Humans, Neanderthals, robots and rights

Mamak, K.

Ethics Inf Technol 24, 33 (2022).

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10676-022-09644-z

Abstract

Robots are becoming more visible parts of our life, a situation which prompts questions about their place in our society. One group of issues that is widely discussed is connected with robots’ moral and legal status as well as their potential rights. The question of granting robots rights is polarizing. Some positions accept the possibility of granting them human rights whereas others reject the notion that robots can be considered potential rights holders. In this paper, I claim that robots will never have all human rights, even if we accept that they are morally equal to humans. I focus on the role of embodiment in the content of the law. I claim that even relatively small differences in the ontologies of entities could lead to the need to create new sets of rights. I use the example of Neanderthals to illustrate that entities similar to us might have required different legal statuses. Then, I discuss the potential legal status of human-like robots.

Conclusions

The place of robots in the law universe depends on many things. One is our decision about their moral status, but even if we accept that some robots are equal to humans, this does not mean that they have the same legal status as humans. Law, as a human product, is tailored to a human being who has a body. Embodiment impacts the content of law, and entities with different ontologies are not suited to human law. As discussed here, Neanderthals, who are very close to us from a biological point of view, and human-like robots cannot be counted as humans by law. Doing so would be anthropocentric and harmful to such entities because it could ignore aspects of their lives that are important for them. It is certain that the current law is not ready for human-like robots.

The info is here.

Here is a summary: 

In terms of robot rights, one factor to consider is the nature of robots. Robots are becoming increasingly sophisticated, and some experts believe that they may eventually become as intelligent as humans. If this is the case, then it is possible that robots could deserve the same rights as humans.

Another factor to consider is the relationship between humans and robots. Humans have a long history of using animals, and some people argue that robots are simply another form of animal. If this is the case, then it is possible that robots do not deserve the same rights as humans.

• The question of robot rights is a complex one, and there is no easy answer.
• The nature of robots and the relationship between humans and robots are two important factors to consider when thinking about robot rights.
• It is important to start thinking about robot rights now, before robots become too sophisticated.

Should animals, plants, and robots have the same rights as you?

Sigal Samuel
www.vox.com
Originally posted April 4, 2019

Here is an excerpt:

The moral circle is a fundamental concept among philosophers, psychologists, activists, and others who think seriously about what motivates people to do good. It was introduced by historian William Lecky in the 1860s and popularized by philosopher Peter Singer in the 1980s.

Now it’s cropping up more often in activist circles as new social movements use it to make the case for granting rights to more and more entities. Animals. Nature. Robots. Should they all get rights similar to the ones you enjoy? For example, you have the right not to be unjustly imprisoned (liberty) and the right not to be experimented on (bodily integrity). Maybe animals should too.

If you’re tempted to dismiss that notion as absurd, ask yourself: How do you decide whether an entity deserves rights?

Many people think that sentience, the ability to feel sensations like pain and pleasure, is the deciding factor. If that’s the case, what degree of sentience is required to make the cut? Maybe you think we should secure legal rights for chimpanzees and elephants — as the Nonhuman Rights Project is aiming to do — but not for, say, shrimp.

Some people think sentience is the wrong litmus test; they argue we should include anything that’s alive or that supports living things. Maybe you think we should secure rights for natural ecosystems, as the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund is doing. Lake Erie won legal personhood status in February, and recent years have seen rights granted to rivers and forests in New Zealand, India, and Colombia.

The info is here.

China's Latest Cloned-Monkey Experiment Is an Ethical Mess

Ryan F. Mandelbaum

www.gizmodo.com
Originally published January 19, 2019

Chinese researchers have cloned five gene-edited monkeys with a host of genetic disease symptoms, according to two scientific papers published today.

The researchers say they want to use the gene-edited macaques for biomedical research; basically, they hope that engineering sick primates will reduce the total number of macaques used in research around the world. But their experiment is a minefield of ethical quandaries—and makes you wonder whether the potential benefits to science are enough to warrant all of the harm to these monkeys.

