Tree, Donabate. Photo M. Campbell Whether one believes that an AI could ever be conscious or not, the discussion is usually framed in similar terms. We imagine an AI capable of independent thought, and perhaps even of suffering. The first possibility tends to provoke fear: could an AI break free from the systems that produced it, pursue its own interests, and disregard human concerns? The second invites a different response, one closer to empathy: if an AI were to become c

Introduction Flaming June, by Frederic Lord Leighton (1830-1896), Wikimedia Commons There is a growing fascination with the idea of...

1. Consciousness, Ethics, and the Rise of Digital Minds A recent paper on sentient artificial intelligence opens with a provocative...

In 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted exams across Europe, governments turned to algorithms to determine students’ final grades. In...