International Conference on Philosophy for Age of AI to be Held in Kyoto in 2025; 1st Kyoto Conference Will Feature Academics, Business Executives

The Yomiuri Shimbun

20:00 JST, October 23, 2024

The Kyoto Institute of Philosophy, which is working to develop philosophy for the age of artificial intelligence, will organize a new international conference to be held in Kyoto on Sept. 23 and 24 next year, it announced on Tuesday.

The inaugural “Kyoto Conference” will be held at the Kyoto International Conference Center; it will feature leading authorities and experts from various fields.

The institute is jointly headed by two co-chairs: Prof. Yasuo Deguchi of Kyoto University and Jun Sawada, chairman of the board of the Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp.

The first Kyoto Conference is scheduled to be attended by renowned experts in philosophy from home and abroad, such as Deguchi; German philosopher Markus Gabriel, who has been appointed as a senior global advisor to the institute; and philosopher Prof. Edward Freeman of the University of Virginia.

There will be participants from the business community as well, such as Sawada and Toshiaki Higashihara, the executive chairman of Hitachi Ltd. Participants from the media world will include Robert Thomson, the chief executive of News Corp, which publishes the Wall Street Journal; Hirokazu Toda, director and chairman of Hakuhodo Inc.; and Toshikazu Yamaguchi, the president of the Yomiuri Shimbun Holdings.

The institute aims to offer the world a proposal on the creation of “multilayered society of values,” which is not solely devoted to the economy or technology. At the conference, the institute will discuss such themes as “important values for an era defined by AI.” The institute is planning to call for the participation of more famous people from the fields of science and technology as well as arts and culture in the future.