Applied Ethics and AI: The Need for Legislation and Ethical Controls

This report delves into the ethical considerations surrounding Artificial Intelligence, specifically addressing the need for legislation to mitigate potential negative consequences. The analysis begins by posing the core ethical question: whether AI should require legislation to avoid serious consequences. It then explores the importance of ethical analysis in the context of AI development, acknowledging AI's replication of human thinking and behavior and the associated ethical dilemmas. The report examines relevant facts related to AI and legal issues, including smart trip planning, surgical robots, and e-commerce. The analysis employs Act Utilitarianism to evaluate the positive and negative consequences of AI, concluding that while AI offers significant benefits, legislation and legal systems are crucial for its proper and ethical use. The report references various academic sources to support its arguments, emphasizing the need for ethical controls and the importance of adapting a judicial point of view as AI continues to develop.

Applied Ethics and Sustainability

Artificial intelligence
a. Should Artificial Intelligence require legislation to be implemented to avoid serious
consequences?
b. Importance and need of analysis of ethical issue
Various research studies are being conducted regarding the ethical issues associated with
Artificial Intelligence (AI), because it is important for humans to control artificial intelligence in
short-term. In the era of artificial intelligence, it is essential to seek ethical adjustment
(tutorialspoint.com, 2019). AI is a replication of human thinking and behaviours but, when
technology reaches a certain level, question arises whether these artificial creations be given life
or let them be enslaved by humans, and to have them emotions to replace human work
(Alsedrah, 2017). As development of AI could have serious consequences, it is essential to
utilize ethical controls and to improve them. At this point of time, it is doubtful that AI
legislation be implemented. From the point of view of legislative efficiency, it is not easy to meet
actual needs so, there is requirement of thinking about and adapting a judicial point of view (Das
et al., 2010). With the use of Marx’s dialectical theory, it has been found that behind production
of a particular thing, there must have two sides i.e. while enjoying the positive role of thing, its
negative influence cannot be ignored, particularly considering the development of science and
technology. In addition to it, one cannot ignore the guidance and education provided by people
while using AI, which is an interdisciplinary science closely associated with computer science,
physics, psychology, linguistics, logic as well as philosophy (Perez et al., 2019). However, it has
become an independent system now, it is still a young and pioneering discipline with a highly
comprehensive character which requires exploring in different ways.

c. Facts relevant to the analysis of ethical question
AI and legal issues for the purpose of analyzing ethical issue are;
 Legal issues related to smart trip planning is that, navigation system has become highly
accurate and it can now be used through computers, mobiles and other devices and have
brought convenience to our lives. Through AI technology, people can plan trips easily
and quickly. Even though, AI technology applies to navigation, there are still various
factors that affect proper functioning such as poor signaling and intelligent judgment
errors or failure of navigation and operation (Bostrom & Yudkowsky, 2018). So, the
application of AI in navigation involves security issues and, who should bear liability
and how to protect the rights of victims (Accenture , 2019).
 In medical field, surgical robots are being used, however, they are not perfect enough to
complete the operation on their own, and doctors give instructions to these robots. It has
been proven that robots have better surgical results and efficiency as compared to
humans but, they also involve a lot of risks as well (Frankish & Ramsey, 2014). In case
of failure in surgery by an intelligent robot, it is considered as medical accident. So,
negligence of machinery or technology might become a legal issue (Ma et al., 2018).
 With the fiercely increasing e-commerce competition, majority of e-commerce vendors
are using AI. Through understanding of big data, data related to past behaviors of the
customers could be collected to analyze their preferences. In addition, customer chat,
intelligent customer service robots provides great benefits to the businesses (BEALL,
2018). On the other hand, proper concern and paying attention to fake and shoddy
quality of goods, is also essential. When e-commerce vendors use AI systems to
recommend products, the responsibility for recommending counterfeit or fake products

should also be taken by them, which raises serious moral ethical concern (Bossmann,
2016).
d. Analyse the ethical question using act utilitarianism
With Utilitarian ethical theory, it can be analyzed if the action is right or wrong through the
motivation behind the act. Its purpose is to act in a manner to achieve best possible
consequences.
Positive Consequences
 AI eases the process and functioning such as easier and quicker smart trip planning due
to which, people prefer to adjust with the security issues related to them (Drew et al.,
2018).
 The assistance of AI systems enhances the accuracy and precision of procedures such as
the use of surgical robots for operations due to which, rarest of the rare possibilities of
accidents could be neglected (D. Luxton et al., 2016).
 AI systems benefit the businesses in various ways so, risks associated with it could be
eliminated by being aware and by paying proper attention (Blaisdell, 2019).
Negative Consequences
 The use of AI system is increasing day by day due to which, laziness among humans
is increasing (MacCarthy, 2018)
 Increasing use of AI systems increases risks of security due to which, important data
and information of people get leaked many a times (Bostrom, 2003).
 The accidents caused due to use of AI systems result into medical emergencies such as
by using surgical robots and automatic driving (Violino, 2018).

f. Ethical Conclusion
The positive consequences exhibit that AI systems have been proved to be highly beneficial. It
has eased the overall processes; quicken the process and enhanced accuracy and precision in
functioning. On the other hand, negative consequences exhibit that there is less probability of
legal issues arising due to AI systems.
Therefore, ethically, the net utility shows that positive consequences outweigh the negative ones,
however, legislation and legal systems should be implemented for proper and legal use of AI
systems.
References
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