Responsible Artificial Intelligence: Recommendations and Lessons Learned

Abstract Artificial Intelligence (AI) has huge potential to bring accuracy, efficiency, cost savings and speed to a whole range of human activities and to provide entirely new insights into behaviour and cognition. However, the way AI is developed and deployed for a great part determines how AI will impact our lives and societies. For instance, automated classification systems can deliver prejudiced results and therefore raise questions about privacy and bias; and, the autonomy of intelligent systems, such as, e.g. self-driving vehicles, raises concerns about safety and responsibility. AI’s impact concerns not only the research and development directions for AI, but also how these systems are introduced into society and used in everyday situations. There is a large debate concerning how the use of AI will influence labour, well-being, social interactions, health care, income distribution and other social areas. Dealing with these issues requires that ethical, legal, societal and economic implications are taken into account. In this paper, I will discuss how a responsible approach to the development and use of AI can be achieved, and how current approaches to ensure the ethical alignment of decisions made or supported by AI systems can benefit from the social perspective embedded in non-Western philosophies, in particular the Ubuntu philosophy.