-
198The onlife manifesto—the onlife initiativeIn The online manifesto: being human in a hyper-connected era, Springer Nature. 2014.The deployment of information and communication technologies (ICTs) and their uptake by society radically affect the human condition, insofar as it modifies our relationships to ourselves, to others and to the world. The ever-increasing pervasiveness of ICTs shakes established reference frameworks through the following transformations 1 : i. the blurring of the distinction between reality and virtuality; ii. the blurring of the distinctions between human, machine and nature; iii. the reversal fr…Read more
-
The ethics of information warfare—an overviewIn Luciano Floridi & Mariarosaria Taddeo (eds.), The ethics of information warfare, Springer International Publishing. 2014.This chapter focuses on issues pertaining to the concept of Information Warfare and the clarifications that need to be made in order to address its ethical implications.
-
394Singularitarians, atheists, and why the problem with artificial intelligence is H.A.LAPA Newsletter on Philosophy and Computers 14 (2). 2015.A short article criticising two churches: those who believe in the Singularity (AIzilla) and those who believe that computers "cannot do x" (AItheist).
-
115Review of David Harel, Computers Ltd (review)Times Literary Supplement. 2001.This paper is a review of Review of David Harel's, Computer Ltd.
-
245The renaissance of epistemology 1919-1945In Thomas Baldwin (ed.), The Cambridge history of philosophy, 1870-1945, Cambridge University Press. pp. 533-543. 2003.The renaissance of epistemology between the two world wars forms a bridge between early modern and contemporary philosophy of knowledge. This paper traces the resurgence of interest in epistemology at the turn of the century, as a reaction against the nineteenth-century development of Neo-Kantian and Neo-Hegelian idealism, through the interwar renaissance of epistemology, prompted by major advances in mathematics, logic, and physics, and its ultimate transformation from a theory of ideas and jud…Read more
-
310Trends in the philosophy of informationIn P. Adriaans & J. van Benthem (eds.), hilosophy of Information, Mit Press. 2008.This chapter reviews some interesting research trends in the philosophy of information (PI). First, PI is defined; then, a series of open problems in PI on which philosophers are currently working is considered. The conclusion highlights the innovative character of this new area of research.
-
212Humans have nothing to fear from intelligent machinesFinancial Times. 2016.This article argues that no AI Godzilla will enslave us. We should focus on the real challenges.
-
352Faultless responsibility: on the nature and allocation of moral responsibility for distributed moral actionsPhilosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A 374 20160112. 2016.The concept of distributed moral responsibility (DMR) has a long history. When it is understood as being entirely reducible to the sum of (some) human, individual and already morally loaded actions, then the allocation of DMR, and hence of praise and reward or blame and punishment, may be pragmatically difficult, but not conceptually problematic. However, in distributed environments, it is increasingly possible that a network of agents, some human, some artificial (e.g. a program) and some hybri…Read more
-
1084Ethical guidelines for COVID-19 tracing appsNature 582. 2020.Technologies to rapidly alert people when they have been in contact with someone carrying the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 are part of a strategy to bring the pandemic under control. Currently, at least 47 contact-tracing apps are available globally. They are already in use in Australia, South Korea and Singapore, for instance. And many other governments are testing or considering them. Here we set out 16 questions to assess whether — and to what extent — a contact-tracing app is ethically justifiable…Read more
-
2747A definition, benchmark and database of AI for social good initiativesNature Machine Intelligence 3. 2021.Initiatives relying on artificial intelligence (AI) to deliver socially beneficial outcomes—AI for social good (AI4SG)—are on the rise. However, existing attempts to understand and foster AI4SG initiatives have so far been limited by the lack of normative analyses and a shortage of empirical evidence. In this Perspective, we address these limitations by providing a definition of AI4SG and by advocating the use of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as a benchmark for tracing…Read more
-
19Hypersuasion – On AI’s Persuasive Power and How to Deal with ItPhilosophy and Technology 37 (2): 1-10. 2024.
