Automatic Pain Detection or the Evidential Paradigm Reversed

In this chapter, I discuss portable technologies for automatic pain detection. This is the case with the Federal Ministry of Education and Research LOUISA project in which I am currently involved at the University of Tübingen. LOUISA is an acronym for “learning model for multidimensional quantitative movement analysis.” The aim of the project is to develop a digital technology (an app for smartphones and smartwatches) for the automatic detection of pain through a multidimensional analysis of signs, or rather signals, traces, or clues of pain: artificial intelligence (AI)-driven analysis of emotions through facial movements, AI-driven analysis of body movements, electromyography, etc. My hypothesis is that by favoring the external or superficial traces of pain over the patient’s words and narratives, these digital technologies risk preventing the development of “intelligent habits.”