118° Nexa Lunch Seminar - From drones to sparkles. A designerly take on AI critique

How do matters of control on autonomous weapon systems relate to magical wands and sparkles? And how can we exercise imagination to challenge deterministic assumptions we collectively held around AI?

The talk will engage with these seemingly unrelated questions to encourage a discussion on the importance of understanding and accounting for the public perception of AI. From dreams of efficiency and liberation, to fears of obsolescence and subordination, AI comes embedded into specific socio-technical imaginaries that have sedimented through history and have become political devices.

The speaker will build upon personal work to underscore how design, in its broadest definition, can contribute to shaping the narratives that feed these popular imaginaries but also can challenge dominant assumtpions and act as a force for collective imagination.


MARIA LUCE LUPETTI is an Assistant Professor in Interaction and Critical Design at the Department of Architecture and Design at Politecnico di Torino (IT). Her research is concerned with all matters of human entanglement with the artificial world, especially concerning complex technologies such as AI and robotics. She also serve as Exhibit X section editor for Interactions Mag and she is the secretary for Società Italiana Design (Italian Design Society).

She is a former core member of the AiTech Initiative on Meaningful Human Control over AI Systems and of the Automated Mobility Lab, at TU Delft, where she worked for several years. Maria Luce Lupetti received a PhD cum Laude in Production, Management and Design from Politecnico di Torino, in Italy, for her design investigations into the field of educational robotics for children.