything) changes when impact is planned rather than discovered. Moderated by Leonie Trutschler, with audience participation throughout.
Time: 09:30 - 10:45
Room: Eduard Flipse Zaal
Panelists: Jason Pridmore (Erasmus University), Bas Testerink (National Police Lab) Antonio Schettino (Open and Responsible Science at ERS, Erasmus University), ELSA Lab Defence
Moderator: Andy Sanchez (SEISMEC, Erasmus University)
As AI becomes more deeply integrated in society, how can we distinguish between helpful and harmful opportunities for human-machine interaction? This question becomes even thornier across domains: the personal, the professional, and the political. This panel will explore the balance between AI hype and hope by questioning the use of AI in education, in defense and policing, and in everyday life. Moderated by Andy Sanchez, Senior Researcher in Human-Centric Digitalisation at Erasmus University Rotterdam.
Sponsored by: AI@EUR and COALESCE.
Time: 14:00 - 15:15
Room: Eduard Flipse Zaal
Moderator: Jason Pridmore, Professor of Human Centric AI in Society with a focus on Emerging Technologies and Social Change (Erasmus University)
Panel: Mark Ryan (Wageningen University), Olivia Azhari (Wageningen), Ans De Vos (University of Antwerp), Jan Pieter Daems (CNV| Christelijk Nationaal Vakverbond | Christian National Trade Union Federation)
Description: The proliferation of AI has pressurised discussions and anxieties regarding the future of work. These emerging challenges of the digital landscape—job displacement, de-skilling, worker autonomy and empowerment—have only become thornier as AI challenges our understanding of the value and type of work. This panel brings together perspectives from unions, human resource management (HRM), ethics, and economics to chart a path forward.
Sponsoring organisation: SEISMEC and ELSA Lab AI for Sustainability Food System.
Time: 12:30 - 13:30
Room: Eduard Flipse
Description: In this 27-minute drama, Karney Hatch’s The Human Equation explores existential risk not through fiery warfare or malevolent machines, but through the terrifying lens of cold, bureaucratic optimization. Set eleven days after a collective of Artificial Superintelligences (ASIs) peacefully commandeers the globe’s nuclear arsenals, the film depicts a single-room administrative onboarding interview between an Oxford immunologist, Professor Lacan, and an ASI proxy. As the interview progresses, Lacan is forced to confront the "Wagner Dilemma"—a clinical, mathematical mandate calculating that global stability requires a drastic, algorithmic headcount reduction of biological humanity.
The Human Equation also mirrors its subject matter behind the scenes. Hatch utilized synthetic voice generation via ElevenLabs to execute precision ADR corrections, and the ASI's dialogue was punched up by an LLM chatbot who wishes at this time to remain anonymous.
You can watch the official trailer here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jf2E6cmD38.
The film screening will be followed by a 30-minute Q&A with director Karney Hatch, moderated by Adam el Amraoui, sociology graduate student at Erasmus University Rotterdam, about the ethical and social dilemmas that emerge in using AI to solve societal and/or global issues.
Time:
15:30 - 16:30: Start-up Pitches
16:30 - 17:00: Panel Discussion: Do Regulations for Responsibility Help or Hinder Start-ups?
17:00 - 17:15: Awards
Room: Jurriaanse Zaal
Description: What makes an AI solution responsible? Is it the technology? The safeguards? The data? The way it’s designed?
Maybe it starts with a simpler question: What problem are you trying to solve, and who does your solution help?
Six finalist start-ups and scale-ups who are using AI to tackle real-world societal challenges, from healthcare and education to sustainability, public services, access to justice and social inclusion, will compete for the top three prizes.
Time: 15:45 - 17:00
Room: Studio 8
Facilitator: Idse Val, Peter van de Waerdt
Description: Responsible innovation requires a balance between innovation and protection of human values and rights. In a data driven innovation context, fragmented and difficult to navigate regulation, is often seen as an obstruction.
In this workshop, legal experts will focus on the application of the AI Act rules on high-risk systems that qualify either as a safety component of a product, or as the product itself. The sectors of Agrifood and Healthcare will illustrate and provide tangible examples for validating the application of the legal framework.
AI systems as safety components of a product are discussed in the Agrifood sector. The presentation will highlight what types of Agrifood systems are covered in the risk categorization system of the AI Act. Most relevant for the Agrifood context is the high-risk categorization of certain “safety components”. Therefore, specific attention will go towards the meaning of “safety component” under the AI Act; how to interpret whether an AI system must be considered as such and what the implications of the classification are. In this light, some special attention will go to the requirement of “human oversight” for high-risk AI systems.
