You are invited to attend:
Faculty of Law Twilight Seminar
Cognitive Sovereignty in an Era of Obscure Intelligence
Professor Lee Andrew Bygrave
Date: Thursday, 28 August 2025
Time: 5.00pm-6.30pm (AEST)
Venue: Bond University, Faculty of Law Building (Building 4), Level 3, Room 3_41 - View on campus map
Closest parking: PG2 (Parking General 2) - View on campus map
The Centre for Space, Cyberspace and Data Law invites you to a seminar presented by Professor Lee Andrew Bygrave from the University of Oslo, a leading expert in internet law and data privacy.
Our era is one in which automated decisional systems based on AI increasingly govern our behaviour. These systems promise a range of benefits, yet they also throw up a number of challenges, not least for our ability as humans to understand their logic and ramifications. This presentation considers such challenges through the prism of ‘cognitive sovereignty’ – a notion coined by Ulrich Beck in his famous work ‘Risikogesellschaft’ (1986). For the purposes of the presentation, cognitive sovereignty essentially denotes our moral and legal interest in being able to comprehend our environs and ourselves. The presentation argues that focus on cognitive sovereignty fills a blind spot in scholarship and policy discourse on the challenges arising from increasing use of AI-based decisional systems. Not only is the notion an important constituent for an overarching conceptual framing of these challenges, it is also vital for grounding normative claims for greater explicability of machine processes. Further, the presentation assesses briefly the role of law, focusing on the provisions of data protection law that specifically concern automated decision-making.
The seminar will commence at 5.30pm with light refreshments being offered from 5pm (vegan, gluten-free, and dairy-free options available).
Please register your attendance by 5pm, Wednesday 20 August.
Professor Lee Andrew Bygrave
Lee A. Bygrave is Full Professor at the Department of Private Law, University of Oslo, where he is Director of the Norwegian Research Center for Computers and Law. He is additionally an Academic Affiliate of the Centre for Health, Law and Emerging Technologies at the University of Oxford, a Fellow of the European Law Institute, and Senior Research Affiliate of the Centre for Digital Law at Singapore Management University. Lee has carried out pioneering research and development of regulatory policy for information and communication technology for over three decades. He has world-class expertise on legal aspects of data privacy, cybersecurity, robotics, artificial intelligence, and governance of internet infrastructure. Lee has functioned as expert advisor on technology regulation for numerous organisations, including the Nordic Council of Ministers, the European Commission, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, and the Norwegian government. His most recent expert advisory appointment was to a legislative committee established by the Norwegian Government to reform Norway’s legislative framework for re-use of public sector data by non-government actors. Lee’s work on data privacy law has been cited several times with approval by Advocates General of the Court of Justice of the European Union.