Research Profile Ethics
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Ethics

The profile area 'Ethics' represents a core area of our TRA and at the same time, with its high relevance for various already existing projects, such as 'Autonomy and Autonomous Systems', 'Digitalization, Law and Economy', it is an important cross-cutting topic of our other profile areas. The projects in the profile area 'Ethics' address questions concerning e.g. public health or the social consequences of the Corona pandemic. This cross-cutting theme aims to bridge the gap between the life sciences (medicine, philosophy, theology, ethics, law, etc.) and societal contexts (e.g. education, culture, market, politics).

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At the heart of this profile area, the Hertz Professorship for 'Life Ethics' was filled in 2021 with Prof. Christiane Woopen, MD. With her research on ethically and legally relevant aspects of societal problems and challenges, which can only be answered by involving various disciplines from the humanities, social sciences and life sciences, Christiane Woopen establishes a link between the different research areas represented in the TRA. For this purpose, the 'Center for Life Ethics' was founded, whose research focuses on four systemically interacting dynamics that particularly characterize changes in our time: mechanization, economization, ecologization and globalization of our lives.

The expertise of the profile area 'Ethics' is furthermore complemented by Prof. Dr. Aimee van Wynsberghe within the framework of an Alexander von Humboldt Professorship for 'Applied Ethics of Artificial intelligence' since December 2020. Both scientists work closely with each other and with many other members of our TRA on the development and expansion of this profile area.

Projects in the profile area 'Ethics'

Project leader
Prof. Dr. Andreas Odenthal 
Prof. Dr. Cornelia Richter

Staff
Rasmus Wittekind (WMA)

David Renz (SHK)

Information about the project
The project examines the possibilities of an appropriate perception, description and interpretation of the (crisis-like) experience of world-societal transformation processes (such as the regional and global effects of climate change, increased mobility and migration, digitalization and artificial intelligence, biotechnology, democracy and governmentality) from a theological and religious studies perspective. Already the semantizations of such complexes of phenomena operate with concepts, categories, linguistic images and value patterns that have implications for the imaginary and real space of action for dealing with, shaping and norming such challenges. The project investigates which notions of salvation, agency and integrity are associated with certain semantizations and thus meaning-making processes in future scenarios.

Events
Teaching events
Publications
  • Daniel Bauer: Impulse von Habermas' Genealogie für die Selbstverortung des christlichen Glaubens in der nachmetaphysischen Moderne. Eine praktisch-theologische Perspektive. In: ThGl 112 (2022), S. 166-181.
  • Andreas Krebs: Erdverbundenheit. Zur Kritik der gnostischen Struktur in Christentum und Moderne, in: Simone Horstmann, Gregor Taxacher (Hg.), Animate Theologies. Ein (un)mögliches Projekt?, Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft 2022, 73–95.
  • Cornelia Richter (Hrsg.): The Illusion of the Obvious. On Truth and Reliability in Times of Crisis. Special Issue. JRAT 8, 2022/1, Brill: 2022.
  • Stefan Walser: Identitätsfindung und Glaubensdynamik. Implikationen für die systematische Theologie, in: Klaus von Stosch / Stefan Walser / Anne Weber (Hg.): Theologie im Übergang. Identität – Digitalisierung – Dialog (Kirche in Zeiten der Veränderung 12) Freiburg i. Br. 2022, 89–113.
  • Heidrun Mader: Hagar, die beschnittene Sklavin, und Sara, die unbeschnittene Freie: Eine Neuinterpretation der Allegorie in Gal 4,21-31 im Kontext des galatischen Konfliktes, in Korinna Zamfir/Uta Poplutz (ed.), Neutestamentliche Briefliteratur (Die Bibel und die Frauen: Eine exegetisch kulturgeschichtliche Enzyklopädie 2.2), Stuttgart: Kohlhammer 2022
    Andreas Odenthal/Cornelia Richter (Hrsg.): Semantisierung in Zukunftsdiskursen. Theologische Analysen krisenbezogener Sprachbilder. Herder: 2023.

Project leader
Dr. Matthew Ryan Robinson

Staff
Miriam Dorlaß (SHK)
Saskia Held (SHK)

Jan Thelen (SHK)

Information about the project
The ‘What Does Theology Do, Actually?’-project aims not to do theology, but to observe what theologies do, in and for the communities in which theologies circulate and hold meaning. How is theology understood and practiced as a semantics of global society? What kinds of problems do theologies solve and how? These questions are pursued, moreover, with specific attention given to the “transcultural”.

Events
Publications

Davis, Phillip Andrew, Daniel Lanzinger, and Matthew Ryan Robinson (eds.). What Does Theology Do, Actually? Vol. 2: Exegeting Exegesis. Leipzig: EVA 2023.

Project leader
Dr. Charlotte Gauvry

Information about the project

Creation of an interdisciplinary and international research forum to develop new criteria for determining whether and when non-human entities, such as non-linguistic animals, new brain organisms, or advanced AI systems can be considered conscious.

