Ethical Considerations in the Design of Artificial Intelligence

John C. Havens * Mike Van der Loos * Alan Mackworth * John P. Sullins

#AIEthics

The Delight In The Data

Welcome and Introductions

Agenda

• Introductions

• John C. Havens

• Mike Van der Loos

• Alan Mackworth

• John Sullins

• Moderated Panelists Discussion

• Audience Q&A

• End#AIEthics

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IEEE Global Ethics Initiative

• Launched April 5, 2016

• Executive Committee of twelve global thought leaders in AI, autonomous tech, Ethics

• Eleven Committees featuring over eighty additional thought leaders from over twelve countries

• IEEE Staff/Society Involvement: Representatives from SA, TA, RAS, SSIT, Computer Society, IEEE P2040*

• AI Association Involvement: AAAI, EurAI, IJCAI

• Policy orgs represented: WEF, UN, FCC, Future of Privacy Forum*

• Companies represented include: IBM, EMC, Cisco, NXP, LucidAI, Google DeepMind*

• Academic Institutions represented include: University of Texas, TU Delft, University of British Columbia, Arizona State University, University of Washington, University of Cambridge, Duke University, Harvard University, MIT, Georgia Institute of Technology*

*Partial listing

05/02/2023 7

Committees:

• Executive Committee

• AI Ecosystem Mapping Committee

• General Principles and Guidance

• Legal Issues

• Affective Computing

• Safety and Beneficence of AGI and ASI

• Individual/Personal Data Control

• Economics of Machine Automation/Humanitarian Issues

• Methodologies to Guide Ethical Research, Design and Manufacturing

• How to Imbue Ethics/Values into AI

• Reframing Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems (LAWS)

• Global Initiative invited to have satellite meeting as part of Europe’s largest AI Conference

• Initiative Committees gather for first face-to-face meeting

• Initiative Committees bring Charter Language (Crowdsourced Code of Conduct) to event

• Committees Bring Standards Projects to Workshops (to submit to SA)

• Attendees at Workshops help iterate Language

• Attendees to Workshops provide feedback and vote on Projects

• Second face to face meeting at UT in March, 2017 before SXSW Conference

• Attendees evolve Charter 2.0 to Charter 3.0

• Charter available via Creative Commons License for good of technology community at large

• By March 2017, over Multiple Standards Projects will be recommended to SA as PARs

• At UT, Global Initiative announces its formation as an Alliance, global University partnerships

• Alliance iterates Charter annually via meetings around the world, creates Certifications/Workshops to implement Charter in multiple verticals, serves as an ongoing, global R&D Standards Pipeline for SA

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Mike Van der Loos

WHAT SHOULD A ROBOT DO? – A quest to develop interactive robots with ethics in mind

H.F. MACHIEL VAN DER LOOSELIZABETH A. CROFT

AJUNG MOON

THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIACOLLABORATIVE ADVANCED ROBOTICS AND INTELLIGENT SYSTEMS LAB

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HFM VAN DER LOOS

CARIS LAB

MAY 13, 2016

Collaborative Advanced Robotics and Intelligent Systems Lab

ELIZABETH A. CROFT

Elizabeth A. Croft Mike Van der Loos

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HFM VAN DER LOOS

ROBOTS ARE COMINGHUMAN-ROBOT COLLABORATION

CARIS lab, UBC (2010)

www.plasticsnews.com

Baxter, Rethink Robotics (2012)

MAY 13, 2016

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HFM VAN DER LOOS

ROBOETHICS

MAY 13, 2016

ETHICS APPLIED TO ROBOTICS

Roboethics

- Human ethics- Applied ethics adopted by

designers / manufacturers / users

- Code of conduct implemented in the artificial intelligence of robots

- Artificial ethics for robots to exhibit ethically acceptable behaviour

Roboethics Robot Ethics

- Morality of a hypothetical robot that is equipped with a conscience and freedom to choose its own actions

Robot’s Ethics

Fiorella Operto, Ethics in Advanced Robotics, 18 IEEE ROBOT. AUTOM. MAG. 72–78 (2011)

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HFM VAN DER LOOS

PROBLEM

MAY 13, 2016

What is right / wrong? Fair / unfair?

What should / ought a robot do?

Who knows the answers?

