Philosophy
The field related to artificial intelligence and cognitive robotics is called artificial consciousness or machine consciousness or even synthetic consciousness. This field was formed with the purpose to "define that which would have to be synthesized were consciousness to be found in an engineered artifact". When different parts of the brains, which are named neural correlates of consciousness of the NCC, interoperate then they generate consciousness, as defined by the hypothesis of neuroscientists. There exist various supporters of artificial consciousness who are of the belief that the possibility of constructing machines, for instance computer systems, which follow the interoperation of NCC is not impossible. If it is to be assumed, as it commonly is, that the notion of intelligence does not include a wide range of aspects of consciousness then artificial consciousness can also be termed as an extended version of artificial intelligence. Constructing conscious robots would hence, fall in this category of artificial intelligence and there are various, ethical, utilitarian as well as social aspects of whether this indeed is a good idea or not. The reasons conscious robot should not be created are twofold: they have both the Kantian as well as the Utilitarian arguments.
This paper makes use of the 1982 hit film by Ridley Scott called Blade runner as a philosophical source of expanding upon various aspects concerning to the ethics of machines. The movie indeed is a relatively successful form of art which aims to offer fascinating and more often than not slightly disturbing concepts of the morality of machines and how to develop questions which are considered worthy enough to go on a pursuit for. Serious consideration of the plot of the film to acknowledge the feasibility of robots utilitarian and the added responsibilities associated with it morally which arise from the creation of ethical robots and the very far away possibility of robot to robot interaction in contrast to the slightly more possible interactions of robot to humans.
The two fold reasons for not being comfortable with the creation of conscious robots include the Kantian view and the Utilitarian perspective. The Utilitarian perspective states that if the robots are created with the help of artificial intelligence and would hence, are able to feel, sympathize and empathize then that would entitle them to certain rights and responsibilities towards them. The legal framework of giving them rights and the ethical and moral aspect of giving them the responsibilities that society has towards them would be a complicated issue and would hence, reinforce the idea of how the creation of conscious robots is not the smartest decision. The rights that would now be associated with the robots after incorporating artificial consciousness would be likes the one mentioned in this article called “Laws of Robotics” by Susan Leigh Anderson. A utilitarian believes in the greater good for people hence, the formation of conscious robots falls in both categories of being good as well as harmful for the long term for human beings. Conscious robots would help resolve a lot of negative aspects of growth and prosperity that is faced by human which are lowest in the food chain as the success of the elite usually depends on the extreme hard work of others. However, creation of such robots would ensure that this does not happen. However, if the hard work is shared and the robots have what is called artificial consciousness then would come the Utilitarian view of giving them benefits too which are for their greater good which might actually cause a conflict of interest with the benefits of humans.
Now comes in the Kantian school of thought which is of the opinion that all the various experiences of a human being are impacted by integral features of our minds which shapes and organized the experiences in such a way that in an abstract sense of view all the experiences shared by a human being have particular necessary structural features. Kant however, goes against the utilitarian view of the greater good and would not agree with utilizing the conscious machines or any professional being as a means to an end thus the creation of such robots for the greater good of the humans cannot be accepted by the Kant school of thought. However, if the creation of the robots would result in the acts being universalized then the creation could be to preserve rationality and the highest good like helping in the search for more sustainable means of living and more sustainable places to live etc which might not be easily tried and tested by humans due to their various bodily limitations but can easily be carried out by conscious robots who would be able to properly comprehend the whole situation with the need for survival that is the humans greatest strength built into them by the artificial consciousness.
Bibliography
Aleksander, Igor. "Artificial Neuroconsciousness: An Update." 1995. Internet Archive, WayBack Machine. http://web.archive.org/web/19970302014628/http://www.ee.ic.ac.uk/research/neural/publications/iwann.html. December 2014.
Anderson, Susan Leigh. "Asimov’s “Three Laws of Robotics” and Machine Metaethics." n.d. 2014. <file:///D:/Laws%20of%20Robotics---%20ANderson.pdf>.
Culbertson, James T. The minds of robots; sense data, memory images, and behavior in conscious automata. Urbana: Univ. of Illinois Press, 1963.
Haikonen, Pentti O. Robot brains : circuits and systems for conscious machines. Chichester, England: John Wiley, 2007.
