Paris IAS Ideas 2026 - 2027

Presentation

The “Paris IAS Ideas” online talk series features short and stimulating presentations by fellows of the Paris Institute for Advanced Study. The talks mark the beginning of 1-month writing residencies in which fellows will write a paper with the “definitive” version of an idea of concept they have been working on for years.

Short, 20-minutes presentations will be followed by interdisciplinary discussions with researchers across social sciences and humanities. Everyone is welcome to attend and contribute to the debates that will inform the fellows’ work at the Paris IAS.

Practical Information

All presentations will be held online via Zoom in English only.
Please consult the detailed programme below for speaker information and schedules.
Registration is mandatory for each presentation. 

Detailed program 

Friday September 4, 2026 

As a one-off, the September Paris IAS Ideas sessions will consist of a 20-minute presentation followed by 10 minutes of questions.

• 9:30 AM to 10:00 AM - Transformations of Agency: Some Consequences of Outsourcing Decision-Making to Smart Machines by Anthony Eliott AM, Distinguished Professor and Executive Director of the Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence for Digital Transformations at Adelaïde University.
• 10:00 AM to 10:30 AM - What is a Metabolic History? by Hannah Landecker, Professor at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education in the Life Sciences, and co-director of the UCLA Center for Reproductive Science, Health, and Education.
• 10:30 AM to 11.00 AM - What Useful Roles Can Middle Powers Play Amidst Intensification of US-China Conflict? by Wing Thye Woo, Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of California, Davis; University Chair Professor at Liaoning University and Visiting Professor at the University of Hong Kong and the University of Malaya.
• 11:00 AM to 11.30 AM - MEMOIR (Memory, Erasure, Mediation, and Ownership in AI Representations) by Li Xiong, Samuel Candler Dobbs Professor of Computer Science and Professor of Biomedical Informatics at Emory University, Director of the Assured Information Management and Sharing (AIMS) Lab.
• 11.30 AM to 12.00 PM - Three Ways of Thinking AI Philosophically by Joseph Tanke, Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Hawaii at Mānoa, specialist in 19th- and 20th-century European philosophy. 

Li Xiong joins the Paris IAS as part of the Distinguished Fellowship programme developed in collaboration with the cluster PostGenAI@Paris.

PostGenAI@Paris : Based in the heart of Paris, this interdisciplinary and cross-sector consortium aims to develop ethical, inclusive and sovereign AI that is fully anchored in the major challenges of our time.

Friday October 2, 2026 

• The First Kulturwissenschaft (cultural science). Topicality and Epistemological Potential of an Intellectual Movement around 1900 by Sigrid Weigel, Emeritus Director and Senior Researcher of the Leibniz Research Center for Literature and Culture (ZfL) in Berlin.
• AI in the Sky: How Generative AI Reshapes Scientific Discovery in Astrophysics by Angèle Christin, Associate Professor of Communication (and, by courtesy, Sociology), Richard E. Guggenhime Faculty Fellow, and HAI Senior Fellow at Stanford University. 
• AI for the Restoration and Analysis of Cultural Material by William Brent Seales, Stanley and Karen Pigman Chair of Heritage Science and Professor of Computer Science at the University of Kentucky. 

Angèle Christin and William Brent Seales join the Paris IAS as part of the Distinguished Fellowship programme developed in collaboration with the cluster PostGenAI@Paris.

PostGenAI@Paris : Based in the heart of Paris, this interdisciplinary and cross-sector consortium aims to develop ethical, inclusive and sovereign AI that is fully anchored in the major challenges of our time.

Friday November 6, 2026 

• Freedom and Order: The Science of Human Flourishing by Michele Gelfand, John H. Scully Professor of Cross-Cultural Management and Professor of Organizational Behavior at the Stanford Graduate School of Business School and Professor of Psychology by Courtesy. 

Friday February 5, 2027 

• A reflection on the sociology of time to deepen our understanding of the societal costs of living with a medical condition by Gerardine Doyle, Pharmacologist, Chartered Accountant and international interdisciplinary researcher, Former Dean of the UCD Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School and Associate Dean of the UCD College of Business.

Friday March 5, 2027 

• With or Without You: A Literature Review on Human–Chemical Relations in the Americas by Johana Kunin, Social Anthropologist and Researcher at Universidad de San Martín, Argentina.
• Arborocentrism at the Golden Gate: What the World can Learn from the Tribulations of Tree-Planting in San Francisco by Diana K. Davis, Geographer and Veterinarian, Professor of History and Geography at the University of California, Davis.
• Between border and fallacies: the management of migration in the Americas by Silvia Elena Giorguli Saucedo, Sociologist and Demographer, Professor at the Center for Demographic, Urban, and Environmental Studies (CEDUA) at El Colegio de México and is a member of El Colegio Nacional.
• The Food Socioscope in discussion with food and transition studies experts by Helga Nowotny, Professor Emerita of Science and Technology Studies, ETH Zurich, Founding Member and Former President of the European Research Council.

Friday April 2, 2027 

• Towards a Theory of Symbiotic Socio-Economic Systems (SSS) by Benjamin Voyer, Professor in the department of Entrepreneurship at ESCP Business School, Scientific Director of the Cartier – ESCP – HEC Research Chair. 
• Risk and the Uncomfortable Reality of Poverty Traps by Christopher Barrett, agricultural and development economist at Cornell University, Stephen B. and Janice G. Ashley Professor of Applied Economics and Management, and International Professor of Agriculture at the Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management.
• Futures thinking in fragile contexts: Navigating hope and despair together by Rebecca Freeth, Senior Associate at Reos Partners. 

Friday May 7, 2027 

• Labels, stigma and policy: A proposal for a paradigm shift by Boaz Keysar, William Benton Professor in Psychology and the College and the Chair of the Cognition program at the University of Chicago.
• Reconstructing Jeux d’Esprit by Karin Kukkonen, Professor in Comparative Literature at the University of Oslo.
• Justice Before Peace? The Design, Architecture and Impacts of Transitional Justice during Armed Conflicts by Louise Mallinder, Professor of Law at Queen’s University Belfast and the Deputy Director of the Senator George J. Mitchell Institute for Global Peace, Security and Justice.

Friday June 4, 2027 

• Artificial Bodies, Naked Truths by Sabine Frühstück, Distinguished Professor and the Koichi Takashima Chair in Japanese Cultural Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
• Framework for Constructive Engagement in Divided Societies: Tools and Process Design Tips by Martha Maya Calle, Deputy Global Director at the Institute for Integrated Transitions (IFIT) and Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean. 
• Freedom through interdependence: A Humanistic Synthesis of Development in Complex Urban Societies by Luis Bettencourt, professor at the University of Chicago, Associate Faculty of the Department of Sociology and External Professor at the Santa Fe Institute and the Vienna Complexity Science Hub.
• Ground Truth: A Historical Sociology of Late Industrial Soils by Scott Frickel, Chair and Professor of Sociology and Core Faculty Fellow at the Institute for the Study of Environment and Society at Brown University