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Robot Ethics: Fantasy or Necessity?| old_uid | 4360 |
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| title | Robot Ethics: Fantasy or Necessity? |
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| start_date | 2008/03/19 |
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| schedule | 16h |
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| online | no |
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| summary | Considered as tools, robots don't really raise special ethical issues. But when we consider them as potential persons, we may have to face up to some more radical ways of understanding robot ethics. First, we need to consider our potential responsibilities towards the robots themselves. Second, we need to think about the potential responsibilities of robots towards us (and no doubt towards each other).
Some would say that to talk of robots as moral agents in their own right is to engage in fantasy. On this view non-organic artificial agents will never have the kinds of autonomy or consciousness that would be necessary to qualify them as members of the moral community – either as targets of moral concern from humans, or as responsible moral actors in their own right.
But there is a contrasting view. The likely multiplication of autonomous robots – in industrial production, on battlefields, in public places, in homes, and so on – means that within a short while they may be making decisions and occupying roles which would certainly have deep moral import if humans were taking such decisions and roles. Perhaps, on this view, there is a need to develop, not just external controls on robot actions, but internal moral self-direction in the robots themselves. If this were so, then building ethical responsibility into robots will be not just a desideratum but a necessity. This could require radical rethinking of social relations.
In this talk I'll present the two sides of this picture and try to unravel some of the conceptual complexities in this area.
Steve Torrance is Emeritus Professor in Cognitive Science at Middlesex University, and a visiting Senior Research Fellow at the University of Sussex. He teaches part-time at Sussex and at Goldsmiths. He has interests in computational and enactive approaches to cognitive science and consciousness, and he has a particular interest in the conceptual and ethical foundations of artificial personhood. He has recently edited journal issues on machine consciousness, ethics and artificial agents, and enactive experience. |
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| responsibles | Bishop |
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