Artificial Moral Agency: Autonomy and Evolution

This thesis aims to establish the possibility of, and a pathway to, artificial moral agents. Artificial moral agents are argued to be of value not just for their practical performance, but because they offer a non-human perspective that can be used to make human theories more objective. The thesis works to a definition of moral agency, arguing that moral agents need to be intentional, morally reasons-responsive, and autonomous, but not necessarily conscious. Then, applying this to artificial agents, it draws on literature from moral epistemology and responsibility to argue that artificial agents normally fail to meet these criteria because they are not simultaneously morally reasons-responsive and autonomous. Following this, it argues that the most promising means of developing artificial moral agents is for artificial agents to evolve into moral agents. Even if not moral agents precisely, the evolutionary development suggested seems likely to produce autonomous artificial agents that respond to some moral reasons, which would still offer the desired non-human perspective.