Philosophy of AI

Catalog Description (Phil 135):  Examines the philosophical issues surrounding Artificial Intelligence.  Topics can include AI consciousness;  AI sentience; AI threats to humanity;  AI rights and welfare; love, sex, and warfare with AI; social and cultural impacts of AI.  No prerequsites.  Units: 3.0  G.E. Area 3 or G.E. Area 4

Catalog Description (Phil 192m):  Examines the philosophical issues surrounding the creation, existence, and nature of artificially intelligent machines.  Topics include machine consciousness, the implications of AI for human life, culture, morality, futures, and fulfillment.  Prerequisites:  6 units in Philosophy or instructor permission.  Units:  3.0.

Required Texts:  All texts will be available linked in the schedule or in a Google folder

Introduction:  

    Humanity is in the midst of a set of technological developments that will, by many accounts, radically change the course of history, culture, and our lives:  the advent of artificial intelligence.  Computer scientists, cognitive scientists, electrical engineers, artificial intelligence researchers are constructing artificial systems that will have problem solving, reasoning, and decision making capacities will rival or surpass human minds in many regards.  The presence of these systems in our lives will have profound philosophical significance.  We face a number of urgent philosophical questions in the fields of ethics, welfare, metaphysics, epistemology, and the study of rationality:   

What is artificial intelligence?    

Can they think?  

Can they reason?  Creative?  Free? Determined? 

Are they conscious?  Can they have feelings?  

What are they going to do to us?  

What’s the morally responsible way to treat them?  

Will they be our property?  Will they own the output of their labor?   

What is the Singularity?  

What new ethical problems do they create?  

Can we be uploaded or become digital?  

In what ways will tech change us? What are the philosophical and ethical issues connected to cybernetic enhancements of humans?  

What are the ethical problems created by AI in warfare?  

In what ways should we build them?  Should we not build them?  Should we make sure they are not conscious?  Will they have moral rights or be agents worthy of moral consideration?  

Does the development of superintelligent AI pose an existential threat to humanity? 

How do we get superintelligent AI to align with human values?  How do we control them?  

Should advanced AI systems have moral, legal, and political rights?  

What are the utopian promises and benefits of AI and superintelligent AI?  What are the dystopian possibilities?  

What happens when there are billions more highly productive workers in society?  

What happens when there are intelligent agents in the world who are vastly smarter than humans?  

What is the fundamental nature of intelligence?  

AI Welfare categories and questions

Metaphysics and consciousness:  What would make an AI a subject of welfare?  

How do standard accounts of welfare, moral status, and moral patienthood apply to AI

What are the ethical issues surrounding the design and training of AI

How do we make AI safe and aligned with human welfare?

There is now a rapidly developing philosophical literature attempting to address these issues.  This course will introduce students to the questions as they arise with recent AI systems.  We will survey some of the philosophical literature that is outlining the issues, questions, and answers.  And we will discuss the important and influential answers that are being produced in these philosophical debates.  

Student Outcome Goals:

1)  to develop the ability to think critically and clearly about the philosophical issues surrounding artificial intelligence.  

2) to better understand the philosophical concepts, themes, arguments and problems associated with artificial intelligence. 

3)  to improve philosophical writing and reasoning abilities.  

GE Learning Goals:  Area 3B, upper division

Students completing this course should be able to:

A. Demonstrate knowledge of the conventions and methods of the study of the humanities.

This course will cover traditional concepts, questions, framings, and theories in philosophical fields such as philosophy of mind, ethics, human welfare, reasoning and rationality, and so on.

B. Investigate, describe, and analyze the roles and effects of human culture and understanding in the development of human societies.

This course will cover the impact AI in human society, culture, and futures.

C. Compare and analyze various conceptions of humankind.

This course will address a range of philosophical theories of human flourishing, ethics, rights, and identity in the light of AI developments

D. Demonstrate knowledge and understanding of the historical development of cultures and civilizations, including their animating ideas and values.

The development of AI focuses our attention and puts pressure on our accounts of who we are, what we will become, our futures, and our self-determination. 

GE Learning Outcomes:  Area 4, upper division

Students should be able to

A. Describe and evaluate ethical and social values in their historical and cultural contexts.

This course covers the major theories of ethics, as well as conceptions of rights, welfare, and moral status in relation to humanity and their interface with AI

B.  Explain and apply the principles and methods of academic disciplines to the study of social and individual behavior.

This course covers a range of philosophical principals, approachs, and methods as they apply to humans and AI systems, and the social outcomes

C. Demonstrate an understanding of the role of human diversity in human society, for example, race, ethnicity, class, age, ability/disability, sexual identity, gender and gender expression.

This course will explore the far-ranging philosophical and moral impact that AI technologies are having on the full range of human society. 

D.  Explain and critically examine social dynamics and issues in their historical and cultural contexts.

This course will explain and critically examine philosophical accounts of how AI technologies are impacting human social dynamics in their historical and cultural contexts. 

Grade Structure for the Course:

12 Reading-Discussion Quizzes  5% each.  60% total grade

Midterm exam 20%

Final exam 20%

Student Assessment:

Students will be assessed on the extent to which they have achieved the outcome goals through the evaluation of their performance on the above assignments.  

Writing Standards

All student written work will be held strictly to these standards:

Philosophy Department Writing Guidelines

How to Analyze a Philosophical Essay

Academic Honesty Policy

Students and the instructor will conform strictly to the CSUS Academic Honesty Policy

No cheating and no violations of the Academic Honesty Policy of any sort will be tolerated in this course.   All sources must be cited and given appropriate credit.  The author of any information from the Internet or another student from class must be given credit; using such information without indicating the source is stealing someone else's hard work and it is immoral.  Cutting and pasting someone else's work is not acceptable.  It is also unacceptable to make  minor revisions in language to disguise someone else's sentences/ideas.  Submitting work from a cheating website or from other students is a violation of the policy. 

