"Ethical Artificial Intelligence?"

When we have yet to even get to consistently ethical human intelligence?

Two (of four) of my current book reads. Stay tuned. Timely, important material.

 Note: Henceforth you are able to click on book cover images to go straight to their respective purchase info sites in a new browser window (usually Amazon). 

For openers, succinctly on "ethics."

Ethics

The field of ethics (or moral philosophy) involves systematizing, defending, and recommending concepts of right and wrong behavior. Philosophers today usually divide ethical theories into three general subject areas: metaethics, normative ethics, and applied ethics. Metaethics investigates where our ethical principles come from, and what they mean. Are they merely social inventions? Do they involve more than expressions of our individual emotions? Metaethical answers to these questions focus on the issues of universal truths, the will of God, the role of reason in ethical judgments, and the meaning of ethical terms themselves. Normative ethics takes on a more practical task, which is to arrive at moral standards that regulate right and wrong conduct. This may involve articulating the good habits that we should acquire, the duties that we should follow, or the consequences of our behavior on others. Finally, applied ethics involves examining specific controversial issues, such as abortion, infanticide, animal rights, environmental concerns, homosexuality, capital punishment, or nuclear war.

Notwithstanding my long (albeit late-blooming) white-collar career in a variety of tech disciplines, my field of grad study was squarely in the domain of "applied ethics." My MA is in "Ethics & Policy Studies," an interdisciplinary gumbo of applied ethics ("moral philosophy"), PolySci, Jurisprudence/ConLaw, and Econ, all applied to a policy topic of interest.

So, this kind of stuff is intrinsically of interest to me.

UPDATE

Amazon's AI certainly has my number. Touted just now in my inbox:

“[Coleman] argues that the algorithms of machine learning — if they are instilled with human ethics and values — could bring about a new era of enlightenment.” —San Francisco Chronicle

The Age of Intelligent Machines is upon us, and we are at a reflection point. The proliferation of fast-moving technologies, including forms of artificial intelligence akin to a new species, will cause us to confront profound questions about ourselves. The era of human intellectual superiority is ending, and we need to plan for this monumental shift.

A Human Algorithm: How Artificial Intelligence Is Redefining Who We Are examines the immense impact intelligent technology will have on humanity. These machines, while challenging our personal beliefs and our socioeconomic world order, also have the potential to transform our health and well-being, alleviate poverty and suffering, and reveal the mysteries of intelligence and consciousness. International human rights attorney Flynn Coleman deftly argues that it is critical that we instill values, ethics, and morals into our robots, algorithms, and other forms of AI. Equally important, we need to develop and implement laws, policies, and oversight mechanisms to protect us from tech’s insidious threats.

To realize AI’s transcendent potential, Coleman advocates for inviting a diverse group of voices to participate in designing our intelligent machines and using our moral imagination to ensure that human rights, empathy, and equity are core principles of emerging technologies. Ultimately, A Human Algorithmis a clarion call for building a more humane future and moving conscientiously into a new frontier of our own design.

A groundbreaking narrative on the urgency of ethically designed AI and a guidebook to reimagining life in the era of intelligent technology."

I'm gonna go broke buying books to study. I don't get paid for these rants. Gonna have to find a gig to continue to fund this Jones.

WHO IS FLYNN COLEMAN?

I have a question for Counselor Coleman:

"Assuming / Despite / If / Then / Therefore / Else..." Could AI do "argument analysis?"

e.g., "NLU"--Natural Language Understanding. I remain dubious. But, it's a moving target.

ANOTHER READ TO CONSIDER

...The demonstrated power of artificial intelligence has, in the last few years, led to massive media exposure and commentary. Countless news articles, books, documentary films and television programs breathlessly enumerate AI’s accomplishments and herald the dawn of a new era. The result has been a sometimes incomprehensible mixture of careful, evidence-based analysis, together with hype, speculation and what might be characterized as outright fear-mongering. We are told that fully autonomous self-driving cars will be sharing our roads in just a few years—and that millions of jobs for truck, taxi and Uber drivers are on the verge of vaporizing. Evidence of racial and gender bias has been detected in certain machine learning algorithms, and concerns about how AI-powered technologies such as facial recognition will impact privacy seem well-founded. Warnings that robots will soon be weaponized, or that truly intelligent (or superintelligent) machines might someday represent an existential threat to humanity, are regularly reported in the media. A number of very prominent public figures—none of whom are actual AI experts—have weighed in. Elon Musk has used especially extreme rhetoric, declaring that AI research is “summoning the demon” and that “AI is more dangerous than nuclear weapons.” Even less volatile individuals, including Henry Kissinger and the late Stephen Hawking, have issued dire warnings. 

The purpose of this book is to illuminate the field of artificial intelligence—as well as the opportunities and risks associated with it—by having a series of deep, wide-ranging conversations with some of the world’s most prominent AI research scientists and entrepreneurs. Many of these people have made seminal contributions that directly underlie the transformations we see all around us; others have founded companies that are pushing the frontiers of AI, robotics and machine learning...

Ford, Martin. Architects of Intelligence: The truth about AI from the people building it (p. 2). Packt Publishing. Kindle Edition.

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More to come...