Ethical Problems with Artificial Intelligence

Although, Artificial Intelligence has the potential to make our lives better, there are certain ethical issues that need to be considered. We can tackle several issues using AI like diagnosing cancer, climate change, financial crisis, poverty etc, however we also need to consider the potential risks.

The first risk lies in the lack of transparency of what builds an algorithm that the machine can use. For example, people may not be aware of how an autonomous vehicle makes driving decisions. This also leads to the issue of fixing responsibility if there's a problem. Suppose there's a car crash, now who should be blamed for it? The owner or the manufacturer? These kind of questions have always bothered scientists.

Another issue is that AI is capable of unfairly discriminating between people since it takes decision based on the past information. For example, an AI tool developed to decide whether to grant people parole to prisoners was found to be biased towards African-American and Hispanic men.

Thirdly, there is the problem of unethically collecting data. AI needs a large amount of data to make decisions and this data can sometimes can threaten user's privacy. For example, in China, government is tracking entire cities to collect data from its citizen. A solution for this is to establish strict international regulations about data collection policies.

There are initiatives around the world which are trying to understand the impact of AI  technology on our lives with the aim of igniting an informed debate before we come to a conclusion. Hopefully, we will be able to strike a balance between the pros and cons of AI. Similar to any technological development in human history, if used to its potential AI could improve human lives.

Read more at wired.co.uk