How to Use Virtue Ethics for Thinking About the Moral Standing of Social Robots: A Relational Interpretation in Terms of Practices, Habits, and Performance

Abstract

Social robots are designed to facilitate interaction with humans through “social” behavior. As literature in the field of human–robot interaction shows, this sometimes leads to “bad” behavior towards the robot or “abuse” of the robot. Virtue ethics offers a helpful way to capture the intuition that although nobody is harmed when a robot is “mistreated”, there is still something wrong with this kind of behavior: it damages the moral character of the person engaging in that behavior, especially when it is habitual. However, one of the limitations of current applications of virtue ethics to robots and technology is its focus on the individual and individual behavior and insufficient attention to temporal and bodily aspects of virtue. After positioning its project in relation to the work of Shannon Vallor and Robert Sparrow, the present paper explores what it would mean to interpret and apply virtue ethics in a more social and relational way and a way that takes into account the link between virtue and the body. In particular, it proposes (1) to use the notion of practice as a way to conceptualize how the individual behavior, the virtue of the person, and the technology in question are related to their wider social-practical context and history, and (2) to use the notions of habit and performance conceptualize the incorporation and performance of virtue. This involves use of the work of MacIntyre, but revised by drawing on Bourdieu’s notion of habit in order to highlight the temporal, embodiment, and performative aspect of virtue. The paper then shows what this means for thinking about the moral standing of social robots, for example for the ethics of sex robots and for evaluating abusive behaviors such as kicking robots. The paper concludes that this approach does not only give us a better account of what happens when people behave “badly” towards social robots, but also suggests a more comprehensive virtue ethics of technology that is fully relational, performance-oriented, and able to not only acknowledges but also theorize the temporal and bodily dimension of virtue.

On the Social-Relational Moral Standing of AI: An Empirical Study Using AI-Generated Art

“…Friedman (2020) reinterprets the standard dyadic conception of morality and defends the protection of perceived robotic moral patients by viewing humans as both moral agents and patients of their actions towards robots. A similar approach has also been put forward by Coeckelbergh (2020a), who argues that engaging in immoral behavior towards social robots could damage an agent's moral character (i.e., its virtue), and thus should be avoided.…”

“…Coeckelbergh (2020b) has proposed a set of conditions that could sufficiently ground a certain level of indirect moral standing to social robots. These conditions cover how immoral interactions with social robots could denigrate one's virtue (see also Coeckelbergh (2020a)) and how they could conflict with human-robot relationships. The present research adapts one of these conditions to a nonsocial robot environment.…”

The Virtuous Servant Owner—A Paradigm Whose Time has Come (Again)

“…The virtue approach to robots is not new and has, in fact, been promoted by numerous thinkers such as: Anne Gerdes (2016) , Robert Sparrow (2017 , 2020) , Shannon Vallor (2018) , Massimiliano Cappuccio et al (2019) , and even Mark Coeckelbergh (2020b , 2020c , though he argues against in 2010a ). However, while virtue ethics clearly eliminates the “dehumanizing” part of the “anthropomorphizing while dehumanizing paradox,” it would appear to utterly capitulate to the anthropomorphizing part.…”

“…He warns the master to “speak calmly and listen to the slave’s complaints,” thus changing the very relationship from one of master-slave to one more akin to employer-employee (and a quite considerate employer at that). Maimonides thus transforms ethical ideal into ethical practice which, ultimately, shapes ethical character ( Aristotle, [350 BCE] 2004 : 23; Ha-Levi, [1523] 1978 : Precept 16; Vallor, 2018 : 3.3; Cappuccio et al, 2019 ; Coeckelbergh 2020b ).…”

Four challenges to Confucian virtue ethics in technology

“…Virtue ethics are often described as employed noncoercively, spreading through the strength of example and relations between humans who engage in self-cultivation processes (Coeckelbergh, 2021;Vallor, 2016). Such self-cultivation is often taken to be a central tenet of the Confucian virtue ethics this article focuses on, especially since subsequent Confucians such as Mengzi, Xunzi, and the later neo-Confucians (Ivanhoe, 2000) emphasize the practice.…”