UMass Boston

How does artificial intelligence change the people using it? What does the future of work look like in an age of increasing automation? How will brain-machine interface technologies impact our basic capacities? 

The Applied Ethics Center and the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies have launched a long term collaboration to explore the ethics and politics of AI. The initiative involves the creation of three post-doctoral fellowships, public lectures, and a series of conferences and symposia.  

Research

The Ethics of Emerging Technologies initiative supports research on the nexus of philosophy, politics and artificial intelligence.

Recent publications supported by the project include:

• “AI and Phronesis” by Nir Eisikovits and Dan Feldman, published in Moral Philosophy and Politics
• “AI and the Traditional Grounds for Human Rights” by Nir Eisikovits, forthcoming as part of a symposium on the second edition of Claudio Corradetti’s Relativism and Human Rights: A Theory of Pluralistic Universalism (Springer). To be published as an appendix in the second edition of the book.
• “A Review of The Ethics of AI and Robotics: A Buddhist Viewpoint” by James Hughes in the Journal of Buddhist Ethics 28 : 113-120
• "Workplace Automation and Political Replacement: A Valid Analogy?" by Jake Burley and Nir Eisikovits, published in AI and Ethics
• "The Post-Dystopian Technorealism of Ted Chiang" by James Hughes and Nir Eisikovits in The Journal of Ethics and Emerging Technologies Vol. 32 No. 1 
   

Policy Papers

• "The Democratic Metaverse: Building an Extended Reality Safe for Citizens, Workers and Consumers" by Alec Stubbs, James Hughes, and Nir Eisikovits
• "Emerging Technologies & Higher Education" by Jake Burley and Alec Stubbs with James Hughes and Nir Eisikovits 
• Forthcoming - Policy Paper on the Ethics and Politics of Chatbot Psychotherapy  

Popular Media: 

The Applied Ethics Center is committed to disseminating research to the broader public. Below are some pieces aimed at a general audience. You can also find discussions related to the Ethics of Emerging Technologies on our podcast Ethics in Action.

• "There is No Such Thing as Robot Proofing" by Nir Eisikovits and Dan Feldman for Slate 
• "ChatGPT, DALL-E 2 and the collapse of the creative process" by Nir Eisikovits and Alec Stubbs for The Conversation 
• "AI is killing choice and chance – which means changing what it means to be human" by Nir Eisikovits and Dan Feldman for The Conversation
• "College could take place in the metaverse, but these problems must be overcome first" by Nir Eisikovits for The Conversation
• "The slippery slope of using AI and deepfakes to bring history to life" by Nir Eisikovits for The Conversation 
• "AI is an existential threat – just not the way you think" by Nir Eisikovits for The Conversation 
• "AI isn’t close to becoming sentient – the real danger lies in how easily we’re prone to anthropomorphize it" by Nir Eisikovits for The Conversation
  
  

In the News

• Is AI a job killer? IBM may think so, but it's all in how you use it. - The Boston Globe 
• ‘ChatGPT, tell me a story’: AI gets literary - Christian Science Monitor 
• Can AI programs be trusted to report the news? - Christian Science Monitor 
• Can TikTok help push climate activism mainstream? - The Boston Globe
• The promise and the pitfalls of everyday artificial intelligence. - Codcast by Commonwealth Magazine
• Your Girlfriend Might Not Be Real - Newsweek
• A technophobe’s guide to AI chatbots - The Boston Globe
• Mass. bill proposed to ban sales and operation of weaponized robots - The Boston Globe
• Why AI Can Seem Sentient - Science for the Public (WGBH)
• How AI is Changing Us - NTN24 TV

Conferences

Past Conferences

• Emerging Technologies and The Future of Work (November 3rd - 4th, 2023).