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Philosophy and ethics: all our articles

All 97 Alyriaz articles on the “Philosophy and ethics” topic: news, analysis and explainers, newest first. To stay up to date, you can get an alert as soon as a new article on this topic is published.

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  1. · Vision

    Can AI have style?

    Without artists to guide it, AI produces images that all look the same, say filmmakers. So what is a style?
  2. · Vision

    What if brakes were there to help you go faster?

    Safety and speed are set against each other. Yet it was brakes that allowed lifts and trains to go further. A lesson for AI.
  3. · Vision

    Who decides that an incident is serious?

    A company calls an incident "minor", the police "unacceptable". Who should decide how serious it is? A deeper question than it appears.
  4. · Vision

    Giving an identity to someone who does not exist?

    Beijing grants papers to a virtual singer. Absurd? Our law already counts "persons" without bodies. What an identity really means.
  5. · Vision

    Can one person's progress make others poorer?

    The AI race is making phones disappear for the poorest, without anyone intending it. How progress produces invisible losers.
  6. · Vision

    Proof without understanding: is it still maths?

    An AI produces hundreds of proofs few will read. Is a truth no one understands still worth anything? Borges imagined the answer.
  7. · Vision

    Should we believe those who storm out?

    Former AI researchers testify that their industry is moving too fast. Should we believe them? How to weigh the words of those who leave.
  8. · Vision

    Can you confide in a machine that sells ads?

    People entrust ChatGPT with their health, their money, their doubts. It now displays adverts. Even without influencing its answers, that changes the relationship.
  9. · Vision

    Who has the right to have an AI without guardrails?

    Google is giving an AI without guardrails to "trusted" defenders. But who decides who deserves that trust, and what happens if they get it wrong?
  10. · Vision

    Bluffing: is it lying?

    An AI bluffs better than Stratego champions. At the game table, that's allowed. But where does bluffing end and lying begin?
  11. · Society

    An AI agent does something stupid: who is responsible?

    When an AI agent gets it wrong with your money, who pays? The FTC refuses to make it an independent actor. What that changes for you.
  12. · Vision

    Should we be worried about good things?

    A critique published this week accuses the dominant narrative of diverting attention from concrete harms towards spectacular risks. We examine the argument, what is right about it, and how to distribute one's concern.
  13. · Vision

    What is an accident?

    The word accident assumes an absence of fault. We examine what this word actually does, why the disciplines that have reduced accidents have stopped believing in it, and what should be said instead.
  14. · Vision

    What does it mean to create, when everything already exists?

    Is building on the work of others creating? We examine this question through the economic shift currently under way, and through what the history of art and technology has to say about it.
  15. · Vision

    The day we stop talking about it

    The technologies that transform the world all, one day, stop being a topic. We examine what happens in that moment of silence, why it is more decisive than the period of effervescence, and what we should take from it.
  16. · Vision

    Is the race a good metaphor?

    The race metaphor dominates political discourse on AI. We examine what it presupposes, what it makes unthinkable, and what might replace it.
  17. · Vision

    Should we ask whether an AI has rights?

    A group is campaigning for AI rights. We take a serious look at what such a question would entail, why it cannot be answered today, and what to do with that uncertainty.
  18. · Society

    A group is campaigning against the removal of AI models

    A advocacy group is calling for a halt to AI model retirements. We examine the claim, what it assumes, and the real problem it highlights.
  19. · Vision

    Can a technical debate stay technical?

    When an expert controversy becomes a political object, it changes in nature. We examine what this shift produces, why it is inevitable, and what needs protecting.
  20. · Vision

    Should machines be given names?

    Naming an object is an old and innocuous gesture. We examine why it ceases to be so when the object speaks, and what a first name changes in the working relationship.

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