Design decision

Policy decisions

Technical implementations

Culture

ReligionContext

Philosophical stance

…

ANSWER

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HFM VAN DER LOOS

DEMOCRATIC APPROACH

MAY 13, 2016

OPEN ROBOETHICS INITIATIVE (ORI)

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HFM VAN DER LOOS

WHO WE ARE

MAY 13, 2016

INTRODUCING THE MEMBERS

Jason Millar

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HFM VAN DER LOOS

AUTONOMOUS CARS

MAY 13, 2016

STUDYING WHAT PEOPLE THINKA total of 10 polls and 766 responses on autonomous cars polls since April 25, 2014

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HFM VAN DER LOOS

AUTONOMOUS CARS

MAY 13, 2016

Image by: Craig Berry

Continue straight and kill the child

64%

Swerve and kill the passenger (you)

36%

If you find yourself as the passenger of the tunnel problem, how should the car react?

N=113. Analyzed on June 22, 2014

Difficult24%

Moderately difficult28%

Easy48%

How hard was it for you to answer the Tunnel Problem question?

N=116. Analyzed on June 22, 2014

Passenger 44%

Lawmakers33%

Other12%

Manufacturer / designer

12%

Who should determine how the car responds to the Tunnel Problem?

N=113. Analyzed on June 22, 2014

STUDYING WHAT PEOPLE THINK

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HFM VAN DER LOOS

A DEMONSTRATION

MAY 13, 2016

IMPLEMENTING PEOPLE’S DECISIONS

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HFM VAN DER LOOS

CONCLUSIONTAKE HOME MESSAGES

MAY 13, 2016

PROBLEM:What should a

robot do? Public acceptance & design decisions

Democratic approach to moral decisions

Delegating decision making to atomic

interactions

Human-Robot Interaction (HRI)

Roboethics

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HFM VAN DER LOOS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS CARIS Lab ICICS UBC Dept. of Mechanical Engineering CFI NSERC Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarships

MAY 13, 2016

CONTACT INFORMATION:Mike Van der Loos, Ph.D., P.Eng.Assoc. Prof., Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, UBC6250 Applied Science LaneVancouver, BC V6T 1Z4 CANADAphone: +1-604-827-4479email: vdl@mech.ubc.caweb: http://mech.ubc.ca/machiel-van-der-loos/research: http://caris.mech.ubc.ca; http://rreach.mech.ubc.caOri: http://www.openroboethics.org

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Alan Mackworth

Trusted Artificial Autonomous AgentsAlan Mackworth

• New ontological category: Artificial Autonomous Agents (AAAs)• Q: Can we trust them? • A: No!• Q: Why not? • A: E.g. ‘Deep Learning’: opaque, with massive, inaccessible training sets• Ethical agents have to be trustworthy• Need new methods to build trusted, ethical agents • Ensure AAAs values are aligned with users’ and society’s values

Five Approaches to Building Trusted Agents

1. Formal methods for specification and verification

2. Hierarchical constraint-based modular architectures

3. Inferring human values: e.g. inverse reinforcement learning

4. Semi-autonomy, human in the loop

5. Participatory Action Design: user-centered with Wizard of Oz techniques

What We NeedAny ethical discussion presupposes we (and agents) can:

• Model agent structure and functionality

• Predict consequences of agent commands and actions

• Impose constraints on agent actions such as goal reachability, safety and liveness (absence of deadlock and livelock)

• Determine if an agent satisfies those constraints (almost always)

Formal Methods to Build Trustworthy AAAs

To show that implementation satisfies specification, we need a tripartite theory:

1. Language to express agent structure and dynamics

2. Language for constraint-based specifications

3. Method to determine if an agent will (be likely to) satisfy its specifications, connecting 1 to 2

A Constraint-Based Agent (CBA)

CBA Structure

Constraint Solver

Formal Methods for Agent Verification

The CBA framework consists of:

1. Constraint Net (CN) → system modelling

2. Timed -automata → behavior specification

3. Model-checking and Liapunov methods → behavior verification

A

(Zhang & Mackworth, 1993, …)

Hierarchical Modular CBA in CN

← CBA Structure

↑Control Synthesis with Prioritized Constraints

Constraint1 > Constraint2 > Constraint3

>

Artificial Semi-autonomous Agents (ASAs)

• Keep human(s) in the loop• Shared autonomy at the higher control levels• Provide ‘sliders’ for users to adjust autonomy levels• Not one size fits all• Case study: smart wheelchairs for cognitively and physically impaired

older adults

Docking and Back-in Parking Assistance Driving Scenario at Long Term Care Facility

Shared Autonomy Wheelchair Control Modes Level 1: Basic safety by limiting speed

Level 2: Level 1 + non-intrusive steering guidance

Level 3: Level 1 + intrusively turning away from obstacles

Level 4: Completely autonomous

The Wizard [Baum, 1900]

Systems developed using user-centered Participatory Action Design methodology and Wizard of Oz techniques

