2026 International seminar series on Digital Emotional Governance

In the first session, Professor Minna Ruckenstein, University of Helsinki, argued that it is not enough to ask what algorithmic systems are doing to us, we must also consider what we are doing to them.

Professor Minna Ruckenstein is Professor of Emerging Technologies in Society at the Consumer Society Research Centre, University of Helsinki. In her 2023 book, The Feel of Algorithms (University of California Press), Prof Ruckenstein discusses the algorithmic culture that emerges as people establish and maintain human–machine connections. She argues that it is not enough to ask what algorithmic systems are doing to us; we must also consider what we are doing to them. How are we feeding such systems with our stories, responses, and affective orientations? The enthusiasm, fears, and frustrations that people express support a broader argument: feelings are form-giving social forces that define contemporary algorithmic culture.

Prof Ruckenstein shifts the perspective to design processes that aim to influence how people feel about themselves and latest technologies. She focuses on the design of an LLM-enhanced chatbot that is deliberately dehumanised as a protective gesture. This case shows that emotional governance is embedded in what the system aims to do, and in how the boundaries of humanness and interaction are defined. It moves the focus from the technology to the organisational and collective arrangements that give AI systems purpose and agency. Whether systems manipulate emotions or avoid doing so, they are embedded in value aims that define what the system is allowed to do and what it should do.

In the second session, Professor Andrew Bickford delivered a talk Chemical Heroes: Pharmacological Supersoldiers in the US Military.

The US military has long imagined and sought ways to create “supersoldiers”: a new kind of soldier with different expectations of performance, capabilities, and survivability. In Chemical Heroes, (2020, Duke University Press) he examines US military biomedical and pharmacological projects intended to develop soldiers who can fight better, longer, and smarter than the enemy, and withstand environmental and disease stressors that could keep them out of action. As the US military increasingly sees the entire globe as a battlefield, it must anticipate, imagine, and design new biomedical and pharmacological protections and enhancements for soldiers in order to make them deployable and combat effective anywhere in the world. These projects give us a chance to think about how the military imagines, designs, and “make” our soldiers, and think about questions of security and insecurity as played out on and in the bodies of soldiers.

As part of the Ethics, Evidence and Expertise network, we hosted sociologist Martyn Pickersgill who discussed Novelty, Normativity, and the Neuro. He talked about some of his work over the last two decades on the social circulation of neuroscience and neurotechnology. He argued that expertise far beyond neuro-research is often necessary for its societal impacts, and reflected on some of the ethical implications of claims to novelty and significance in relation to brain technology.

We also welcomed colleagues from EthUcate. EthUcate is a growing initiative aimed at educating diverse stakeholders about responsible science and ethics communication. By contributing to responsible research and innovation, enhancing public trust and fostering informed policy decisions, EthUcate seeks to empower individuals and organizations to engage thoughtfully with scientific information. Katherine Bassil will introduce the work they do and key challenges in ethics communication.