Difference between revisions of "CISC849 S2022"

An examination of issues raised by recent and expected advances in robotic and artificially intelligent (AI) systems, from the perspective of both their designers/creators and members of society generally. We will briefly cover the history and current state of robotics and AI, review relevant philosophical foundations and professional guidelines for engineers, and examine a number of topic areas. These include workplace safety, robots as caregivers and companions, surveillance and data mining, driverless cars, drones and autonomous military systems, and super-intelligent game-players. The format will focus on discussion and analysis of case studies in each topic area, as well as broader economic and social impacts.

• 20% Analytical paper, due Mar. 17
• 20% Presentation, given between Apr. 15 and 19
• 30% Final project, alone or team of two. Proposal due Apr. 26, presentations May 12, 17
• 30% Class participation. This includes attendance and how much you talk, but also the quality of what you say

For the presentation, each student will choose a real or hypothetical case/topic involving robotics/AI ethics issues. In 15-20 minutes, you will orally deliver a summary of the topic, outline the ethical issues and stakeholders, and ask the class several questions designed to initiate discussion. Visual aids (i.e., slides) are not required, but may be used for clarity. Presentation subjects must not be too similar to topics already in the syllabus, so you must get instructor approval after choosing a presentation date.

The project will involve a written and presentation component. Similar to the presentation, you will pick a topic (with instructor permission) to summarize and analyze. In fact, if you choose you may use the same topic as your presentation. However, here slides will be required, and you will also be asked to propose a technical "solution" that mitigates one or more ethical concerns related to the topic. The design and justification of this "solution" will constitute the bulk of the deliverables for the project.

All homework artifacts (papers, slides) must be submitted via e-mail to the instructor by midnight of the deadline day (with a grace period of a few hours afterward).

Students can discuss problems with one another in general terms, but must work independently on all assignments except the final project. This also applies to online and printed resources: you may consult them as references (as long as you cite them), but the words you turn in must be yours alone. Any quoting must be clear and appropriately cited--plagiarism in any form will not be tolerated. The University's policies on academic dishonesty are set forth in the student code of conduct here.

For the overall course grade, a preliminary absolute mark will be assigned to each student based on the percentage of the total possible points they earn according to the standard formula: A = 90-100, B = 80-90, C = 70-80, etc., with +'s and -'s given for the upper and lower third of each range, respectively. Based on the distribution of preliminary grades for all students (i.e., "the curve"), the instructor may increase these grades monotonically to calculate final grades. This means that your final grade can't be lower than your preliminary grade, and your final grade won't be higher than that of anyone who had a higher preliminary grade.

I will try to keep you informed about your standing throughout the semester. If you have any questions about grading or expectations at any time, please feel free to ask me.

• Machines of Loving Grace: The Quest for Common Ground Between Humans and Robots, John Markoff, 2015 (MLG)
• Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies, Nick Bostrom, 2014 (Super)
• The Second Machine Age: Work, Progress, and Prosperity in a Time of Brilliant Technologies, Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee, 2016 (TSMA)

• Super, history portion of Chapter 1

• AI-robotics timeline at Computer History Museum

• "Judge" component of Harvard Moral Sense Test (No registration required, but lots of demographic data must be entered. Warning: some of the questions are quite offensive and/or disgusting)
• "Start Judging" on MIT Moral Machine test (Much gentler set of driverless car scenarios)
• "Scientist Finds the Beginnings of Morality in Primate Behavior", Nicholas Wade, NY Times, Mar. 20, 2007
• Metaethics, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry (skip section 2)

Add/drop deadline Feb. 26

• Through Section 1 of of virtue ethics
• Introduction, Kantianism, divine command, and Ross sections of Deontological ethics Wikipedia entry
• Introduction, utilitarianism, and rule consequentialism sections of Consequentialism Wikipedia entry

• Asimov's 3 Laws of robotics, xkcd comic on 3 laws
• "Runaround", Isaac Asimov (1942 story introducing 3 laws of robotics)
• ACM code of ethics
• IEEE code of ethics
• ASCE code of ethics
• Proposed code of ethics for robotics engineers, ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction, 2010

• 3 laws scene from "I, Robot" (start at 1:24)
• Rob Miles on problems with 3 Laws

• "Case of the Killer Robot", onlineethics.org (2006)
• Ethics tests for decision-making
• "Liability in Robotics" paper (2010, robots as "dangerous dogs")

• "Robocop" (1987) demo scene (1:34)
• Sawyer collaborative (and safe) robot

• TSMA, Chapter 2: "The Skills of the New Machines: Technology Races Ahead"
• "AI Teaching Assistant Helped Students Online—and No One Knew the Difference", singularityhub.com, May 11, 2016
• "DeepMind's AlphaCode AI writes code at a competitive level", techcrunch.com, Feb. 2, 2022
• TSMA, Chapter 12: "Learning to Race with Machines: Recommendations for Individuals" (first 3 pages)