Events
Teaching events 
Publications
  • U. Peters. 2023. « Unjustified Sample Sizes and Generalizations in Explainable AI Research: Principles for More Inclusive User Studies. IEEE Intelligent Systems (main author; co-authored with Mary Carman).
  • Charlotte Gauvry & Theodor Rüber, « Extrapolating Consciousness in Isolated Hemispheres. Hemispherotomy as a new challenge », Revue de métaphysique et de morale, Special Issue : « New research on Consciousness », 1 (2024).
  • Tobias Bauer/ Charlotte Gauvry/ Theodor Rüber et al., « Intact functional brain networks in the isolated hemisphere of people after hemispherotomy », 2024.
  • Charlotte Gauvry, « Aktuelle Herausforderungen bei der Modellierung minimaler Erfahrungen (MPE) von Thomas Metzinger – Hemispherotomie als Fallstudie », Zeitschrift für Philosophie und Theologie, 2024.
Further activities

Project leader
Prof. Dr. Christiane Woopen

Staff:
Dr. Björn Schmitz-Luhn 
Johanne Stümpel 
Silke Gaertzen 
Annika Dörrhöffer (SHK)
Judith Wolters (SHK)
Anna-Yumi Haußmann (SHK)

Information about the project
For the Think Journey, leading experts from different disciplines are invited to present their views on the future and to discuss them with the participants. Students and young scientists are given the opportunity to meet with these experts and go on a "journey of thought". Together, new ideas for an ethically sound design of futures are to be developed and models and approaches to action for coping with the diverse dynamic changes and designing futures of a good, successful life are to be developed. Students and young scientists have the opportunity to network with the experts and to identify further research and development opportunities for their own scientific path.

Events
Project leader

Jan Linhart

Information about the project

As part of a long term strategy for decolonising and opening the current science system towards a pluriverse of perspectives on global challenges, this joined project brings together a transdisciplinary group of experts from Latin America and Germany for engaging during one week in pluriversal dialogues on environmental ethics and education for futures beyond "development". A series of workshops will provide space for experimenting with pluriversal practices and methodologies from intercultural and environmental research and education, analysing them form different cultural, social, historical and geopolitical perspectives, providing important insights concerning the potential, viability and challenges of mobilizing diverging perspectives for co-creating social and ecologically sustainable solutions.

Events

Further activities 

Publications

  • Conference Paper (SSEC2024): Pluriversal Dialogues on Environmental Ethics: Decolonising Scientific Practice to Build Futures Beyond ‘Development’, 2025.
  • Pluriversal Dialogues on Environmental Ethics: Decolonising Scientific Practice to Build Futures Beyond ‘Development’ Sammelband; Springer; open access; mehrsprachige Veröffentlichung, 2025.
Project leader
Prof. Dr. Takahiro Nakajima (University of Tokyo)
Prof. Dr. Paul Pickering  (Australian National) 

Prof. Dr. Xudong Zhang (New York University)

Information about the project

The Winter Institute is an annual collaboration between Australian National University, New York University, the University of Tokyo and the University of Bonn to discuss a broad topic in an interdisciplinary setting. The program involves keynote lectures, faculty papers and graduate student presentations including cross-disciplinary questioning. The Winter Institute also includes social and networking events for delegates.

Events
  • Winter Institute (07.-10. January 2025): "Techne and Human Sciences in the 21st Century"
  • Winter Institute (20.04.-24.04.2026): "Dualism and Non-Duality in the Age of Artificial intelligence" - Part I: Non-Duality, Kyoto (hosted by Kyoto University)
  • Fall Institute (21.09.-25.09.2026): "Dualism and Non-Duality in the Age of Artificial Intelligenge" - Part II: Dualism, New York (hosted by the New School for Social Research, New York City) 
Further activities
Project leader

Dr. Sarah Diner

Information about the project

The aim of the project is to address the pressing questions associated with new model systems in the basic sciences from the unifying perspective of ethics. The focus is on three-dimensional models of the human body generated from stem cells, so-called organoids, which are a central focus of research at the University of Bonn. 

Events

Closed projects in the profile area 'Ethics'

Project leader
Prof. Dr. Mathias Schmoeckel
Prof. Dr. Martin Keßler

Staff
Ji Chen (SHK)

Sophie von Depka-Prondzuynski (SHK)

Information about the project
In the Age of Enlightenment, natural and human rights were not only called for programmatically, but also proclaimed politically - as in Virginia in 1776. Civil rights do become parts of institutions. As universal as the legal claims as such are, the circumstances that led to their very implementation are just as diverse. The project investigates decisive moments and developments that added in various counties and ages to the political establishment of fundamental rights.

Events
  • Workshop (28.04.2023-30.04.2023): 'Natural law and the Definition of Good Order'
Teaching Events
Further information

Project leader
Prof. Dr. Cornelia Richter

Staff

Torben Alles 

Information about the project
Further information will follow

Events
Teaching events 
Publications
Further information
  • Call for Papers (Deadline: 31.07.2020)
    • 1st place: Dr. Martin Breuel (Köln): „Lüge, Bullshit, Propaganda? ‚Postfaktische Politik‘ und das Rationalitätspotential der Demokratie‘“
    • 2nd place: Florian Buchmayer (Bremen): „Das Gerede vom Postfaktischen als diskursive Wende“
    • 3rd place: Eytan Celik (Bayreuth): „Fake News als Bedrohung für die moderne Gesellschaft – eine kantische Perspektive“
  • Prize Question 2020-2022 (Deadline: 31.12.2021): What is truth under the conditions of digitalization? An epistemological question in conversation with hermeneutics, philosophy
    of religion and sociocultural phenomenology
    • Award winner: Dr. Matteo Belgrano (Philosophie, UCA/CONICET)

Contact for further information

Johanna Tix

Manager of the TRA Individuals and Societies

Contact

 +49 228 73 54468

johanna.tix@uni-bonn.de

tra4@uni-bonn.de

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