It is unacceptable to do any coursework for anyone else, either in the course now, or in the future.  If anyone approaches you to take a quiz, or do a course assignment for them, notify me immediately.  Any students caught violating this or any of the other academic honesty policies will be failed from the course and reported to the administration for disciplinary action, within the bounds of the University Policy Manual.

From the university policy manual:  Plagiarism at Sacramento State includes but is not limited to:

The act of incorporating into one’s own work the ideas, words, sentences, paragraphs, or parts thereof, or the specific substance of another’s work without giving appropriate credit thereby representing the product as entirely one's own. Examples include not only word-for-word copying, but also the "mosaic" (i.e., interspersing a few of one’s own words while, in essence, copying another’s work), the paraphrase (i.e., rewriting another’s work while still using the other’s fundamental idea or theory); fabrication (i.e., inventing or counterfeiting sources), ghost-writing (i.e., submitting another’s work as one’s own) and failure to include quotation marks on material that is otherwise acknowledged; and

Representing as one’s own another’s artistic or scholarly works such as musical compositions, computer programs, photographs, paintings, drawing, sculptures, or similar works.

Collaboration:  Students are allowed, even encouraged, to discuss lectures, readings, and assignments with each other.    But every students must do his or her own work.  Be cautious of sharing your notes, ideas, work, assignments, or papers with other students.  Once you have given them a copy of or access to your work, you cannot control what they might do with it.  If two or more students' work are found to violate the policy, all of the students will receive the same punishment, even if one did the work and the other plagiarized.  Also beware of relationships with other students in which you stand to lose more than you gain.  A student who freeloads off of your hard work might elevates his or her grade (or he might bring yours down) without working, and you get no benefit.  Furthermore, you put yourself at risk for severe penalties for cheating. 

Here is an important passage from the university policy on academic honesty:

The attempt by a student to cheat on an exam or other academic assignment or to engage in plagiarism is a violation of a fundamental principle of academic honesty and integrity and will not be tolerated in the University. Formal procedures exist for dealing with these cases and penalties will be imposed on students who are found guilty of academic dishonesty. In the event of expulsion, suspension or probation, a notation is made on the student’s transcript. Suspension and probation notations remain on the transcript for the life of the suspension/probation. For information, contact the office of the Vice President for Student Affairs.

Artificial Intelligence and Academic Misconduct:

Using an AI text generator for any class assignments, unless the instructor specifically instructs otherwise, is dishonest and will be considered a violation of the CSUS Academic Honesty policy here.  https://www.csus.edu/umanual/student/stu-100.htm  

Submitting any course assignments or prompts to an AI text generator and then submitting the results or any altered form of the results for credit for the assignment in class unless specifically instructed to do so by the instructor will be considered plagiarism, and it could be subject to the full range of sanctions outlined in the university policy.  Here are some of the relevant passages from the policy:

Plagiarism at Sacramento State includes but is not limited to:

1. The act of incorporating into one’s own work the ideas, words, sentences, paragraphs, or parts thereof, or the specific substance of another’s work without giving appropriate credit thereby representing the product as entirely one's own. Examples include not only word-for-word copying, but also the "mosaic" (i.e., interspersing a few of one’s own words while, in essence, copying another’s work), the paraphrase (i.e., rewriting another’s work while still using the other’s fundamental idea or theory); fabrication (i.e., inventing or counterfeiting sources), ghost-writing (i.e., submitting another’s work as one’s own) and failure to include quotation marks on material that is otherwise acknowledged; and 

2. Representing as one’s own another’s artistic or scholarly works such as musical compositions, computer programs, photographs, paintings, drawing, sculptures, or similar works.

Acceptable and Unacceptable Uses of AI Text Generators

Acceptable uses of GPT-3, Chatbot, or other AI text generators:

• Don’t use an AI text generator at all.  

• Submitting your original text or answers to an AI text generator to catch spelling, grammar, and minor structure errors, and making minor revisions in response to the AI’s feedback.  

Unacceptable uses of GPT-3, Chatbot, or other AI text generators:  

Submitting any assignment question or prompt (or part of it, or something similar to it) to an AI text generator (unless you have been explicitly instructed to do so by the instructor) and then doing one or more of the following:

• Reading the AI's response, and using the ideas in the response as inspiration for writing my own answer to the prompt using my own words, or by making changes in the AI’s wording. 

• Copying and pasting all or part of the AI response into the course submission. 

• Making making minor and/or major changes to the AI response, and submitting those results for the course assignment. 

• Using the the AI response to figure out the correct answers.

In addition to using TurnItIn, this course may use rapidly evolving technology (like this) to help detect when student writing has been assisted by AI technology (like Chat GPT). Improper use of AI technology can be grounds for a charge of plagiarism or other academic misconduct, leading to academic penalties (like failing a course) and administrative penalties (like expulsion from the university), regardless of when the academic misconduct is discovered. It is likely that, in the arms race that is digital technology, what seems like today’s detection-proof AI writing tool will be easy to detect by tomorrow, or next week, or next month.

How to Correspond with Your Professors

In general, follow these suggestions for how to correspond:  How to Correspond with Your Professor

There may be a Canvas section associated with this course, but I will not be using the Canvas messaging or email system for any course communications.  Please direct all emails to mccormick@csus.edu  Or see me during office hours, listed and linked on my main webpage above.  

Students with Disabilities

If you have a disability and require accommodations, you need to provide disability documentation to SSWD, Lassen Hall 1008, 916-278-6955. 

http://www.csus.edu/sswd/index.html

Please discussion your accommodation needs with me after class or during my office hours early in the semester.