Paper/Proposal Title

Delinking the "Human" from Human Rights: Artificial Intelligence, Transhumanism and the Future of Human Rights

Presenter/Author Information

A. Kayum Ahmed, Columbia UniversityFollow

Location

Tech and "Human" Rights

Start Date

10-4-2019 8:30 AM

End Date

10-4-2019 10:00 AM

Keywords

human rights, artificial intelligence, transhumanism

Abstract

Human rights discourses are deeply embedded in an epistemic anthropocentricism that centers the human in human rights. However, conceptions of what constitutes the human are being eroded through the development of artificial intelligence, bio-hacking and transhumanism, all of which, support the emergence of new kinds of humans.These emergent humans include the enhanced human who possesses abilities that compel us to reconsider the parameters of humanness, as well as computer systems that demonstrate characteristics thought of as uniquely human. The blurring of the divide between human and machine therefore compels us to reconsider our understanding of the human in human rights, including the possibility of delinking the human from human rights.

Author/Speaker Biographical Statement(s)

A. Kayum Ahmed is Division Director at the Open Society Foundations (OSF) in New York where he leads the global portfolio on access to medicines and innovation in the Public Health Program. He also teaches a class on socio-economic rights at Columbia Law School. Before joining OSF, Kayum served as Chief Executive Officer of the South African Human Rights Commission from 2010 to 2015. During this period, he led a team of 178 colleagues to monitor, protect and promote human rights in South Africa, and oversaw the management of nearly 45,000 human rights cases. He holds a Ph.D. in education from Columbia University, various degrees in law from the universities of Oxford (MS.t), Cape Town (LL.B.), and Leiden (LL.M.), as well as degrees in anthropology (M.A.) and theology (B.A. Hons).