---
title: "Machine ethics"
chunk: 5/7
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_ethics"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T04:23:37.276938+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

=== Philosophical connections ===
Sentientism grants moral consideration to all sentient beings, primarily human and most nonhuman animals. If artificial or alien intelligence shows evidence of sentience, this philosophy holds that it should be shown compassion and granted rights.
Alternative approaches to sentientism have been considered. David J. Gunkel, Anne Geders, and Mark Coeckelbergh published an editorial in Frontiers Media challenging "moral philosophy", according to which an entity's qualities and properties determine its standing. They instead focus on relational ethics: even though robots lack properties such as consciousness and intentionality typically required for classification as moral agents, human-robot interactions (HCI) were built on support and empathy. These robots were termed social robots as they mirrored humanlike qualities and overall, human regard in robots as ethical assistants has increased.
In their article "Should robots have rights or rites?", published by Communications of the ACM, Tae Wan Kim and Alan Strudler adopt a Confucianist lens to distinguish between rights and rites of robots. Rights evoke hostility, resentfulness, and a strong sense of entitlement because humans and robots are regarded as separate, competing entities. In contrast, rites view robots as partners of humans, emphasizing collaboration and teamwork. Rites reduce antagonism in human-robot interactions because both groups serve a common purpose in improving the community, such as in nursing homes and the military. The article stresses unification in HCI because when both groups learn from each other, they improve the world. Rites also model altruism, according to which humans exist to serve and uplift each other: through mutual contributions, humans and robots strengthen their communities and communicate positive change.
Arguments against treating robots as moral beings also exist. In the article "Why Don't Robots Have Rights? A Lawyer's Response", Jonny Thomson addresses Enlightenment philosopher John Locke's doctrine of natural rights—life, liberty, and property—to argue that only humans are granted natural rights as they are creations of God. As robots are not creations of God, they do not have rights. According to Thomson, because robots are programmed, "rights to liberty and property, for examples, are meaningless to robots." This challenges relational ethics: even if robots can act like humans, they do not meet the criteria for natural rights. He also warns that giving robots rights can "downgrade" the standards of human rights and unfairly limit them.
Šekrst has argued that increasingly human-like AI behavior can prompt premature moral attribution, as systems may convincingly simulate ethical sensitivity or concern without consciousness or moral understanding, thereby blurring distinctions central to debates about moral status. David Gunkel has argued that debates about robot and AI moral status should not be grounded solely in intrinsic properties such as consciousness, intelligence, or autonomy. Instead, he emphasizes a relational approach, according to which moral standing emerges from social interaction, communicative engagement, and the roles artificial agents play in human practices. Daniel Dennett has argued that humans routinely attribute agency, intentions, and responsibility to systems based on their observable behavior rather than on knowledge of their internal makeup, a strategy he terms the "intentional stance". Applied to artificial systems, this helps explain why sophisticated robots or AI may be treated as moral agents or patients even when their underlying architecture does not support consciousness or moral understanding.
Social and political implications
Robot rights raise social and political questions beyond ethics. Granting legal personhood to robots such as Sophia the humanoid could be more symbolic than practical, serving political interests rather than giving robots real agency. Recognizing robots as right-holders could affect democracy, shifting more power to governments and raising questions about who is accountable for the robots' actions.
Robots can influence human decisions, showing a need for regulation. Legal recognition of robots could also affect economic structures, increasing inequality if not managed closely. Overall, these considerations show that ideas about robot rights are related to how societies govern technology and balance power, not just moral theory.