The researchers began by using CRISPR/Cas9 to alter the DNA of a donor macaque. CRISPR/Cas9 is the often-discussed gene editing tool derived from bacteria that combines repeating sequences of DNA and a DNA-cutting enzyme in order to customize DNA sequences. Experts and the press have heralded it as an important advance due to how quickly and cheaply it can alter DNA, but recent research has demonstrated it may cause more unintended effects than previously thought.

(cut)

This research combines a ton of ethical issues into one package, from those surrounding animal rights to cloning to gene editing. As bioethicist Carolyn Neuhaus from The Hastings Center summarized her reaction to the announcement: “Whoa, this is a doozy.”

The info is here.

Ethics debate as pig brains kept alive without a body

Pallab Ghosh
BBC.com
Originally published April 27, 2018

Researchers at Yale University have restored circulation to the brains of decapitated pigs, and kept the organs alive for several hours.

Their aim is to develop a way of studying intact human brains in the lab for medical research.

Although there is no evidence that the animals were aware, there is concern that some degree of consciousness might have remained.

Details of the study were presented at a brain science ethics meeting held at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda in Maryland on 28 March.

The work, by Prof Nenad Sestan of Yale University, was discussed as part of an NIH investigation of ethical issues arising from neuroscience research in the US.

Prof Sestan explained that he and his team experimented on more than 100 pig brains.

The information is here.

Breakthrough as scientists grow sheep embryos containing human cells

Nicola Davis
The Guardian
Originally published February 17, 2018

Growing human organs inside other animals has taken another step away from science-fiction, with researchers announcing they have grown sheep embryos containing human cells.

Scientists say growing human organs inside animals could not only increase supply, but also offer the possibility of genetically tailoring the organs to be compatible with the immune system of the patient receiving them, by using the patient’s own cells in the procedure, removing the possibility of rejection.

According to NHS Blood and Transplant, almost 460 people died in 2016 waiting for organs, while those who do receive transplants sometimes see organs rejected.

“Even today the best matched organs, except if they come from identical twins, don’t last very long because with time the immune system continuously is attacking them,” said Dr Pablo Ross from the University of California, Davis, who is part of the team working towards growing human organs in other species.

Ross added that if it does become possible to grow human organs inside other species, it might be that organ transplants become a possibility beyond critical conditions.

The information is here.

Toward a Psychology of Moral Expansiveness

Daniel Crimston, Matthew J. Hornsey, Paul G. Bain, Brock Bastian
Current Directions in Psychological Science 
Vol 27, Issue 1, pp. 14 - 19

Abstract

Theorists have long noted that people’s moral circles have expanded over the course of history, with modern people extending moral concern to entities—both human and nonhuman—that our ancestors would never have considered including within their moral boundaries. In recent decades, researchers have sought a comprehensive understanding of the psychology of moral expansiveness. We first review the history of conceptual and methodological approaches in understanding our moral boundaries, with a particular focus on the recently developed Moral Expansiveness Scale. We then explore individual differences in moral expansiveness, attributes of entities that predict their inclusion in moral circles, and cognitive and motivational factors that help explain what we include within our moral boundaries and why they may shrink or expand. Throughout, we highlight the consequences of these psychological effects for real-world ethical decision making.

The article is here.

The Moral Fabric and Social Norms

AEI Political Report
Volume 14, Issue 1
January 2018

A large majority now, as in the past, say moral values in the country are getting worse. Social conservatives, moderates, and liberals agree. At the same time, however, as these pages show, people accept some behaviors once thought wrong. Later in this issue, we look at polls on women’s experiences with sexual harassment, a topic which has drawn public scrutiny following recent allegations of misconduct against high profile individuals.

Q: Right now, do you think . . . ?

The rest of the statistics and information is here.

