A PHILOSOPHICAL LOOK AT ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

PROFESSOR IN FOCUS

Technology and artificial intelligence are tricky topics. On the one hand, cyberutopians praise the infinite possibilities. Opposite are the techno-alarmists for whom the digital revolution is heading for disaster. In the first group, you will find a striking number of entrepreneurs and engineers. In the second, quite a few social scientists and philosophers. Prof. Lode Lauwaert does not take sides. This allows him to expertly demolish some sacred cows and take a magnifying glass look at technological developments.

Late October 2021 saw the publication of ‘We, robots. A philosophical look at technology and artificial intelligence’ by Prof. Lauwaert. In the weeks and months that followed, the author was not got out of the media. A second edition was already released in November and a film adaptation of the work is currently in the pipeline. The right book at the right time, that much is clear.

“My book is closely linked to the Faculty of Engineering Technology,” Prof. Lauwaert explains. “When I was asked seven years ago to teach the subject Philosophy and Ethics on the Leuven campuses, I found that there was not much literature available in our language area. So I just started writing my own. What was originally meant to be course material for Engineering Technology students has developed and grown into a book for all those concerned or engaged with technology and AI.”

Propositions

In ‘We, robots’, Prof. Lauwers takes a close look at three propositions generally supposed to be true. Is technology really as neutral as commonly assumed? Does AI really have a disruptive effect on society? And is technological development following its own path that nobody can control yet? For each proposition, the author first clarifies the concepts. Then he weighs the arguments pro and con to finally assess the relevance of the reasoning. Philosophising may be fascinating, but does the engineer benefit from the thinking exercises?

On the so-called neutrality of technology, Prof. Lauwaert says: “The neutrality thesis is as old as Western philosophy. The Stoics in ancient Greece already passed judgement that technological artefacts are neutral”. That this is not true, the author illustrates through numerous examples. From algorithms that systematically favour men in selection procedures because they are taught to do so, to the discrimination against people of colour because the software is trained to recognise white faces first. Each time, it turns out that technology is loaded with values simply because it is designed from an existing frame of reference. Incidentally, this does not necessarily have to be negative. Technology can just as easily be loaded with positive values, but this confirms the fact that it is not a neutral matter.

Disruptive and determined

The disruptiveness of digital technology and AI has been much talked about for some time. The world wide web, the smart phone, social media have dramat- ically changed lives with on one side unprecedented connectivity, and on reverse growing polarisation, disinformation, hate messages and young girls with eating disorders because they are bombarded with images of hyper-slim young ladies.” Ethically, these problems are neither new nor unique to AI,” Prof. Lauwaert said. “Rather, they are transformations, shifts or magnifications of things that existed before. But there is more. Behind the stories of disruption, there is not infrequently a marketing trick. After all, the more disruptive a product is presented, the more it is highlighted and arouses curiosity among consumers. So it is not seldom a promotional message from a company hoping for a self-fulfilling prophecy.”

Prof. Lode Lauwaert

© Filip Van Loock

According to the ancient Greeks, Prometheus was the founder of technology. He brought fire to helpless humanity. When they started working with it, it started up an untameable development. One invention or application inevitably led to another. The so-called determination thesis is the third sacred house to be demolished. Prof. Lauwaert enfeebles the argument of the same technologies emerging in different places at the same time . “The computer, the aeroplane, the passenger car did not appear in different places at the same time. So we are dealing with a generalisation. And even if it happened to be the case, it is no proof of inevitability or necessity. Most technological developments are the result of a choice by people in a particular context or role.”

Responsible engineers

That with the rise of AI, nothing fundamentally new has really occurred in the world runs like a thread through Prof. Lauwaert’s book. The so-called neutrality, disruptiveness and determinacy of the technology are not infrequently fallacies of stakeholders who would like nothing more than for no ethical questions to be asked about their product. Of course, Prof. Lauwaert realises that the technological clock cannot be reversed or stopped. So he puts his hopes in engineers and policy makers. “They have to take their moral responsibility and use their expertise to design AI that makes little or no mistakes or repro-duces. That means they need to assess the potential drawbacks of their creations at every moment and anticipate harmful side effects. Hiding behind the neutrality principle or -even worse- placing the blame unilaterally on the user is equal to acting unethically.”

Yves Persoons

Lode Lauwaert, We, robots. A philosophical look at technology and artificial intelligence’. Lannoo Campus, ISBN 9789401470544