{"id":149,"date":"2020-10-07T11:00:30","date_gmt":"2020-10-07T11:00:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thenextweb.com\/?p=1321840"},"modified":"2020-10-07T11:00:30","modified_gmt":"2020-10-07T11:00:30","slug":"can-ai-develop-a-sense-of-right-and-wrong","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.londonchiropracter.com\/?p=149","title":{"rendered":"Can AI develop a sense of right and wrong?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Can artificial intelligence learn the moral values of human societies? Can an AI system make decisions in situations where it must weigh and balance between damage and benefits to different people or groups of people? Can AI develop a sense of right and wrong? In short, will artificial intelligence have a conscience?<\/p>\n

This question might sound irrelevant when considering today\u2019s AI systems, which are only capable of <\/span>accomplishing very narrow tasks<\/a>. But as science continues to break new grounds, artificial intelligence is gradually finding its way into broader domains. We\u2019re already seeing AI algorithms applied to areas where the boundaries of good and bad decisions are not clearly defined, such as criminal justice and job application processing.<\/p>\n

In the future, we expect AI to care for the elderly, teach our children, and perform many other tasks that require moral human judgement. And then, the question of conscience and conscientiousness in AI will become even more critical.<\/p>\n

With these questions in mind, I went in search of a book (or books) that explained how humans develop conscience and give an idea of whether what we know about the brain provides a roadmap for conscientious AI.<\/p>\n

A friend suggested <\/span>Conscience: The Origins of Mor<\/em><\/a>al Intuitionby Dr. Patricia Churchland, neuroscientist, philosopher, and professor emerita at the University of California, San Diego. Dr. Churchland\u2019s book, and a conversation I had with her after reading Conscience<\/em>, taught me a lot about the extent and limits of brain science. <\/span>Conscience<\/em> shows us how far we\u2019ve come to understand the relation between the brain\u2019s physical structure and workings and the moral sense in humans. But it also shows us how much more we must go to truly understand how humans make moral decisions.<\/p>\n

It is a very accessible read for anyone who is interested in exploring the biological background of human conscience and reflect on the intersection of AI and conscience.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a very quick rundown of what <\/span>Conscience <\/em>tells us about the development of moral intuition in the human brain. With the mind being the main blueprint for AI, better knowledge of conscience can tell us a lot about what it would take for AI to learn the moral norms of human societies.<\/p>\n

The learning system<\/h2>\n

\u201cConscience is an individual\u2019s judgment about what is normally right or wrong, typically, but not always, reflecting some standard of a group to which the individual feels attached,\u201d Churchland writes in her book.<\/p>\n

But how did humans develop the ability to understand to adopt these rights and wrongs? To answer that question, Dr. Churchland takes us back through time, when our first warm-blooded ancestors made their apparition.<\/p>\n

Birds and mammals are endotherms: their bodies have mechanisms to preserve their heat. In contrast, in reptiles, fish, and insects, cold-blooded organisms, the body adapts to the temperature of the environment.<\/p>\n

The great benefit of endothermy is the capability to gather food at night and to survive colder climates. The tradeoff: endothermic bodies need a lot more food to survive. This requirement led to a series of evolutionary steps in the brains of warm-blooded creatures that made them smarter. Most notable among them is the development of the cortex in the mammalian brain.<\/p>\n

The cortex can integrate diverse signals and pull out abstract representation of events and things that are relevant to survival and reproduction. The cortex learns, integrates, revises, recalls, and keeps on learning.<\/p>\n

The cortex allows mammals to be much more flexible to changes in weather and landscape, as opposed to insects and fish, who are very dependent on stability in their environmental conditions.<\/p>\n

But again, learning capabilities come with a tradeoff: mammals are born helpless and vulnerable. Unlike snakes, turtles, and insects, which hit the ground running and are fully functional when they break their eggshells, mammals need time to learn and develop their survival skills.<\/p>\n

And this is why they depend on each other for survival.<\/p>\n

The development of social behavior<\/h2>\n
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\"Chimpanzee\"
<\/i><\/a>The development of complex cortical structures in the brain gave rise to social behavior in mammals<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n<\/figure>\n

The brains of all living beings have a reward and punishment system that makes sure they do things that support their survival and the survival of their genes. The brains of mammals repurposed this function to adapt for sociality.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the evolution of the mammalian brain, feelings of pleasure and pain supporting self-survival were supplemented and repurposed to motivate affiliative behavior,\u201d Churchland writes. \u201cSelf-love extended into a related but new sphere: other-love.\u201d<\/p>\n

The main beneficiary of this change are the offspring. Evolution has triggered changes in the circuitry of the brains of mammals to reward care for babies. Mothers, and in some species both parents, go to great lengths to protect and feed their offspring, often at a great disadvantage to themselves.<\/p>\n