---
title: "Ethics of artificial intelligence"
chunk: 9/12
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethics_of_artificial_intelligence"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T04:23:03.965241+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

Vernor Vinge, among numerous others, has suggested that a moment may come when some or all computers will be smarter than humans. The onset of this event is commonly referred to as "the Singularity" and is the central point of discussion in the philosophy of Singularitarianism. While opinions vary as to the ultimate fate of humanity in wake of the Singularity, efforts to mitigate the potential existential risks brought about by AI has become a significant topic of interest in recent years among computer scientists, philosophers, and the public at large.
Many researchers have argued that, through an intelligence explosion, a self-improving AI could become so powerful that humans would not be able to stop it from achieving its goals. In his paper "Ethical Issues in Advanced Artificial Intelligence" and subsequent book Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies, philosopher Nick Bostrom argues that AI has the capability to bring about human extinction. He claims that an artificial superintelligence would be capable of independent initiative and of making its own plans, and may therefore be more appropriately thought of as an autonomous agent. Since artificial intellects need not share our human motivational tendencies, it would be up to the designers of the superintelligence to specify its original motivations. Because a superintelligent AI would be able to bring about almost any possible outcome and to thwart any attempt to prevent the implementation of its goals, many uncontrolled unintended consequences could arise. It could kill off all other agents, persuade them to change their behavior, or block their attempts at interference.
However, Bostrom contended that superintelligence also has the potential to solve many difficult problems such as disease, poverty, and environmental destruction, and could help humans enhance themselves.
Unless moral philosophy provides us with a flawless ethical theory, an AI's utility function could allow for many potentially harmful scenarios that conform with a given ethical framework but not "common sense". According to Eliezer Yudkowsky, there is little reason to suppose that an artificially designed mind would have such an adaptation. AI researchers such as Stuart J. Russell, Bill Hibbard, Roman Yampolskiy, Shannon Vallor, Steven Umbrello and Luciano Floridi have proposed design strategies for developing beneficial machines.

== Solutions and approaches ==
To address ethical challenges in artificial intelligence, developers have introduced various systems designed to ensure responsible AI behavior. Examples include Nvidia's Llama Guard, which focuses on improving the safety and alignment of large AI models, and Preamble's customizable guardrail platform. These systems aim to address issues such as algorithmic bias, misuse, and vulnerabilities, including prompt injection attacks, by embedding ethical guidelines into the functionality of AI models.
Prompt injection, a technique by which malicious inputs can cause AI systems to produce unintended or harmful outputs, has been a focus of these developments. Some approaches use customizable policies and rules to analyze inputs and outputs, ensuring that potentially problematic interactions are filtered or mitigated. Other tools focus on applying structured constraints to inputs, restricting outputs to predefined parameters, or leveraging real-time monitoring mechanisms to identify and address vulnerabilities. These efforts reflect a broader trend in ensuring that artificial intelligence systems are designed with safety and ethical considerations at the forefront, particularly as their use becomes increasingly widespread in critical applications.

== Institutions in AI policy and ethics ==
There are many organizations concerned with AI ethics and policy, public and governmental as well as corporate and societal.
Amazon, Google, Facebook, IBM, and Microsoft have established a non-profit, The Partnership on AI to Benefit People and Society, to formulate best practices on artificial intelligence technologies, advance the public's understanding, and to serve as a platform about artificial intelligence. Apple joined in January 2017. The corporate members will make financial and research contributions to the group, while engaging with the scientific community to bring academics onto the board.
The IEEE put together a Global Initiative on Ethics of Autonomous and Intelligent Systems which has been creating and revising guidelines with the help of public input, and accepts as members many professionals from within and without its organization. The IEEE's Ethics of Autonomous Systems initiative aims to address ethical dilemmas related to decision-making and the impact on society while developing guidelines for the development and use of autonomous systems. In particular, in domains like artificial intelligence and robotics, the Foundation for Responsible Robotics is dedicated to promoting moral behavior as well as responsible robot design and use, ensuring that robots maintain moral principles and are congruent with human values.
Traditionally, government has been used by societies to ensure ethics are observed through legislation and policing. There are now many efforts by national governments, as well as transnational government and non-government organizations to ensure AI is ethically applied.
AI ethics work is structured by personal values and professional commitments, and involves constructing contextual meaning through data and algorithms. Therefore, AI ethics work needs to be incentivized.

=== Intergovernmental initiatives ===
The European Commission has a High-Level Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence. On 8 April 2019, this published its "Ethics Guidelines for Trustworthy Artificial Intelligence". The European Commission also has a Robotics and Artificial Intelligence Innovation and Excellence unit, which published a white paper on excellence and trust in artificial intelligence innovation on 19 February 2020. The European Commission also proposed the Artificial Intelligence Act, which came into force on 1 August 2024, with provisions that shall come into operation gradually over time.
The OECD established an OECD AI Policy Observatory.
In 2021, UNESCO adopted the Recommendation on the Ethics of Artificial Intelligence, the first global standard on the ethics of AI.