Are There Non-human Persons? Are There Non-person Humans?

Glenn Cohen | TEDxCambridge
Published October 24, 2017



If we want to live a moral life, how should we treat animals or complex artificial intelligence? What kinds of rights should non-humans have? Harvard Law Professor and world-renowned bioethics expert Glenn Cohen shares how our current moral vocabulary may be leading us into fundamental errors and how to face the complex moral world around us. Glenn Cohen is one of the world’s leading experts on the intersection of bioethics and the law, as well as health law. He is an award-winning speaker and writer having authored more than 98 articles and chapters appearing in countless journals and gaining coverage on ABC, CNN, MSNBC, PBS, the New York Times and more. He recently finished his role as one of the project leads on the multi-million dollar Football Players Health Study at Harvard aimed at improving NFL player health.

If Animals Have Rights, Should Robots?

Nathan Heller

The New Yorker

Originally published November 28, 2016

Here is an except:

This simple fact is responsible for centuries of ethical dispute. One Harambe activist might believe that killing a gorilla as a safeguard against losing human life is unjust due to our cognitive similarity: the way gorillas think is a lot like the way we think, so they merit a similar moral standing. Another might believe that gorillas get their standing from a cognitive dissimilarity: because of our advanced powers of reason, we are called to rise above the cat-eat-mouse game, to be special protectors of animals, from chickens to chimpanzees. (Both views also support untroubled omnivorism: we kill animals because we are but animals, or because our exceptionalism means that human interests win.) These beliefs, obviously opposed, mark our uncertainty about whether we’re rightful peers or masters among other entities with brains. “One does not meet oneself until one catches the reflection from an eye other than human,” the anthropologist and naturalist Loren Eiseley wrote. In confronting similarity and difference, we are forced to set the limits of our species’ moral reach.

Today, however, reckonings of that sort may come with a twist. In an automated world, the gaze that meets our own might not be organic at all. There’s a growing chance that it will belong to a robot: a new and ever more pervasive kind of independent mind. Traditionally, the serial abuse of Siri or violence toward driverless cars hasn’t stirred up Harambe-like alarm. But, if like-mindedness or mastery is our moral standard, why should artificial life with advanced brains and human guardianships be exempt? Until we can pinpoint animals’ claims on us, we won’t be clear about what we owe robots—or what they owe us.

The article is here.

The ethics of animal research: a survey of the public and scientists in North America

Ari R. Joffe, Meredith Bara, Natalie Anton and Nathan Nobis

BMC Medical Ethics

BMC series – open, inclusive and trusted 2016

Background

To determine whether the public and scientists consider common arguments (and counterarguments) in support (or not) of animal research (AR) convincing.

Methods

After validation, the survey was sent to samples of public (Sampling Survey International (SSI; Canadian), Amazon Mechanical Turk (AMT; US), a Canadian city festival and children’s hospital), medical students (two second-year classes), and scientists (corresponding authors, and academic pediatricians). We presented questions about common arguments (with their counterarguments) to justify the moral permissibility (or not) of AR. Responses were compared using Chi-square with Bonferonni correction.

Results

There were 1220 public [SSI, n = 586; AMT, n = 439; Festival, n = 195; Hospital n = 107], 194/331 (59 %) medical student, and 19/319 (6 %) scientist [too few to report] responses. Most public respondents were <45 years (65 %), had some College/University education (83 %), and had never done AR (92 %). Most public and medical student respondents considered ‘benefits arguments’ sufficient to justify AR; however, most acknowledged that counterarguments suggesting alternative research methods may be available, or that it is unclear why the same ‘benefits arguments’ do not apply to using humans in research, significantly weakened ‘benefits arguments’. Almost all were not convinced of the moral permissibility of AR by ‘characteristics of non-human-animals arguments’, including that non-human-animals are not sentient, or are property. Most were not convinced of the moral permissibility of AR by ‘human exceptionalism’ arguments, including that humans have more advanced mental abilities, are of a special ‘kind’, can enter social contracts, or face a ‘lifeboat situation’. Counterarguments explained much of this, including that not all humans have these more advanced abilities [‘argument from species overlap’], and that the notion of ‘kind’ is arbitrary [e.g., why are we not of the ‘kind’ ‘sentient-animal’ or ‘subject-of-a-life’?]. Medical students were more supportive (80 %) of AR at the end of the survey (p < 0.05).

