Robots: Lifesavers or Terminators?

Government officials say autonomous vehicles will make transportation safer, more accessible, more efficient and cleaner and last week, the Department of Transportation released guidelines for the testing and deployment of automated vehicles, which detail how the vehicles should perform, and include a model for state policies. Self-driving vehicles are just the tip of the autonomous revolution. In 2016, autonomous robot doctors perform surgery; algorithms invest your money; robocops patrol shopping malls; and if you end up in hospital, a computer system can determine how quickly you get treated. Many decisions made by autonomous machines have moral implications -- yet little is determined about what ethics machines follow, or who decides what those ethical assumptions should be. In Florida in May, Joshua Brown died when an autopilot system did not recognize a tractor-trailer turning in front of his Tesla Model S and his car plowed into it -- the first fatality involving an autonomous vehicle.