Michele Cardinali

Bio

Michele Cardinali is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Institute of Law, Politics, and Development (DIRPOLIS) at the Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies in Pisa, where he is currently leading a research project: “Trust in Technology: How to Assess and Improve RoboT-User Interaction in Elderly Care Integrating Ethical, Technical and Social Variables”. He is an adjunct professor at the University of Macerata, where he teaches a course in Moral Philosophy. He also teaches at Campus Ludes in Lugano, where he is an adjunct professor for courses in Bioethics and Humanities, and in Bioethics and Professional Ethics. In 2024, he obtained a PhD with honors in “Humanities and Technologies” from the University of Macerata, with a dissertation titled On Attention: Phenomenology and Ethics for the Doctor-Patient Relationship in the Digital Environment. In 2020, he earned a Master’s degree with honors in “Narrative Medicine, Communication, and Ethics of Care” from the Polytechnic University of Marche. In 2018, he graduated with honors with a Master’s degree in “Philosophical Sciences”, with a thesis titled The Oikonomia of Care: A Path through Seneca, Epictetus, and Marcus Aurelius. He was a scholarship fellow at the Italian Institute for Philosophical Studies in Naples. He is currently the editorial secretary for the series “Colloqui di Etica” published by Aracne. His international research experience includes time as a visiting scholar at the Institut de Recherche en Santé et Société (IRSS) at the Université Catholique de Louvain (Belgium), the Centre d’Éthique Médicale (CEM) at the Université Catholique de Lille (France), and at EOC Hospital in Lugano (Switzerland).

Research

His research interests include moral philosophy, phenomenology, hermeneutics, the concept of attention, ethics of care, narrative medicine, and the ethics of emerging technologies. He has explored the transformations affecting the doctor-patient relationship within digital health environments, and how new dimensions of ethical attentiveness and patient involvement arise through technological mediation. His research focuses on the ethical dimensions of clinical relationships, both in traditional and digital settings. In particular, he has investigated topics such as the concept of embodiment, the lived experience of health and illness, the clinical relationship, and how digitalization transforms the narrative dimension of the clinical encounter. He is currently studying the ethical role of Personal Care Robots in caregiving practices. He also pursues interests in literature and literary criticism, especially in relation to philosophical and ethical themes.

Publications

Cardinali, M. (2025). Come non mancare il presente. Elogio e criticità dell’attenzione nel progresso morale. In F. Abbate & G. Pintus (a cura di), Il progresso morale. Sfide, opportunità e prospettive future. (pp. 775-790). Inschibboleth Edizioni.

Boi, L., Massa, S. M., Reforgiato Recupero, D., Riboni, D., Alonso, R., Cardinali, M., Ricci, E., & Pirni, A. (in press). A companion robot platform for exploring technical and ethical aspects in elderly care. In Artificial Intelligence, Data, and Robotics: Foundations, Transformations, and Future Directions.

Ricci, E., Cardinali, M., & Pirni, A. (2025, in press). Humanizing healthcare: Re-imagining a comprehensive value sensitive design for care robots. Short paper accepted for the IX Congress of the National Group of Bioengineering.

Ricci, E., Cardinali, M., & Pirni, A. (2025, in press). AI-powered care robots for compassionate care: A value-sensitive approach to humanizing healthcare. Short paper accepted for the 23rd International Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Medicine (AIME 2025).

Cardinali, M. (2024). Nel tempo della fine. Curare, narrare, accompagnare. In L. Alici & D. Pagliacci (a cura di), Tempo della cura, cura del tempo. Del vivere e del morire (pp. 145–155). Mimesis.

Cardinali, M. (2023). Pratiche di cura e nuove tecnologie. Una questione di attenzione. In L. Alici & S. Bignotti (Eds.), Cura e narrazione. Tra filosofia e medicina. Humanitas, 78(2/23), 286–295.

Cardinali, M. (2020). Per una cura ordinata. Logica, fisica ed etica nella cura di sé stoica. In L. Alici & F. Miano (a cura di), L’etica nel futuro (pp. 109–120). Orthotes.