Workshop on Autonomous Technologies and their Societal Impact

On 2 Sep, 2016
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An IEEE Future Directions Committee (FDC) incubation project, entitled "Autonomous Technologies and their Societal Impact" is aiming to bring together industry, academia, and government to understand the current and future implications of autonomous technologies via workshops and discussions consisting of presentations and panel discussions from leaders and experts in technological, legal, and public policy fields. Based on the discussions before, during, and after these workshops, a White Paper consisting of 'valid' and 'balanced' concerns reflecting the state-of-the-art with an emphasis on technology and public policy issues that are representative of various stakeholders from across the globe will be published towards the end of 2016. The findings and summaries will be made available via the FDC website for other initiatives and similar efforts to use them as a reference guide to foster discussions within the community and to foster best practices.

First in the series, a Workshop was organized at IEEE PHM'16 on June 20th focusing on issues relevant to North America, in general. *This second WS aims to bring together researchers, practitioners, and agencies involved in areas related to autonomous technologies and their impact on society with particular attention to topics that are relevant to laws, regulations, and issues from a European perspective*. The proposed Workshop will allow for discussion on autonomous systems that require further attention in terms of their effect in impacting humanity and their societal impact in both positive and negative ways. Emphasis will be placed not only on technology and public policy issues but also on environmental, cultural, structural, political, and socio-economic factors.

TOPICS OF INTEREST
The workshop will consist presentations from different perspectives and views, including but not limited to:
* Socio-economic Aspects of Autonomous Technologies in Developed Vs. Developing Economies
* Legal, Ethical and StrategicImplicationsof the Weaponization of Autonomous Technologies
* Roles of Organizations including Academia, Government, Industry, and End-users
* Ethical and Legal Aspects in Designing Autonomous Systems in Civilian and Military Domains

EXTENDED ABSTRACT SUBMISSION
If you're working in the above areas and if the goals of the WS are of interest to you, we would love to hear from you! Presentations are solicited from speakers from diverse backgrounds such as in the intersection of public policy and technology issues, and societal impacts of robotics and automation from regulatory, liability, safety, security, and privacy perspectives.

*Prospective presenters are invited to submit an extended abstract of 1-2 pages (max.)* reporting on their current research and ideas that motivate discussion during the WS. Each submission will be evaluated on their relevance and potential contribution to the WS themes. It is expected that at least one of the co-authors of accepted presentations will attend the Workshop to present their work.
**Please email your abstract as a pdf document to <raj.madhavan@ieee.org> indicating your affiliation, contact details, and include a brief biography.**

Note that you are not required to write a paper but your presentation will be archived for the benefit of the community at an archival website. As a final step and as a record of the WS, we intend to capture key points from speakers, salient points from the discussions, identify missing gaps and future steps, and summarize them in a White Paper to formulate action items.

IMPORTANT DATES
27 July 2016: Extended Abstract Submission Deadline
7 August 2016: Notification of Accepted Presentations

For more information on the FDC ATSI incubation project and the first Workshop including list of speakers and their talk details, please visit
http://phmconf.org/autonomoustech_workshop.html