Closing Thoughts• More R&D on building trusted AAAs and ASAs required • Formal specification and verification of AAAs needed• Governments lack technical expertise to develop standards• Lack of effective global standards bodies with enforcement • Regulatory capture: power of corporations to fend off regulation• Poor education of AI scientists & roboticists in morals and ethics • AI singularity & superintelligence hype overshadows real concerns• See One Hundred Year Study of AI https://ai100.stanford.edu

Thanks to: Y. Zhang, P. Viswanathan, A. Mihailidis, B. Adhikari, I. Mitchell, J. Little, …. Contact: mack@cs.ubc.ca @AlanMackworth URL: http://www.cs.ubc.ca/~mack

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John P. Sullins

John P. SullinsProfessor of PhilosophySonoma State University

Embedded Ethics Design for AI and Robotics• Building workable solutions requires many disciplines to work

together• When it is working well, philosophy is a big picture discipline and it

has much to offer in our quest of building beneficial AI and robotics applications

• Especially in the area of ethics and the design of artificial moral agents

Bryant Walker Smith• Lawyers and Engineers Should Speak the S

ame Robot Language, Bryant Walker Smith, 2015

• Each application has many uses• Actual• Legal• Reasonable• Use intended by the designer

• “An open question is the extent to which product design should attempt to confine actual uses to those that are legal, reasonable, or intended.”

Ethical DesignI recommend we add ethical use to the list of potential uses as well

A-Actual Use

B-Reasonable Use

C-Intended Use

D-Legal Use

E-Ethical Use

Actual Use

Reasonable use

Intended UseLegal Use

Ethical Use

Ethics Applied to AI and Robotics

Image from: Are Deontological Moral Judgements Rationalizations?

Some problems• Classical Ethics is only

concerned with human agency

• What is the best ethical system to apply?• No science is ever truly

finished so the science of ethics will not result in one unified theory either

A Helpful Alternative• The following discussions can be

distracting• Egoism vs Altruism

• Self interest vs Benevolence• Free Will vs Determinism

• Responsibility

• Morality has roots in evolution• Ethics is a tool or instrument

that we use to design new forms of beneficial behavior

American Pragmatist Philosopher:1859-1952

Three Active Areas of AI Ethics Research

Embedded Ethics Design• The "...engineer, carries on the great

part of his work without consciously asking himself whether his work is going to benefit himself or someone else. He is interested in the work itself; such objective interest is a condition of mental and moral health.... Nevertheless, there are occasions when conscious reference to the welfare of others is imperative." Dewey, Ethics 1935.

• We need embedded ethics professionals at the level of the design team

• To meet the needs for engineers who must focus on their work

• And for the organization that employs them to pay appropriate concern to the ethical impacts of their work

• This can take the form of consultants but it would be best to have some of the designers trained in values sensitive design

• Their job is to find the areas of ethical concern in a design and suggest constructive means for mitigating problems in the design stage

• This prevents the approach we often see• release-disaster-beg forgiveness

• Since embedded ethicists might be susceptible to something like the Stockholm syndrome, we must also have ethics review boards

AI and Robotics Ethics BoardsShort term ethical concerns are met by creating a dialog that follows these steps

1. Identify the ethical concerns raised by the new technology.

a. Anticipate consequences. Create proactive ethics rather than merely reactive ones.

b. Enhance the standard model IRB and replace it with one that fosters embedded ethicists in the design groups that closely work with them and help foster a community of practice around ethical deliberation.

2. Vet the overall design strategy of the organization.

a. Define the ethical goals—what does the organization want to craft as its legacy?

3. Help operationalize the ethical code of the organization as it is applied to AI and robotic projects and update this code as new challenges are resolved.4. Keep a repository of these deliberations to facilitate future discussions

Artificial Ethical/Moral Agents (AEA, AMA)• Artificial Practical Wisdom

• Virtues for robots• Security• Integrity• Accessibility• Ethical trust

• Functional moral sensibility• Accurate choice of ethical actions and

goals• Context sensitive• Accurate ranking of exemplar cases

and reasoning

For More InformationApplied Professional Ethics for the Reluctant Roboticist. Open Robotics, 2015

Ethics Boards for Research in Robotics and Artificial Intelligence: Is it Too Soon to Act? Chapter 5 in Social Robots: Boundaries, Potential, Challenges, edited by Marco Nørskov, Ashgate

Q&A – Ethics in AI

John C. HavensJohn.Havens.US@ieee.org

@johnchavensjohnchavens.com

Alan Mackworth mack@cs.ubc.ca @AlanMackworth

http://www.cs.ubc.ca/~mack

Mike Van der Loos vdl@mech.ubc.ca

http://mech.ubc.ca/machiel-van-der-loos/

John Sullinsjohn.Sullins@Sonoma.edu,

sonoma.academia.edu/JohnSullins

Thank you.