AI EthicsOndřej Veselý

Tomáš Kopeček

A recent study out of North Carolina State University also found that

asking software engineers to read a code of ethics does nothing to change their behavior.

So, what does?

Main Areas of InfluenceWhat we will investigate?

● Cognitive / discursive implications

● Cultural differences

● Technical possibilities

What is the goal?

● Broaden picture from EU to whole world● Identify some influences● Become aware of them in real-world

from developer to CEO● Create set of questions which should be

asked during AI/ML design to mitigate these problems

(Discursive) Framing● SkyNet - US, China, Doomsday...

● “Intelligence” is tolerable and better○ eased deployment of surveillance systems

○ less resistance against medical “advices”

● Less metaphors during time (brain == computer, AI is more ML, …)

Metaphors are often used for establishing field.

● Transhumanism h+

● AI wants to be not “artificial” and paternalistic → Superintelligence

Could there be any problem with language/framing?

“This is not just being picky about semantics. Anthropomorphic terms like ‘ethical’ and ‘humane’, when applied to machines, lead us to making more and more false attribution about robots further down the line. They act as linguistic Trojan horses that smuggle in a rich interconnected web of human concepts that are not part of a computer system or how it operates. Once the reader has accepted a seemingly innocent Trojan term, such as using ‘humane’ to describe a robot, it opens the gates to other meanings associated with the natural language use of the term that may have little or no intrinsic validity to what the computer program actually does.”

N. E. Sharkey

Mass Application / Cognitive Bias● Voice identification in TOEIC, 2018

○ 0,5 - 1%

○ ~ 35,000 denied visas

● Al-Qaeda courier identification in SKYNET○ 0.008%

○ ~ 15,000 “targets”

● Missing comparison in fuzzy areas○ Is Watson worse than average oncologist?

Could there be any problem with effect size bias?

AI and Religion“Yes, well, we need a new religion. A principal role of religion has been to rationalize death, since up until just now there was little else constructive we could do about it.”

“Once we saturate the matter and energy in the universe with intelligence, it will “wake up,” be conscious, and sublimely intelligent. That’s about as close to God as I can imagine.”

Ray Kurzweil

Religious Attitudes to AI (...and science)● Western - driven by monotheistic eschatology

○ Judaism - Kabbalah → golems (minyan, citizenship), ethnicism → genetic issues

○ Catholicism - Jesuits, Teilhard de Chardin, man vs. animal, embodiment

○ Mormonism - Transhumanism, (MTA), Science as salvation

○ Orthodox Church - Fyodorov, Tsiolkovskii

○ Islam - Sufism

● Eastern - no fear from science as a tool to end of the world○ Buddhism - Dalai Lama “stream of consciousness might actually enter into a computer”

○ Shintoism - Soul is in everything, Hatsune Miku

Cultural Differences● Self-driving cars (when we stopped using

‘autonomous’?)

○ Moral Machine

○ Moral car is probably unmarketable

● Obsession by AI as individuality

● Trust in “scientific” system

● Cutting-edge tech interests

● Uncanny valley

● Distance of developers vs. audience

Moral Machine● Autonomous vehicles● 40 million decisions● 233 countries

Moral Machine

Uncanny Valley

Could there be any problem with cultural acceptaptance?

Alchemy

“The computer programmer is a creator of universes for which he alone is the lawgiver. No playwright, no stage director, no emperor, however powerful, has ever exercised such absolute authority to arrange a stage or a field of battle and to command such unswervingly dutiful actors or troops.”

Joseph Weizenbaum

Creature - Anthropomorphization● Ethical machine - engineering ethics (deontology, consequenialism, virtue)● Kantian paradox● Genderized robots / interaction● Military / medicine

○ Stopping test after “hurting” robot○ Fishing with “fellow comrade”○ Transferring responsibility

● Christian God defined the material world as world without spirit.● Create superhuman, transhumanism, posthumanism, ...● game of life IS life for court

Could there be any problem with team structure?

What Questions Should I Ask?1. Where you are coming from

a. What culture?

b. Is team balanced?

2. Which customers you facing

a. What culture?

b. Are they homogenous?

3. Scale

a. What minorities you create?

b. What errors mean?

4. Frame

a. What is your internal framing?

b. What is customer framing?

c. What is public framing?

5. Don’t go easy way

a. Is it ethical decision or easiest one?