Ethics for AI and Robotics

Potential deployments of AI and intelligent robots raise ethical questions about the impacts they may have on human well-being, just like other powerful tools or technologies such as nuclear power or genetic engineering.

Unlike other technologies, intelligent robots and other AIs have the potential to act, and to be considered, as members of our society. Since they will make their own decisions about the actions they take, it is appropriate for humans to expect them to behave ethically. This requires AI research with the goal of understanding the structure, content, and purpose of ethical knowledge, well enough to implement ethics in artificial agents.

What To Read First

The following four papers (2018, 2020, 2022, 2023) describe my current thinking about AI and ethics. They are best read in that sequence, though each is self-contained. The 2022 paper is the most interdisciplinary and scholarly. The 2012 paper introduced the idea of considering corporate entities as AIs.

All Papers


BJK