{"id":2139,"date":"2019-12-17T02:36:36","date_gmt":"2019-12-17T02:36:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kusuaks7\/?p=1744"},"modified":"2024-02-08T13:24:35","modified_gmt":"2024-02-08T13:24:35","slug":"can-artificial-intelligence-increase-our-morality","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.experfy.com\/blog\/ai-ml\/can-artificial-intelligence-increase-our-morality\/","title":{"rendered":"Can Artificial Intelligence Increase Our Morality?"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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Just as we define our technologies, they define us.<\/h2><\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tIn discussions of\u00a0AI<\/a>\u00a0ethics, there\u2019s a lot of talk of designing \u201cethical\u201d algorithms, those that produce behaviors we like. People have called for software that treats people\u00a0fairly<\/a>, that avoids violating\u00a0privacy<\/a>, that cedes to humanity decisions about who should\u00a0live and die<\/a>. But what about AI that benefits humans\u2019\u00a0morality<\/a>, our own capacity to behave virtuously?\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tThat\u2019s the subject of a talk on \u201cAI and Moral Self-Cultivation\u201d given last week by\u00a0Shannon Vallor<\/a>, a philosopher at Santa Clara University who studies technology and ethics. The talk was part of a meeting on \u201cCharacter, Social Connections and Flourishing in the 21st Century,\u201d hosted by Templeton World Charity Foundation, in Nassau, The Bahamas. (Full disclosure: I was the invited respondent for Vallor\u2019s talk, providing commentary and facilitating discussion, and TWCF paid for my travel.)\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tVallor painted a suspect picture of technology as it stands, noting several ways in which algorithms degrade our morality. Russian bots disrupt civil discourse online. YouTube recommendations facilitate our compunction to click on extremist content. Video games goad us into continued playing, feeding addictive behavior. Even well-meaning AI applications have potential dark sides, she said. Algorithms aimed at putting at-risk students back on track could conceivably increase\u00a0conformity<\/a>.\u00a0Therapy<\/a>\u00a0apps that give points for good behavior might make personal growth feel like a badge-harvesting grind. Social credit systems like that in China, or even more subtle systems of nudging, could make virtue feel inauthentic.\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tVallor noted a few successful efforts to temper our worse impulses. Some platform filter harmful content, and some phones lock people out after extended screen time. But she labeled these \u201cremedial efforts,\u201d meant to limit harms but not generate new benefits. Moreover, she pointed to three reasons morality-enhancing tech hasn\u2019t been a priority for Silicon Valley: There\u2019s no clear profit motive, modifying our behavior can seem paternalistic, and even deciding which behavior to encourage can stifle pluralism.\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tBut Vallor held out some hope. \u201cAre we really stuck between the Scylla of a digital Wild West, and the Charybdis of surrender to Orwellian digital overlords?\u201d she asked. \u201cI don\u2019t see why we must be.\u201d Here she cited the humanizing force of Fred Rogers, imagining the companionship of a virtual Mr. Rogers, or at least the types of apps he would have designed. \u201cAI systems could invite us to reflect privately upon the sort of person we think we are or want to be,\u201d she said, \u201cand then offer ways in which we might steer our actual choices more effectively in that desired direction.\u201d Of course, she cautioned, even a virtual Mr. Rogers would not be immune to the issues of fairness, accountability, and transparency that attend almost every other AI system.\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tAs I said at the meeting, I found Vallor\u2019s talk wise, insightful and beautifully written. I went on to mention a few near-term AI systems that enhance human\u00a0cooperation<\/a>, or at least coordination. Nicholas Christakis (who presented later at the meeting) has\u00a0shown<\/a>\u00a0that interspersing bots in social networks can help people solve puzzles that require coordination. In recent\u00a0research<\/a>, autonomous vehicles learned to reduce surrounding traffic in a simulation\u2014and could perhaps reduce road\u00a0rage<\/a>\u00a0in reality.\u00a0When<\/a>\u00a0Twitter bots call out racists, the racists use fewer slurs; Intel is similarly\u00a0teaching<\/a>\u00a0AI to call out hate speech in Reddit forums. And researchers have\u00a0developed<\/a>\u00a0a reinforcement learning algorithm that\u2019s better than people at eliciting cooperation from human partners in iterated prisoner\u2019s dilemma (as long as they think it\u2019s a person).\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tAnd while there aren\u2019t many apps that target morality specifically, moral development can result from broader interventions. Therapy apps improve users\u2019 mental health, and when we\u2019re well we can focus on being good. AI could also help people dedicate more facetime to each other by automating paperwork and other rote tasks. And\u00a0social robots<\/a>\u00a0have been known to improve the ability of\u00a0autistic<\/a>\u00a0children and\u00a0trauma<\/a>\u00a0survivors to open up to other people.\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tFor sure, designing technologies to encourage ethical behavior raises the question of which behaviors are ethical. Vallor noted that paternalism can preclude pluralism, but just to play devil\u2019s advocate I raised the argument for pluralism up a level and noted that some people support paternalism. Most in the room were from\u00a0WEIRD<\/a>\u00a0cultures\u2014Western, educated, industrialized, rich, democratic\u2014and so China\u2019s social credit system feels Orwellian, but many in China don\u2019t mind it.\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tThe biggest question in my mind after Vallor\u2019s talk was about the balance between self-cultivation and situation-shaping. Good behavior results from both character and\u00a0context<\/a>. To what degree should we focus on helping people develop a moral compass and fortitude, and to what degree should we focus on nudges and social platforms that make morality easy?\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tThe two approaches can also interact in interesting ways. Occasionally extrinsic rewards crowd out intrinsic drives: If you earn points for good deeds, you come to expect them and don\u2019t value goodness for its own sake. Sometimes, however, good deeds perform a\u00a0self-signaling<\/a>\u00a0function, in which you see them as a sign of character. You then perform more good deeds to remain consistent. Induced cooperation might also act as a social scaffolding for bridges of trust that can later stand on their own. It could lead to new setpoints of collective behavior, self-sustaining habits of interaction.\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tThere\u2019s a lot to speculate about. What\u2019s clear is that just as we define our technologies, they define us. All the more reason to think hard about where it\u2019s going\u2014and to involve psychologists and philosophers in the discussion.\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tThis article originally appeared in Psychology Today<\/a>.\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What about AI that benefits humans’ morality, our own capacity to behave virtuously? Designing technologies to encourage ethical behavior raises the question of which behaviors are ethical. To what degree should we focus on helping people develop a moral compass and fortitude, and to what degree should we focus on nudges and social platforms that make morality easy? What’s clear is that just as we define our technologies, they define us. AI systems could invite us to reflect privately upon the sort of person we think we are or want to be.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":693,"featured_media":3067,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[183],"tags":[97],"ppma_author":[3492],"class_list":["post-2139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ai-ml","tag-artificial-intelligence"],"authors":[{"term_id":3492,"user_id":693,"is_guest":0,"slug":"matthew-hutson","display_name":"Matthew Hutson","avatar_url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&r=g","user_url":"","last_name":"Hutson","first_name":"Matthew","job_title":"","description":"Matthew Hutson, Science & Technology Writer, is Author at Penguin Group USA. He is the author of The 7 Laws of Magical Thinking: How Irrational Beliefs Keep Us Happy, Healthy, and Sane (Penguin). He was also the News Editor at Psychology Today from 2006-2010."}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.experfy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.experfy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.experfy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.experfy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/693"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.experfy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2139"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.experfy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2139\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35907,"href":"https:\/\/www.experfy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2139\/revisions\/35907"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.experfy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3067"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.experfy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.experfy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.experfy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2139"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.experfy.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=2139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}