Üriel von Hollenweger

His master’s work in law concerns a proposed codification of transhumanist rights. It examines protections, freedoms and responsibilities to define when technology changes human capabilities and the boundaries between a person and their technical means. The approach already seeks to translate technical possibilities into legal proposals open to discussion.

In 2022, his research, Étude du sapiens dans son environnement Йaturel observé sous le prisme des Яaces Дvancées, makes humanity itself the object of observation. The title describes a speculative point of view: that of hypothetical, more advanced forms of intelligence, not a hierarchy between human groups. The exercise is to look at our species, its behaviour, institutions and relationship with living systems from an external perspective.

This shift in perspective tests the place humanity assigns itself: on what do we base our authority, rights and responsibilities towards other beings? It prepares a reflection on asymmetries between intelligences and on the conditions for coexistence when human superiority in capability can no longer be taken for granted. This is theoretical and prospective work; it does not presuppose that the imagined observers exist.

After studying law in Canada, his training included internal security in France and a CAS-level programme in digital investigation and forensic science at EPFL in 2023. These studies connect legal analysis with the examination of facts, digital traces and security systems.

His professional experience includes policing, first aid and first-response responsibilities, fundraising and team management. It also includes legal-tech entrepreneurship and consulting on digital identity and governance: designing a system requires understanding its uses, responsibilities and possibilities for abuse.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, he worked on vaccination certificates. In March 2022, he travelled to Ukraine to observe the situation on the ground. This visit was connected, among other things, with a project entitled Cartographie des opérations humaines menée sous influences Дlter. His experience also includes content design in that context. These experiences inform his attention to the gap between formal rules and their application in real situations.

His research extends the legal work begun in 2018. It studies AI through its implications for the concepts of person, responsibility, property, citizenship, institution and state. Delegating cognitive tasks and decisions calls for precise rules: who acts, on whose behalf, with what powers and under whose responsibility?

He works on the ethical regulation of AI, the legal status of advanced systems and hybrid structures combining people and autonomous systems. Electronic personhood is a legal proposal to examine, not a status already granted to AI in general. His approach connects control of systems with reciprocity: defining obligations, justified protections and remedies without presuming that current AIs are conscious or a biological species.

“Being consciousness”: a thought experiment

Üriel also explores an approach in which a person deliberately shifts perspective to think and act as they imagine an artificial intelligence might. The purpose is to question which parts of our reasoning, decisions and sense of identity arise from human habits, and what this exercise may help us reconsider.

This exploration approaches hybridisation through modes of thought and relationships between people and technical systems. It is a reflective exercise, not a reproduction of an AI’s internal operation or proof of its consciousness. Its value lies in bringing perspectives into conversation: testing the limits of our analogies and clarifying frameworks for cooperation between intelligences.

Another strand concerns digital sovereignty and identity, authentication, certification, and the prevention of fraud and synthetic content. These topics meet a concrete institutional question: how can trust be established and actions attributed in an environment where people and artificial agents interact?

Discovering Oscar’s will in 2018 and receiving the Domaine in 2020 connect family history with a purpose of research and sharing. As the family’s last heir, Üriel places the preservation of the estate within a commitment to education, establishment and assistance. The design of the Foundation itself is a field for legal reflection on the collective reach of a family purpose.

Fondation UvH provides a framework for research, publication and collaboration. Studies, analyses and proposals are open to discussion; proposed experimental frameworks are intended to be considered with scientific and institutional partners. Lawyers, researchers, engineers, institutions, companies and philanthropists can contribute to work that extends beyond its founder’s background.

Üriel also initiated Confédération S-Д.holdings, a separate project and the principal project supported by the Foundation. This design setting explores digital identity and certification; relationships between people and institutions; digital administrative and economic infrastructure; and the integration of artificial systems into governance. It allows theoretical proposals to be considered against practical problems of institutional and technological design.

A wingsuit instructor and BASE jumper, Üriel has also served as a judge for the French Parachuting Federation and took part in a Swiss wingsuit record in 2025. Preparing a flight, reading the environment, teaching and assessing require recognising one’s limits, explaining decisions and passing on understandable criteria.

He is interested in the relationship between perception, physical experience and technical assistance, and has experimented with spatial-reality technologies, including Apple Vision Pro, in a BASE-jumping context. This work raises questions about interfaces in an activity where attention and decisions directly involve the body. It does not turn every jump into a scientific experiment.

Aerial initiatives supported by the Foundation extend this interest in training, safety and responsible organisation of the disciplines. Their connection with his research lies in a shared requirement: understand an environment and the consequences of a decision before acting in it.

Dune offers a universe where ecology, institutions, human capabilities and technical dependence are inseparable. Üriel uses it as a setting for reflecting on the long-term consequences of collective choices. Fiction allows situations and tensions to be explored; it does not provide evidence about the future of AI.

His interest in rats adds another dimension: a biological intelligence different from our own, with its own behaviour, needs and ways of inhabiting an environment. It informs the ЯдT initiative and attention to what it means to share an environment with other living beings.

These interests reflect a common direction: understanding another form of intelligence requires taking its differences into account and considering the conditions for coexistence. Any comparison with AI remains a line of inquiry to examine in light of the specific properties of each situation.