• "Watson and the Jeopardy! Challenge" (IBM, 3:45)
• "Do labor-saving robots spell doom for American workers?" PBS NewsHour, July 30, 2015 (8:42)
• Moley kitchen robot commercial (1:00)
• Spyce robot salads (stop after 3:45)

• MLG, Chapter 2: "A Crash in the Desert"

• 2004 DGC starts (watch 3:36-6:10)
• "The Great Robot Race" (PBS Nova on DGC 2005)
• 2007 DUC highlights (watch 0:30-3:20)
• Sebastian Thrun TED talk, 2011 (4:14)
• "360 degree Experience: A Fully Self-driving journey" (Waymo, 3:36)

• "When the Trial Lawyers Come for the Robot Cars" (Slate, 2016)
• "Tesla's Autopilot Driving Mode Is a Legal Nightmare" (Gizmodo, 2016)
• "Inside the Self-Driving Tesla Fatal Accident", NY Times, July 12, 2016
• "UBER'S SELF-DRIVING CAR SAW THE WOMAN IT KILLED, REPORT SAYS", Wired.com, May 24, 2018
• "Autonomy’s Roadkill: The Path to Driverless Cars Will Be Strewn with the Carcasses of Big Industry", Car & Driver magazine, Feb. 26, 2016

• US NHTSA vehicle automation levels
• "Tesla Autopilot Fatal Crash Raises Safety Questions", ABC Good Morning America report, July 2, 2016 (2:23)
• "Tesla Autopilot update wants your hands on the wheel", CNET update, Sep. 12, 2016 (1:08)

• "Inside China’s Dystopian Dreams: A.I., Shame and Lots of Cameras", Luke Dormehl, New York Times, July 8, 2018
• The Drone as Privacy Catalyst, R. Calo (2011)
• "Inside Google's Internet Justice League and its AI-Powered War on Trolls", Wired.com, Sept. 2016

• "A Soldier, Taking Orders From Its Ethical Judgment Center", Cornelia Dean, NY Times, Nov. 25, 2008
• "Robots at War: The New Battlefield", P. W. Singer, The Wilson Quarterly, Winter, 2009
• "Law and Ethics for Robot Soldiers", K. Anderson and M. Waxman, 2012

• "CreativeAI: On the Democratisation & Escalation of Creativity", Samim Winiger & Roelof Pieters, medium.com, Mar. 7, 2016
• "Inceptionism: Going Deeper into Neural Networks", Google Research Blog, Jun. 17, 2015
• "The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Recurrent Neural Networks", A. Karpathy, May 21, 2015
• "Movie written by algorithm turns out to be hilarious and intense", Ars Technica, Jun. 9, 2016

• "Ethical Frontiers of Robotics" (stop before military stuff), Noel Sharkey, Science magazine, Dec. 19, 2008
• "In gadget-loving Japan, robots get hugs in therapy sessions", Yuri Kageyama, USA Today, Apr. 11, 2004

• "The Legal Rights of Robots", Robert Freitas Jr., Student Lawyer, vol. 13, 1985
• "Android science and animal rights: Are There Analogies?", David Calverley, presented at CogSci 2005 conference workshop

• "Scientists Worry Machines May Outsmart Man", John Markoff, NY Times, July 25, 2009
• Super, Chapter 6: "Cognitive superpowers"
• Super, Chapter 7: "The superintelligent will"
• Super, Chapter 8: "Is the default outcome doom?"

• "Sunspring" and follow-up "It's No Game"
• GPT-3-written "Solicitors"

• Cleverbot: about, live conversation
• CakeChat live conversation
• "Your Next Friend Could Be A Robot", Wall Street Journal, Oct. 9, 2016 (PAYWALLED)
  • "Can Amazon's Alexa Be Your Friend?", digg.com, Mar. 30, 2017
• "It’s Your Fault Microsoft’s Teen AI Turned Into Such a Jerk", Wired.com, March 25, 2016
• "Avoiding the Uncanny Valley", Slate.com, Oct. 21, 2015

• "The Sadness and Beauty of Watching Google's AI Play Go", Wired.com, Mar. 11, 2016
• "Robots Don't Play Sports for Fun", NY Magazine, Mar. 16, 2015
• "BATTLEBOTS IS SPORTS ALL RIGHT, AND IT'S AMAZING", Vice Sports, Jul. 21, 2015
• "Lockheed Martin offers $250K prize for first AI drone to beat human pilot", CNET, September 5, 2018