John's Research
My research focuses on issues in cognitive science and AI ethics. I have published empirical work on technology accepatance and philosophical work on ethical AI, epistemic agency, and metacognition. Below are my publications and videos of two of my talks, one on AI ethics and another on metacognition.
Talk on AI Ethics
Why AI Cannot be Trustworthy
Why AI Cannot be Trustworthy
Talk on Metacognition:
Embodied Entanglement
Embodied Entanglement
Talk given at Dresden University (Sep, 2023)
Start at 02:40 // Talk given at UCL: Consciousness Club (Dec, 2022)
Publications
Dorsch, J. (forthcoming, awaiting publication). Mindshaping and AI: Will Mindshaping a Robot Create an Artificial Person? Zawidzki, T. (Ed.) Handbook of Mindshaping. Routledge.
Dorsch, J. (forthcoming: accepted, awaiting reviewer feedback). Why AI Cannot Be a Bona Fide Moral Agent (Yet): Trustworthiness, Moral Normativity, and Giving a Damn. American Philosophical Quarterly.
Dorsch, J. (under contract for publication). The Origin and Future of Self-Knowledge: Epistemic Agency, 4E Metacognition, and Artificial Intelligence. Springer Nature: Studies in Brain and Mind.
Dorsch, J. & Moll, M. (forthcoming, awaiting publication). Explainable AI for Decision Support Systems: The Theory of Epistemic Quasi-Partnerships. Müller, Vincent C.; Dewey, Aliya R; Dung, Leonard and Löhr, Guido (eds.), Philosophy of Artificial Intelligence: The State of the Art. Pre-Print (APA): https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2409.14839
Dorsch, J., & Deroy, O. (2025). The impact of labeling automotive AI as trustworthy or reliable on user evaluation and technology acceptance. Nature Scientific Reports, 15, 1481. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-025-85558-2
Dorsch, J. (2024). Epistemic and Moral Agency in a Crisis of Trust? International Journal of Philosophical Studies. https://doi.org/10.1080/09672559.2024.2437269
Dorsch, J., & Deroy, O. (2024). Quasi-Metacognitive Machines: Why We Don’t Need Morally Trustworthy AI and Communicating Reliability is Enough. Philosophy & Technology, 37, 62. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13347-024-00752-w
Dorsch, J. (2024). Can You See a Ganzfeld? International Journal of Philosophical Studies. https://doi.org/10.1080/09672559.2024.2360782
Dorsch, J. (2023). Are Noetic Feelings Embodied? The Case for Embodied Metacognition. Philosophical Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1080/09515089.2023.2197937
Dorsch, J. (2022). Hijacking Epistemic Agency: How Emerging Technologies Threaten our Wellbeing as Knowers. Proceedings of the AAAI and ACM on Artificial Intelligence, Ethics, and Society, 5. https://doi.org/10.1145/3514094.3539537
Dorsch, J. (2022). Embodied Metacognition: How we feel our hearts to know our minds. Doctoral Dissertation, University of Edinburgh. Edinburgh Research Archive. https://dx.doi.org/10.7488/era/2763
De Preester, H. & Dorsch, J. (2021). Descartes’s Passions of the Soul, Epistemic Affect and the Challenges for Interoception Research in Emotions. Danish Yearbook of Philosophy, 54 (1), 65-92. https://doi.org/10.1163/24689300-bja10021
Dorsch, J. (2018). Prescribing Proficiency: Ethical Medical Practice in English-Speaking Contexts. German American Institute (DAI), Tübingen. (Course book for teaching cultural competency and ethical medical practices in patient encounters, published by the DAI and actively used in their curriculum).
Dorsch, J. (2017). On Experiencing Meaning: Irreducible Cognitive Phenomenology and Sinewave Speech. Phenomenology and Mind 12, 218-227. https://doi.org/10.13128/PHE_MI-21120
Dorsch, J. (2016). Irreducible Cognitive Phenomenology and the 'Aha!' Experience. Phenomenology and Mind 10, 108-121. https://doi.org/10.13128/PHE_MI-20095