Conclusions

Responses suggest that support for AR may not be based on cogent philosophical rationales, and more open debate is warranted.

The article is here.

Workshop on ethics of monkey research earns cheers and boos

By David Grimm
Science Insider
Originally posted September 8, 2016

Here is an excerpt:

Jeffrey Kahn, a bioethicist at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, and the chair of the chimpanzee report, added that nonhuman primate research should only be conducted if it has to be conducted. “It’s not ethically acceptable to do research that is not necessary. Being ‘necessary’ is not the same as ‘worth doing.’”

That led to a debate about just what constituted “necessary” and “moral justification.” Even research that doesn’t have an immediate translation to people—like figuring out how the monkey brain works—is necessary, argued Newsome, because it could eventually lead to significant new knowledge that might improve human health. “It will be a tragedy for the world if we don’t leave room for basic science.” Most attendees seemed to agree, with some stating that not doing research on monkeys was ethically indefensible because humans would suffer down the line.

Despite that ethical debate, animal welfare groups said they were upset that science—not welfare—dominated the workshop. Of the 13 speakers, eight make their living working with nonhuman primates. The workshop also only devoted 2 minutes—instead of its scheduled 30 minutes—to public comments. “We are extremely disappointed that no animal protection groups were invited,” wrote Kathleen Conlee, vice president of animal research issues for The Humane Society of the United States in Washington, D.C., in an email to ScienceInsider. “It is clear that NIH has not followed through on what Congress requested, which was to examine ethical policies and processes.”

The article is here.

What I Learned From Tickling Apes

By Franz de Waal
New York Times Sunday Review
Originally posted on April 8, 2016

Here is an excerpt:

One reason this whole debate is as heated as it is relates to its moral implications. When our ancestors moved from hunting to farming, they lost respect for animals and began to look at themselves as the rulers of nature. In order to justify how they treated other species, they had to play down their intelligence and deny them a soul. It is impossible to reverse this trend without raising questions about human attitudes and practices. We can see this process underway in the halting of biomedical research on chimpanzees and the opposition to the use of killer whales for entertainment.

Increased respect for animal intelligence also has consequences for cognitive science. For too long, we have left the human intellect dangling in empty evolutionary space. How could our species arrive at planning, empathy, consciousness and so on, if we are part of a natural world devoid of any and all steppingstones to such capacities? Wouldn’t this be about as unlikely as us being the only primates with wings?

The article is here.

Once and Future Sins

By Stefan Klein and Stephen Cave
Aeon Magazine
Originally published March 24, 2015

Here is an excerpt:

But before we start basking in the glow of spreading goodness, we must realise that these changing values have a price. For many of us, such changes would mean sharing or giving up privileges that we have long enjoyed, or admitting that our comfortable lifestyles are based on industries of exploitation, or otherwise recognising that we have in a hundred ways been wrong. This is not a message we rush to hear: there is a reason why prophets of new moralities – think of Socrates or Jesus – often end up dead at the hands of their own people.

We hope that debating the question of what we might be condemned for in 100 years is a way of easing that transition. To help get this debate going, below are four suggestions as to what we think we might be castigated for by our great-grandchildren. They are, we believe, natural extensions of the progress we have witnessed so far. Just as the suffragettes 100 years ago were campaigning for the revolution in women’s rights that we now enjoy, so there are people who are already pushing for these moral revolutions today (which is not to say that we two authors are already living up to them).

The entire article is here.