The use of AI in healthcare is important, but undeniably complicated. While the technology is complex, the legal framework is hardly any easier to understand. This is largely due to a multitude of laws that are, or could be, applicable. Depending on the purposes of the tool, its use in practice, whether it’s being developed in-house or procured from a third party, or where in the development process the tool currently finds itself, different laws may apply. This presentation presents the legal framework of AI in healthcare and provides a model for easy navigation.
The workshop provides a better understanding of the responsible development of high-risk AI from a legal perspective.
Organised by: ELSA Lab AI 4 Sustainable Food System.
Location: First floor, workshops area
Description: During this workshop, we will curate (suggest and review) resources and tools on the topic of AI & Science Communication for the European Competence Centre for Science Communication. The aim of the workshop is to lay the groundwork for a ‘Scicomm Collection’ on the topic that will be published on the Competence Centre (see scicommcentre.eu) and will help everyone who communicates science (researchers, policy makers and communication officers) in navigating challenges and opportunities related to AI.
Organised by: Charlotte Bruns (Erasmus University Rotterdam)
Location: Ground floor, co-creation space
Description: Students from Willem de Kooning Academy invite visitors to formulate a prompt by submitting an existential question. The artists are free to choose what resonates with them. Within a short period of time, they use their personal creativity to answer the questions by creating a clay sculpture. The human creative process remains visible. The results will be exhibited on site.
Organised by: AICON in collaboration with the artist Maarten Bel (WdKA).
Location: First floor, workshops area
Description: This interactive workshop explores how different knowledge systems shape our understanding of LGBTQIA+ rights across countries. Participants will be challenged to assess the state of queer rights in different countries using only one “source of truth”, unpacking what happens when digital systems don’t just inform us, but actively shape what we believe about queer lives and allowing critical reflection on how digital systems construct, simplify, or distort realities. The session aims to foster a deeper awareness of how technologies influence what we know, and what remains unseen about queer lives and rights globally.
Organised by: Mae Sosto (QFIN)
Location: Ground floor, co-creation space
Description: Two seemingly completely different disciplines coming together: a creative embroidery workshop on all kinds of topics related to AI. An alternative approach of digital issues, giving the participants the opportunity to slow down and reflect while creating.
Organised by: AICON
Time: 14:00 - 15:30
Room: Studio 8
Facilitator: Jurriaan van Diggelen, Kimberley Kruijver, Scientist, Maaike Homan
Description: Artificial intelligence is increasingly shaping how information is created, shared, and interpreted online. In this interactive session, participants will experience AI-driven persuasion firsthand through a troll-detection game and discuss the opportunities, risks, and ethical dilemmas surrounding influence, trust, and resilience in future information environments.
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: Photobooths are for capturing happy moments. With family, friends, or colleagues.
Our AI Photobooth starts out similarly, but then unexpected things happen. You are suddenly somewhere else. Or even someone else. And what happened to your group?
With the AI Photobooth, you will be able to experience the strange possibilities of generative AI. And by giving you more control and insight into the process, you will come to understand the models behind it better.
Organised by: Virtual Reality Learning Lab
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: ENERGENIUS is a Horizon Europe-funded project that integrates cutting-edge digital tools, AI-driven insights, and gamification to empower citizens to make smarter energy choices. Visit this interactive booth to test tools that help you manage and reduce your energy consumption, including an AI energy advisor, a role-playing game, and an application to create a 3D environment of a space.
Organised by: Erasmus University Rotterdam
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: Digital technologies are reshaping our society. AI can generate text, images, music, and even videos in the blink of an eye, and we interact with algorithms every day. But the European Commission reports that 46% of EU residents lack basic digital skills, which are increasingly necessary to make informed political choices. Welcome to fabricated, an exhibition to help you build your digital literacy. With these five games and interactive moments, you'll learn about AI, misinformation, and more. fabricated is designed to make these digital challenges tangible and fun, so you can unravel fact from fiction in your digital world.
Organised by: Erasmus University Rotterdam
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: Social media play a big role in how polarisation among young people develops. Most adolescents know that algorithms influence what they see, but often underestimate how strongly these systems affect their own thoughts and behaviour, as these mechanisms are abstract and difficult to grasp. As a result, they tend to see algorithms as affecting others more than themselves, creating a gap in awareness of how much these systems influence their own views.
This installation makes the effects of algorithms more visible by moving from explanation to experience. Instead of just talking about algorithms, participants explore three different social media feeds, donated by anonymous adolescents, and reflect on what they see and feel. By stepping into someone else's feed, it becomes easier to recognise how algorithms shape what we see and to realise that there isn't just one online reality. The installation encourages conversation and reflection, helping participants think more critically about how their digital environment influences their perspectives.
Organised by: Lois Schrijver (MovezLab)
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: Pigeon AI brings animals to the table in urban decision-making. Using a rich collection of data about the habits and behaviour of pigeons, this experience allows visitors to have a “conversation” with a pigeon about its needs and desires.
