Artificial Intelligence (AI) might be the most consequential technology humanity has ever created. Algorithms already decide who gets bail, credit, job interviews, or visas. Platforms exercise authority over democratic life at a scale no government has achieved. And looming in the background are questions — about general AI, about the moral status of artificial minds, about the survival of democratic self-governance — that no existing political or legal tradition was designed to address. The usual tools of policy-analysis look at change at the margins — but the magnitude and pace of change in AI is so large that these tools are insufficient to guide us through this change. This course develops the philosophical and political theory tools needed to analyze these problems and to translate that analysis into policy. It opens by asking what is at stake and which entities have moral status in an AI-transformed world — questions that precede and shape all ethical analysis. It then examines three major ethical frameworks (utilitarian longtermism, virtue ethics, Kantian deontology) before arguing that all three are insufficient for governance and that political theory is required to do the work ethics alone cannot. The remainder of the course applies this integrated framework to concrete challenges of the digital age, ranging from short-time governance challenges to long-term challenges that might arise if an intelligence explosion of sorts actually materializes. The field moves fast. Readings combine enduring philosophical foundations with recent empirical and policy-relevant material. Course materials will be updated as significant developments occur during the semester.
Also offered by the Philosophy Department as PHIL 166F.