ETHICS
58 determines that one person dies to save five people , which would be considered the ‘ correct ’ ethical decision , does that mean they are not liable for the death of that one person ? Until we get AI determining legal cases in their entirety , every decision that is made by AI will ultimately be determined by human beings : judges , lawyers and juries .”
For Pardoe , the blame rests squarely with the user . “ In the same way that it ’ s the person who pulls the trigger of the gun is ultimately responsible for shooting someone and not the gun manufacturer , there has to be significant responsibility with the entity who is the user of the AI application .”
But he makes an important distinction , that “ as an industry we have an ethical responsibility to ensure we can control and limit the use of such technologies , for specific applications , in a way that is acceptable to the general public and limits the risk to the reputation of the technologies themselves .”
It ’ s a dilemma of the AI ethics debate that , clouded by poor judgement as humans are , machines could make better ethical decisions , yet cannot unbind
“ The person who pulls the trigger of the gun is ultimately responsible for shooting someone and not the gun manufacturer ”
— Prof Andy Pardoe , Founding & Managing Partner , Pardoe Ventures
themselves from a legal framework built around human fallibility .
Holder and Giles say , “ The issue is with us rather than the AI – we would prefer to ask a person to do what they feel is right , which is something that a machine using AI simply cannot do . It remains a machine , not a human being and so it is incapable of ‘ emotion ’ in the true human sense and is incapable of having an ‘ ethical view ’.
“ A machine using AI cannot , therefore , reach a ‘ correct ’ ethical answer to [ Judith Jarvis Thomson ’ s famous ethics survey ] the trolley problem and it remains a human imperative to construct autonomous machines that react to the data around them , in accordance with current ethical and regulatory standards .”
DECEMBER 2020