EECS 690

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EECS 690

• April 9

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A top-down approach

• This approach is meant to generate a rule set
  from one or more specific ethical theories.
• Wallach and Allen start off pessimistic about the
  viability of this approach, but point out that
  adherence to rules is an aspect of morality that
  must still be captured.

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The Big Picture Theories (in Western thought)

• Utilitarianism
• Deontology
• What will be the authors questions about these
  theories is what the computability requirements
  would be for each. This approach may shed a
  unique light on the practice of morality itself.

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Consequentialism

• Utilitarianism (a subset of consequentialism)
  might initially appeal to us because of Benthams
  focus on calculability.
• James Gips, in 1995, supplied this list of
  computational requirements for a consequentialist
  robot
• A way of describing the situation in the world
• A way of generating possible actions
• A means of predicting the situation that would
  result if an action were taken given the current
  situation
• A method of evaluating a situation in terms of
  its goodness or desirability

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Some difficulties

• How can one assign numbers to something as
  subjective as happiness?
• Do we aim for total or average happiness?
• What are the morally relevant features of any
  given situation? (People, animals, ecosystems?)
• How far/wide should the calculation of effect go?
• How much time is a moral agent allowed to devote
  to the decision-making process?
• Note that these are not only problems generated
  while thinking about the computability of moral
  theories, they are problems that concern peoples
  application of these moral theories, and they are
  issues that have not been widely settled, and not
  for lack of discussion.

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A note

• The authors do a good job of avoiding the
  question how do humans do this? when discussing
  ethical algorithms and behaviors. It may well be
  that general human behavior is not a good model
  to emulate for ethical systems.
• This raises the question of what standard to hold
  ethical systems to. Do we tolerate the same
  range of moral failure among these systems? These
  are questions that might fit here, but for the
  sake of organization are addressed later in the
  book.

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Asimovs Laws of Robotics

• A robot may not injure a human being or, through
  inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
• A robot must obey orders given it by human beings
  except where such orders would conflict with the
  First Law
• A robot must protect its own existence as long as
  such protection does not conflict with the First
  or Second Laws.
• (Later, a Zeroth law was added A robot may not
  harm humanity, or, by inaction, allow humanity to
  come to harm)

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Laws of Robotics

• Asimov was really serious about this, and was (I
  think foolishly) optimistic about the usefulness
  of robotic laws as stated. (Asimovs short essay
  on the robotic laws forthcoming on the Further
  Resources section)
• This doesnt fit with consequentialist theories
  very well because of its reliance on special
  duties
• The zeroth law is hopelessly vague for an
  action-guiding principle, and the first law alone
  can generate conflicts.
• There may be a real pressing difficulty with
  negative responsibility

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Specific versus Abstract

• Specific rules are very easy to apply, but have
  limited usefulness in novel situations. Still,
  perhaps part of what ethical systems require is a
  few specific rules for specific circumstances,
  though these alone would not be sufficient.
• Abstract rules are more generally useful, as they
  allow adaptation, but are correspondingly
  difficult to apply.

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The Categorical Imperative

• Act only as you could will that your maxim become
  universal law.
• A computer would need to appreciate
• a goal
• a maxim (a behavior-guiding means to the goal)
• an understanding of the implications for
  achievement of the goal by making the maxim
  universal
• Lying, for example, could not be a universal law,
  because its goals would be thwarted by its being
  universalized. (This provides a problem,
  according to critics of Kant.)

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Language vagueness and morality

• Our language is full of words that are vague but
  that have clear applications and misapplications.
  (e.g. baldness is a vague concept, but Captain
  Picard IS bald, and the members of the band ZZ
  Top are not)
• Perhaps by focusing on the clear applications of
  moral rules, we might achieve something useful
  for the less clear cases.