Curriculum descant: stories and plays about the ethical and social implications of artificial intelligence

Abstract

A central issue in any discussion of the ethical and social implications of artificial intelligence (AI) is the appropriate role of intelligent systems in the world that we are creating. Can intelligent systems potentially threaten the vitality of human con-sciousness? Can intelligent systems " steal " vital capabilities and skills from humanity? Over the past several years I have been writing stories and plays that address the ethical and social implications of AI. These stories and plays are available through my AI Stories web-site (www.cs.wcupa.edu/~epstein/stoplay-html). I hope that professors who teach artificial intelligence, computer ethics, or the social implications of computing will use these stories and plays in their courses. The AI Stories Web project began as a story about the future that I wrote for my book, The Case of the Killer Robot (Epstein 1997). The Killer Robot is a fictitious scenario that uses various written media (e.g., newspaper stories and magazine interviews) to tell the story of how a programming error led to the death of a robot operator. One of our reviewers liked the future story and said that he would like to see more stories about the future. Consequently, I embarked on a new pro-ject—to create a portrait of the future (circa 2028) using a variety of print media (e.g., newspaper articles, book reviews, television infomercial transcripts, magazine interviews, commencement addresses). The purpose of this effort was to provide professors with materials that they could use to teach and discuss the ethical and social implications of computer technology, especially artificial intelligence and virtual reality (VR). I call this collection of stories Sunday, May 14, 2028. Stories that specifically relate to AI and VR are available in the AI Stories Web. I will briefly introduce these stories and two plays that are available at the aforementioned website. The 37 stories in the AI Stories Web are organized according to the domain of human experience that is affected by the technology being discussed. One story that gets to the heart of the matter is " The Great Brain Robbery. " This story discusses the impact of computer technology (especially, artificial intelligence) in a broad social context. The story is told through an interview with Professor Lowe-Tignoff (who also appeared in the Killer Robot book). He discusses his belief that intelligent systems (again, he is speaking from the perspective of 2028) are stealing human capabilities in various domains, including …