The Laws Of Robots

This book explores how the design, construction, and use of robotics technology may affect today’s legal systems and, more particularly, matters of responsibility and agency in criminal law, contractual obligations, and torts. By distinguishing between the behaviour of robots as tools of human interaction, and robots as proper agents in the legal arena, jurists will have to address a new generation of “hard cases.” General disagreement may concern immunity in criminal law (e.g., the employment of robot soldiers in battle), personal accountability for certain robots in contracts (e.g., robo-traders), much as clauses of strict liability and negligence-based responsibility in extra-contractual obligations (e.g., service robots in tort law). Since robots are here to stay, the aim of the law should be to wisely govern our mutual relationships.

AI is poised to disrupt our work and our lives. We can harness these technologies rather than fall captive to them—but only through wise regulation. Too many CEOs tell a simple story about the future of work: if a machine can do what you do, your job will be automated. They envision everyone from doctors to soldiers rendered superfluous by ever-more-powerful AI. They offer stark alternatives: make robots or be replaced by them. Another story is possible. In virtually every walk of life, robotic systems can make labor more valuable, not less. Frank Pasquale tells the story of nurses, teachers, designers, and others who partner with technologists, rather than meekly serving as data sources for their computerized replacements. This cooperation reveals the kind of technological advance that could bring us all better health care, education, and more, while maintaining meaningful work. These partnerships also show how law and regulation can promote prosperity for all, rather than a zero-sum race of humans against machines. How far should AI be entrusted to assume tasks once performed by humans? What is gained and lost when it does? What is the optimal mix of robotic and human interaction? New Laws of Robotics makes the case that policymakers must not allow corporations or engineers to answer these questions alone. The kind of automation we get—and who it benefits—will depend on myriad small decisions about how to develop AI. Pasquale proposes ways to democratize that decision making, rather than centralize it in unaccountable firms. Sober yet optimistic, New Laws of Robotics offers an inspiring vision of technological progress, in which human capacities and expertise are the irreplaceable center of an inclusive economy.

The development of robot technology to a state of perfection by future civilizations is explored in nine science fiction stories.

Like the Internet before it, robotics is a socially and economically transformative technology. Robot Law explores how the increasing sophistication of robots and their widespread deployment into hospitals, public spaces, and battlefields requires rethinking of a wide variety of philosophical and public policy issues, including how this technology interacts with existing legal regimes, and thus may inspire changes in policy and in law. This volume collects the efforts of a diverse group of scholars who each, in their own way, has worked to overcome barriers in order to facilitate necessary and timely discussions of a technology in its infancy. Identifying controversial legal, ethical, and philosophical problems, the authors reveal how issues surrounding robotics and regulation are more complicated than engineers could have anticipated, and just how much definitional and applied work remains to be done. This groundbreaking examination of a brand-new reality will be of interest and of use to a variety of groups as the authors include engineers, ethicists, lawyers, roboticists, philosophers, and serving military.

This book explains why AI is unique, what legal and ethical problems it could cause, and how we can address them. It argues that AI is unlike any other previous technology, owing to its ability to take decisions independently and unpredictably. This gives rise to three issues: responsibility--who is liable if AI causes harm; rights--the disputed moral and pragmatic grounds for granting AI legal personality; and the ethics surrounding the decision-making of AI. The book suggests that in order to address these questions we need to develop new institutions and regulations on a cross-industry and international level. Incorporating clear explanations of complex topics, Robot Rules will appeal to a multi-disciplinary audience, from those with an interest in law, politics and philosophy, to computer programming, engineering and neuroscience.

Argues that treating people and artificial intelligence differently under the law results in unexpected and harmful outcomes for social welfare.

Bringing a unique perspective to the burgeoning ethical and legal issues surrounding the presence of artificial intelligence in our daily lives, the book uses theory and practice on animal rights and the rights of nature to assess the status of robots. Through extensive philosophical and legal analyses, the book explores how rights can be applied to nonhuman entities. This task is completed by developing a framework useful for determining the kinds of personhood for which a nonhuman entity might be eligible, and a critical environmental ethic that extends moral and legal consideration to nonhumans. The framework and ethic are then applied to two hypothetical situations involving real-world technology—animal-like robot companions and humanoid sex robots. Additionally, the book approaches the subject from multiple perspectives, providing a comparative study of legal cases on animal rights and the rights of nature from around the world and insights from structured interviews with leading experts in the field of robotics. Ending with a call to rethink the concept of rights in the Anthropocene, suggestions for further research are made. An essential read for scholars and students interested in robot, animal and environmental law, as well as those interested in technology more generally, the book is a ground-breaking study of an increasingly relevant topic, as robots become ubiquitous in modern society. The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/ISBN, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.

Explains how artificial intelligence is pushing the limits of the law and how we must respond.