Introduction
The growth of technologies has significantly influenced the whole world’s development. Technologies touch upon most of the spheres of human life and are used as helpful instruments to alleviate daily activities. Many of them are constructed and based on the artificial intelligence (AI) platform. Even though such technologies empower human development, the implementation of AI has negative aspects. Most of them are confined to ethical principles addressing such issues as fairness and equality, information protection, power distribution, mass manipulation, and others. As far as there are substantial moral risks and consequences of AI development, the regulating and limiting measures are significant to be explored.
The current research aims to find possible ways to create a fair AI. Some of the objectives include exploring power concentration, mass manipulation, depreciation of human labor, and information protection issues involved in AI implementation.
Overview of the Studies
Today the ethics of AI and its moral implications are actively discussed within the academic field. Various authors publish theoretical and practical research results to highlight the necessity of creating fair AI. Some of the works provide a broader overview of the implications of technological development on society. For example, Susskind (2020) analyzes the changes in the political systems which are necessary to empower the equal technology-based community. Another example of the book, which only partly touches upon AI consequence but provides valuable insights on the human consciousness changed by the technologies, is Homo Deus (Harari, 2018).
Being oriented mainly on the religious and psychological aspects of human existence, the book addresses the question of data flow and how it can reshape human minds (Harari, 2018). Some authors focus primarily on the ethical consequences of AI implementation in politics, culture, and power distribution (Crawford, 2021). All the mentioned resources have common features only in discussing the theoretical changes implied by the technologies and AI. Analyzing human history, the authors provide the possible implication and propose the likely technologically-based ethical changes in society.
There are also academic works that present more practical results of AI implementation, which can be seen even today. For example, Chan et al. (2021), using the data of recent years’, highlight the unequal research distribution, which can humiliate the rights of the racial and cultural minorities in future AI developments. Whittlestone et al. (2019) emphasize which spheres should be stressed in AI development to create a technologically-advanced fair society.
These works are more practically oriented and have up-to-date evidence. At the same time, the mentioned earlier books and the article analyze human history, trying to predict future changes. Both types of resources are necessary to analyze in order to answer the research question. Only the combination of theory and practice can help find possible solutions for the ethical challenges provoked by AI.
The theoretical resources pay attention mainly to the historical development of humans, aiming to highlight the repeatability of the social processes. The question addressed in these works are highly debatable and supported primarily by the historically-distant facts. In contrast, practical research analyzes the current relationships between AI and people. Even though the resources analysis provides valuable insight into the research field, it is essential to mention the significant gap in all these structures. All the resources, even practical ones, only briefly discuss the possible ways to solve the ethical problems encouraged by AI implementation.
The authors aim to highlight the issue and appeal to scientists and ordinary people’s minds provoking the discussion. As a result, there are practically no solutions for how people could create fair AI. Most of the authors touch upon the possible variants and provide valuable ideas. Thus, in order to fill the gap in this scientific field, these works’ theoretical and practical material can be summarized and used to develop possible ways to make AI fair.
The Politics to Make AI Fair
Fair AI-wide usage exploration should address the following ethical problems: power concentration, mass manipulation, depreciation of human labor, and information protection. Solutions to these issues include governmental regulation or AI controlling legislation which can state the ethical norms of the fair implementation of the technology. The problem of power concentration is correlated with the idea that only the vast prosperous corporations can afford to use AI in production. As a result, these companies will hold all the resources produced. Companies that apply AI technology will have greater output concentration, thereby creating a substantial market disbalance.
Crawford (2021) believes that such a situation will cause productive discrimination and the exploitation of the worker’s labor. The resources produced by the machine are hard to be distributed fairly. Moreover, the problem of racial discrimination based on AI owing is also should be solved (Chan et al., 2021). When the AI resources are situated in technologically-developed regions, the poor territories will be discriminated against as having no access to production. Thus, the AI-wide usage consequence is that the massive companies will hold the prevalent number of resources.
This idea provokes another problem of mass manipulation by giant corporations. When such a significant power is situated in one’s company’s hands, the administration can use this opportunity for its benefit. Through social media and advertising management, the company can influence and even shape the mass worldview and manipulate people. Harari (2018) discusses a similar situation and considers it as a natural human law: gaining power, people start to perform malicious actions to broaden their opportunities. The possible solution to the problems mentioned above is to create a proper legislation system controlling fair production involving AI.
Besides that, the regulation regarding the volumes of manufacturing should be designed. In order to avoid power concentration, each company should produce a limited amount of resources by applying the fair rules of distribution. Besides, mass manipulation can be eliminated through media censorship instruments.
The next problem to be discussed is the deprivation of human labor which can cause the high unemployment level worldwide. Moreover, the problem of lower payments is also relevant to the topic. Susskind (2020) addresses this issue and highlights the necessity to reconsider many counties’ political and economic systems. The governments should comprehend the responsibility of introducing AI into production. People should be able to work. Therefore, the government must provide new workplaces and career opportunities. The typical labor type which is paid today should be changed accordingly to the more intelligent-involving one. There are various functions that AI can never perform, such as impartial judgment (Alexandrova et al., 2019). This means that the whole working system should be reconsidered: the people and authorities should be ready to change labor focus. To meet the changing technologically-conditioned labor, the entire educational and work procedures should be redesigned.
The last problem to discuss in the current research is information protection. AI enables more efficient use of video surveillance systems and personal information. However, the probability of working errors is still pretty high. Any technology can have net distortions or other system failures. Thus, this fact allows for the increased risks of information leakage. In this case, it can be used for malicious aims and provoke the feeling of constant surveillance in people’s minds (Crawford, 2021).
In order to avoid this problem, AI-encouraged technologies should comply with the legal rules of information protection and release. The different legislations to limit AI’s information flow can significantly decrease the risks of personal data leakages. The information protection system should be developed accordingly to each type of AI involving personal data. Without proper regulation, society will be full of manipulation, discrimination, and unfair treatment (Crawford, 2021). Therefore, in general, AI implementation involves significantly reshaping the current world’s political and economic systems. Analyzing the potential and possible problems of AI spreading, governments should develop efficient plans to prepare people for such changes.
Conclusion
The discussed ethical and practical issues encouraged by future AI implementation are essential to be addressed. As was mentioned earlier, the political, economic systems, and society, in general, should prepare for AI-involving life. The governmental responsibility to provide fair technologies and ensure the equality of opportunities for all the members of society should be discussed. The elaboration on this topic and offering possible solutions can highlight the severity of the problem and alleviate its future solving. Scientific research in the sphere of AI ethics can contribute to the better implementation of this technology. Thus, this topic is relevant not only for the research field but also for society’s future.
References
Chan, A., Okolo, C. T., Terner, Z., & Wang, A. (2021). The limits of global inclusion in AI development. ArXiv:2102.01265 [Cs]. Web.
Crawford, K. (2021). Atlas of AI: Power, politics, and the planetary costs of artificial intelligence. Yale University Press.
Harari, Y. N. (2018). Homo deus: A brief history of tomorrow. Harper Perennial.
Susskind, J. (2020). Future Politics: Living together in a world transformed by tech. Oxford Univ Press.
Alexandrova, A., Cave, S., Nyrup, R., & Whittlestone, J. (2019). The role and limits of principles in AI ethics. Proceedings of the 2019 AAAI/ACM Conference on AI, Ethics, and Society, 195-200. Web.