Living with Artificial Intelligence – Can Computers Behave Ethically?

Please join us for the first in a series of conversations about Living with Artificial Intelligence. Professor Terry Caelli, Professorial Fellow at The University of Melbourne will lead a conversation to discuss Can Computers Behave Ethically?

Abstract
If we can no longer trust humanity to use computers in ethical ways, then maybe it is time we considered how we can endow computers, per se, with an autonomous, conscience form of ethics, ethical decision making. We will consider how this could be achieved and what would constitute a “charter of computer rights” that stand independently of their own creators - humans. Key to accepting and achieving this is the need to explore the degree to which language - for computers, operating systems and programming languages - can define ethical behaviour or the degree to which it is epiphenomenal. Finally, we will consider how ethical computer behaviour could be learned and what would be required to adjudicate their behaviours and relationship with humanity.

Professor Terry Caelli
He is a Professorial Fellow at the University of Melbourne and contracted Professor to the Defense Science and Technology Group/RMIT. Previous to this he has held a number of senior positions with National ICT Australia’s (NICTA) including Laboratory Director and Director of NICTA Health Program. His interests lie in Signal Processing, Human and Machine Perception, Cognitive Engineering, Machine Learning and their applications in Health, Environment and Defence. He is a Fellow of the International Association for Pattern Recognition (FIAPR) and a Fellow of the Institute for Electronic and Electrical Engineers (FIEEE). He is also a Convocation Medalist from the University of Newcastle. He has spent 15 years in North American universities and research institutes (Bell Laboratories and NASA Commercial Space Centre), has been a DFG Professor, Germany, Killam Professor of Science, the University of Alberta, Canada. He has served on the editorial boards of many international journals including IEEE: PAMI, Pattern Recognition and numerous international conference committees.