Hard Choices and Hard Limits for Artificial Intelligence
This addresses a foundational philosophical problem for AI ethics and decision theory, but it is incremental as it builds on existing debates about AI limitations.
The paper tackles the problem of whether AI can assist with hard choices where alternatives are on a par, arguing that parity imposes hard limits on AI in decision-making, concluding that AI cannot and should not resolve such choices.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is supposed to help us make better choices. Some of these choices are small, like what route to take to work, or what music to listen to. Others are big, like what treatment to administer for a disease or how long to sentence someone for a crime. If AI can assist with these big decisions, we might think it can also help with hard choices, cases where alternatives are neither better, worse nor equal but on a par. The aim of this paper, however, is to show that this view is mistaken: the fact of parity shows that there are hard limits on AI in decision making and choices that AI cannot, and should not, resolve.