Sciences in Context : Agency and responsibility in humans and intelligent machines

Lecture by Patrick Haggard, 2019-2020 Paris IAS Fellow, as part of the "Sciences in Context" cycle organized by the Centre de recherche interdisciplinaire and the Paris IAS.

Presentation

Sciences in Context is a series of public lectures, organized by Muriel Mambrini and Pascal Kolbe, in collaboration with the Institut d'études avancées de Paris, aimed at bringing SHS concepts and perspectives to the CRI community. The topics of the conference will be discussed at a public session of the Practical Philosophy Club on the Friday before each conference, in order to encourage discussion with the guest speaker.

Subject

People generally know what they are doing, and what they have done.  The healthy adult human brain contains specific circuits that give us a sense of agency over our actions, and thus over the outcomes of our actions in the external world.  My talk will show that the cognitive processes implemented by these brain circuits underlie human development of technology, and key aspects of human culture, such as legal and moral responsibility for action.  The arrival of intelligent machines will require us to interact with artificial agents who have cognitive and behavioural capacities resembling our own, but who lack our encultured concepts of agency and responsibility.  All human societies appear to have some form of responsibility for action.  How AI might put pressure on this underpinning feature of human society will be discussed.