The Ethics of Artificial Intelligence: Principles, Challenges, and Opportunities

The Ethics of Artificial Intelligence discusses the meta-theoretical goal of reconciling agency and intelligence in AI, exploring the ethical implications of this divorce and investigating the potential risks and benefits of AI. It also focuses on the design, development, and deployment of AI for social good, the impact of AI on the environment, and the possibility of using AI to support the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

Format: Hardback
Length: 272 pages
Publication date: 11 August 2023
Publisher: Oxford University Press

The Ethics of Artificial Intelligence has two primary objectives. The first goal, meta-theoretical, is fulfilled by Part One, which comprises the first three chapters: an interpretation of the past (Chapter 1), the present (Chapter 2), and the future of AI (Chapter 3). Part One develops the thesis that AI represents an unprecedented divorce between agency and intelligence. On this basis, Part Two investigates the consequences of such a divorce, developing the thesis that AI, as a new form of agency, can be harnessed ethically and unethically. It begins (Chapter 4) by offering a unified perspective on the many principles that have been proposed to frame the ethics of AI. This leads to a discussion (Chapter 5) of the potential risks that may undermine the application of these principles, and then (Chapter 6) an analysis of the relation between ethical principles and legal norms, and a definition of soft ethics as post-compliance ethics. Part Two continues by analyzing the ethical challenges caused by the development and use of AI (Chapter 7), evil uses of AI (Chapter 8), and good practices when applying AI (Chapter 9). The last group of chapters focuses on the design, development, and deployment of AI for Social Good or AI4SG (Chapter 10); the positive and negative impacts of AI on the environment and how it can be a force for good in the fight against climate change—but not without risks and costs, which can and must be avoided or minimized (Chapter 11); and the possibility of using AI in support of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (Chapter 12). The book The Ethics of Artificial Intelligence concludes (Chapter 13) by arguing in favor of a new marriage between the Green of all our habitats and the Blue of all our digital technologies and how this new marriage can support and develop a better society and a healthier.

Weight: 542g
Dimension: 161 x 242 x 21 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780198883098