Machine ethics is the study of how autonomous systems can be imbued with ethical values. Ethical autonomous systems are needed because, inevitably, near future systems are moral agents; consider driverless cars, or medical diagnosis AIs, both of which will need to make choices with ethical consequences. Although machine ethics has been the subject of theoretical and philosophical study for about twenty years, it is only in the past five years that proof-of-concept ethical machines have been demonstrated in the laboratory. This webinar aims to open a discussion of the interesting and difficult technical challenges of engineering ethical machines, alongside wider societal and regulatory questions of how such machines should be governed, if and when they find real-world application.

Panelists:
– Alan Winfield (University of the West of England)
– Katina Michael (Arizona State University)
– Sarah Spiekermann (Vienna University of Economics and Business)
– Louise Dennis (University of Liverpool)
– Jean-François Bonnefon (Université Toulouse-1 Capitole)