Can machines be moral agents?

Tue 30 April 2019

St Edmund's College

Faraday Institute Seminar given by Prof. Nigel Crook

Abstract

The recent rapid and widespread deployment of AI and robotic systems across a broad range of application domains has raised considerable ethical concern in both public and academic arenas. This concern ranges from fears about the ethical consequences of creating so-called ‘super- intelligence’ to anxiety about the ability of autonomous vehicles to make the ‘right’ moral choice of who to kill in the conventional ‘trolley problem’ scenario. In this talk I will explore the motivations for developing machines with moral competence and outline some current approaches. I will briefly present a theological perspective on human moral agency and discuss the extent to which this might be applied to machines and explore some issues relating to moral agency.

Cost: Free