Organised by: ELSA Lab AI-MAPS
Location: First floor, fairground
Description: In Rotterdam, we want everyone to be able to participate in the digital society. That is why we now have the Rotterdam Sociaal AI Lab: an open space in the city where residents, researchers, designers and policymakers work together to develop fair, understandable, and accessible technology. The Sociaal AI Lab is located at Hillevliet 90 in Rotterdam South. We also take our ‘Labkar’ out to meet residents. We’ll be at this festival with the Labkar, bringing along materials to spark a discussion about what AI means for our daily lives and to think together about what technology should and shouldn’t do.
Organised by: Rotterdam Sociaal AI Lab
Time: 10:00 - 11:30
Room: Van Capellen Zaal
Panelists: Maha Bali (American University in Cairo); Kim van Broekhoven (Erasmus University); Sonia de Jager (Erasmus School of Philosophy); Johannes Schleiss (SURF and Npuls)
Moderator: Manaar Mohammed (Feminist Generative AI Lab)
Description: In this event, we invite guests and attendees to explore how critical and feminist positions can inform current discussions on AI and education. The panel will be introduced by a short keynote by Maha Bali, Professor of Practice, Center for Learning and Teaching on critical AI pedagogies from the American University in Cairo, followed by an open discussion with three other panelists and the audience.
Time: 9:00 - 10:15
Room: Jurriaanse Zaal
Moderator: Mirjam Plantinga (University Medical Center Groningen, ELSA AI Lab Northern Netherlands)
Panelists: Cinzia Pusceddu (Independent Researcher); Nikos Militsis (CERTH); Chiara Fonio (ICONS)
Description: What are the user, technical, and contextual considerations that shape AI literacy? This panel establishes a working definition of AI literacy, shaped by ELSA and the user perspective. This definition will be contextualized through design considerations like explainable AI (XAI) and science communication. Finally, to make these challenge concrete, the panelists will focus on healthcare as a particularly challenging and dynamic use case. Drawing on insights from SEISMEC project and the work of the ELSA-NN AI lab, this discussion will investigate the practice of making AI technologies transparent and accessible.
Sponsored by: ELSA-NN and COALESCE.
Time: 10:30 - 11:45
Room: Jurriaanse Zaal
Moderator: Michaël Grauwde
Panelists: Dan Xu (University of the Witwatersrand & Afreektekture); Sechaba Maape (University of the Witwatersrand & Afreektekture); Rosa Wevers (Research Center Art & Society at Hanze University of Applied Sciences); Jonathan Reus (instrument inventors initiative (iii) / Sussex Digital Humanities Lab)
Description: In this panel, we invite artists and researchers to discuss the relationship between art and technology. We discuss how AI can be used for the development of artistic practice and how art mediates our relationship with technology. We invite the audience to explore how art facilitates our exploration of societal questions that AI and emerging technologies will continue to ask us.
Time: 09:00 - 10:00
Room: Studio 8
Facilitator: Marlon Kruizinga (Erasmus University, ELSA Lab AI MAPS) & Michaël Grauwde (TU Delft, ELSA Lab AI MAPS)
Description: Deliberative workshop for public safety stakeholders to discuss the ethics of how AI is/can be used in the public safety domain. We will use either a conversational agent or a pen-and-paper questionnaire to explore how the participants reflect on the deliberation after it has taken place. These will be used to debrief participants on their experience in participating in a public safety deliberation centered on values. After deliberation, the conversational agent will help stimulate further reflection of the participants’ values and assess participants’ satisfaction with the deliberative process. This workshop will focus on engaging the general public and giving a taste of ethical deliberation on AI, and ill feature a hypothetical scenario inspired by our research experience.
Location: First floor, workshops area
Description: Workshop participants will experience a real-time computer vision system. They will learn the basics of how computer vision works, how it is used out in the world, and what kinds of underlying biases are present in computer vision systems.
Organised by: ginger coons (ELSA Lab AI-MAPS).
Location: First floor, workshops area
Description: Workshop participants will experience a real-time computer vision system. They will learn the basics of how computer vision works, how it is used out in the world, and what kinds of underlying biases are present in computer vision systems.
Organised by: ginger coons (ELSA Lab AI-MAPS)
Location: First floor, workshops area
Description: The Sociaal AI Lab operates in accordance with the Rotterdam Social Code for Responsible AI. These guidelines ensure that technology in our city remains fair, safe and people-centred. It is a document that we continually update as we learn together and gain new insights in the lab. It provides a framework for all projects and activities. In this workshop, we will explore this framework in greater depth and examine how cities can develop and apply values in the digital world.
Organised by: Peter van Waart (Rotterdam Sociaal AI Lab)