In this special edition of the William Temple Foundation Podcast, our Director of Research Chris Baker, hosts a panel of international experts who explore the theme of Ethical Robots through the lenses of theology and philosophy, offering innovative insights from their own work and discussing key emerging issues such as the current paradigm shift in Artificial Intelligence (AI) in a post-digital world. Guests include Canon Dr Eve Poole (Widely acclaimed Theologian and Institutional Leader), Prof Nigel Crooke (Oxford Brookes University), Dr Anna Puzio (University of Twente and University of Oxford) and Rev Eric Trazzo (University of Divinity, Australia). Each panelist offers a 10 minute reflection from their own work, and then Prof Baker guides an open dialogue, exploring the future of this pioneering and interdisciplinary dialogue.

This podcast is offered in memory of Rev Dr John Reader, William Temple Research Fellow and Chair of the Ethical Future Network at University of Oxford, who passed away unexpectedly in late 2023.

Richard Irvine ends the series by joining the dots between geology and anthropology. Are these vast timescales ultimately dehumanising? And can we learn something about time from monastic communities?

In this episode, Simone Kotva speaks about deep time, religious apocalypse, and the ‘end of the world’. She makes the case that what we believe is potentially much less important than spiritual exercises and practices of attention for encouraging ecological concern.