Ethics and Social Philosophy of the Digital Society

I am leading the Ethics and critical theories of artificial intelligence research group at the Institute of Cognitive Science at the University of Osnabrück. My team works on contemporary critical philosophy of the digital world. Our projects cover the ethics of AI, data protection and Big Data, digital technology and power, intersectionality and anti-discrimination, digital enlightenment and participation.

Research interests   Research team

Join our discussion!

Our weekly research colloquium and most of our teaching is in English and hybrid – you can participate remotely if you’re not based in Osnabrück.

Colloquium   Data Ethics Outreach Lab   Teaching program

Current research

Predictive Privacy and Purpose Limitation for Models: A new approach in data protection that reacts to the risks of predictive analytics and unaccounted secondary use of trained AI models. Standing research collaboration with Prof. Dr. Hannah Ruschemeier. Read more…

  1. Mühlhoff, Rainer. 2023. „Predictive Privacy: Collective Data Protection in the Context of AI and Big Data“. Big Data & Society, 1–14. doi:10.1177/20539517231166886.
  1. Mühlhoff, Rainer, und Hannah Ruschemeier. 2024. „Updating Purpose Limitation for AI: A Normative Approach from Law and Philosophy“. SSRN Preprint, Januar. https://papers.ssrn.com/abstract=4711621.

Human-Aided AI: Machine Learning systemes are based on human labour and must be analysed as networked socio-technical systems.

  1. Mühlhoff, Rainer. 2020. „Human-Aided Artificial Intelligence: Or, How to Run Large Computations in Human Brains?“ New Media & Society 22 (10): 1868–84. doi:10.1177/1461444819885334.

Ethics of AI as critical social philosophy: An effective ethical debate of AI needs to analyse the power of AI systems.

  1. Mühlhoff, Rainer. 2020. „Automatisierte Ungleichheit: Ethik der Künstlichen Intelligenz in der biopolitische Wende des Digitalen Kapitalismus“. Deutsche Zeitschrift für Philosophie 68 (6): 867–90. doi:10.1515/dzph-2020-0059.

News | Dates

05. February 2024

NDR Kultur – Das Journal on my work

Under the title “Was sind die Risiken von KI?”, NDR Kultur – Das Journal made a report on my current work. Many thanks to Lennart Herberhold.

19. July 2023

New preprint: Purpose Limitation for Models

Hannah Ruschemeier and I present a new regulatory approach to the risk of abusive secondary use of trained machine learning models. The paper will be present...

14. December 2022

Predictive Privacy at CAIS Bochum

It was a great pleasure presenting my research on ethical implications of predictive analytics at the Center for Advanced Internet Studies in Bochum.

29. August 2022

Live bei WDR5 – Das Philosophische Radio

Am 29. August 2022 bin ich zu Gast bei WDR5 im Philosophischen Radio. Mit Moderator Jürgen Wiebicke rede ich über Ethik der künstlichen Intelligenz, Datensch...

23. September 2019

Transitioning to TU Berlin

I’m happy to announce that as of October I will transition to the newly founded Excellence Cluster Science of Intelligence at Technische Universität Berlin....

21. September 2019

New article on “Human-Aided AI” out

My article Menschengestützte Künstliche Intelligenz. Über die soziotechnischen Voraussetzungen von «deep learning» just appeared in Zeitschrift für Medienwis...