-
80Regulation by Design: Features, Practices, Limitations, and Governance ImplicationsMinds and Machines 34 (2): 1-23. 2024.Regulation by design (RBD) is a growing research field that explores, develops, and criticises the regulative function of design. In this article, we provide a qualitative thematic synthesis of the existing literature. The aim is to explore and analyse RBD’s core features, practices, limitations, and related governance implications. To fulfil this aim, we examine the extant literature on RBD in the context of digital technologies. We start by identifying and structuring the core features of RBD,…Read more
-
26The case for a broader approach to AI assurance: addressing “hidden” harms in the development of artificial intelligenceAI and Society 1-16. forthcoming.Artificial intelligence (AI) assurance is an umbrella term describing many approaches—such as impact assessment, audit, and certification procedures—used to provide evidence that an AI system is legal, ethical, and technically robust. AI assurance approaches largely focus on two overlapping categories of harms: deployment harms that emerge at, or after, the point of use, and individual harms that directly impact a person as an individual. Current approaches generally overlook upstream collective…Read more
-
Faultless responsibility: On the nature and allocation of moral responsibility for distributed moral actionsPhilosophical Transactions. Series A, Mathematical, Physical, and Engineering Sciences 374. 2016.
-
Translating Principles into Practices of Digital Ethics: Five Risks of Being UnethicalSSRN Electronic Journal 32 185-193. 2019.
-
283Regulation is nothing without enforcement. This particularly holds for the dynamic field of emerging technologies. Hence, this article has two ambitions. First, it explains how the EU´s new Artificial Intelligence Act (AIA) will be implemented and enforced by various institutional bodies, thus clarifying the governance framework of the AIA. Second, it proposes a normative model of governance, providing recommendations to ensure uniform and coordinated execution of the AIA and the fulfilment of t…Read more
-
37A Genealogical Approach to Algorithmic BiasMinds and Machines 34 (2): 1-17. 2024.The Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency (FAccT) literature tends to focus on bias as a problem that requires ex post solutions (e.g. fairness metrics), rather than addressing the underlying social and technical conditions that (re)produce it. In this article, we propose a complementary strategy that uses genealogy as a constructive, epistemic critique to explain algorithmic bias in terms of the conditions that enable it. We focus on XAI feature attributions (Shapley values) and counterfac…Read more
-
41Anthropomorphising Machines and Computerising Minds: The Crosswiring of Languages between Artificial Intelligence and Brain & Cognitive SciencesMinds and Machines 34 (1): 1-9. 2024.The article discusses the process of “conceptual borrowing”, according to which, when a new discipline emerges, it develops its technical vocabulary also by appropriating terms from other neighbouring disciplines. The phenomenon is likened to Carl Schmitt’s observation that modern political concepts have theological roots. The authors argue that, through extensive conceptual borrowing, AI has ended up describing computers anthropomorphically, as computational brains with psychological properties…Read more
-
150International regulation of autonomous weapon systems (AWS) is increasingly conceived as an exercise in risk management. This requires a shared approach for assessing the risks of AWS. This paper presents a structured approach to risk assessment and regulation for AWS, adapting a qualitative framework inspired by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It examines the interactions among key risk factors—determinants, drivers, and types—to evaluate the risk magnitude of AWS and esta…Read more
-
316The article argues that AI can enhance the measurement and implementation of democratic processes within political parties, known as Intra-Party Democracy (IPD). It identifies the limitations of traditional methods for measuring IPD, which often rely on formal parameters, self-reported data, and tools like surveys. Such limitations lead to the collection of partial data, rare updates, and significant demands on resources. To address these issues, the article suggests that specific data managemen…Read more
-
221InformationIn Carl Mitcham (ed.), Encyclopedia of Science, Technology, and Ethics (ESTE). 2005.
New Haven, Connecticut, United States of America