Refining the ethics of computer-made decisions: A classification of moral mediation by ubiquitous machines

Refining the ethics of computer-made decisions: A classification of moral mediation by ubiquitous machines

Van der Voort, M.
Pieters, W.
Consoli, L.

Technology, Policy and Management

Engineering, Systems and Services

2015-01-23

In the past decades, computers have become more and more involved in society by the rise of ubiquitous systems, increasing the number of interactions between humans and IT systems. At the same time, the technology itself is getting more complex, enabling devices to act in a way that previously only humans could, based on developments in the fields of both robotics and artificial intelligence. This results in a situation in which many autonomous, intelligent and context-aware systems are involved in decisions that affect their environment. These relations between people, machines, and decisions can take many different forms, but thus far, a systematic account of machine-assisted moral decisions is lacking. This paper investigates the concept of machine-assisted moral decisions from the perspective of technological mediation. It is argued that modern machines do not only have morality in the sense of mediating the actions of humans, but that, by making their own decisions within their relations with humans, mediate morality itself. A classification is proposed to differentiate between four different types of moral relations. The moral aspects within the decisions these systems make are combined into three dimensions that describe the distinct characteristics of different types of moral mediation by machines. Based on this classification, specific guidelines for moral behavior can be provided for these systems.

ubiquitous computing
moral reasoning
technological mediation
moral decisions
human computer relations

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:1eb5ff7d-4d44-4348-b1da-b1320e8a64ca

Springer

1388-1957

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10676-015-9360-2

Ethics and Information Technology, 17 (1), 2015

Institutional Repository

journal article

(c) 2015 The Author(s)
This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com