Should Robots Be Given Rights?

At least 150+ experts that work in areas of law, AI, robotics, and medical science, have together written a letter that urges the EU to reconsider giving robots human rights, or legal status as an “electric person".

In an EU report from 2017, it was suggested that self-learning robots might be granted electronic personalities and if so, that might enable the robots to be insured individually and also held liable for their actions. It's alleged that robot manufacturers and their partners are the ones who are pushing for the changes.

Manufactures and legal experts, lawmakers and others, have been busy debating the potential for robots to be given rights. Ultimately, they are discussing who should bear the responsibility of the actions of the robots.

Should it be manufacturers? The controllers of those robots? Or the robots themselves etc?

Experts suggest that robots might be afforded “rights” in the same way that companies have legal rights today, though they warn that they shouldn't receive the same protected rights that humans might have because at the end of the day the robots are being programmed by humans.

One robot in Saudi Arabia, known as Sophia, already made headlines after she was granted citizenship in the region. And Sophia is regarded as the very first robot to receive citizenship as such.

Those who are pushing for the changes, suggest that by granting robots this sort of status, that it would be on par with the legal persons status that corporations are given. But there are many critics who warn that doing this would be inappropriate and unethical.

They warn that manufacturers are trying to evade the responsibility for the actions of the machines that they create.

It's expected that the European Commission will present their final initiative on the matter sometime soon. It's also been reported recently that they want both private companies and governments to continue funneling billions of dollars toward AI research.

Just recently, they announced plans to spend over €20bn on AI research and innovation over the next few years.

One commission vice president, Andrus Ansip, has shared his views on the ongoing debate, and suggested that he doesn't think the group will make the move to grant robots human rights.

There has been a committee appointed, to spend time coming up with ethical guidelines surrounding the use of AI and that group is expected to convene sometime in the summer.

Pics:
Pixabay

Sources:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2018/04/13/europe-warned-granting-robots-legal-status-breach-human-rights/
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/crux/2017/12/05/human-rights-robots/
https://www.mirror.co.uk/tech/sex-robots-should-human-rights-12330202
http://www.newsweek.com/robots-human-rights-electronic-persons-humans-versus-machines-886075
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/apr/25/european-commission-ai-artificial-intelligence
https://www.euractiv.com/section/digital/news/commission-vows-to-spend-e1-5-billion-on-artificial-intelligence-by-2020/