Episode 124

The ninth episode in a series discussing free will with Mark Taylor. I recall hearing a Buddhist monk discussing the possibility of conscious machines, and our ethical responsibilities towards these. From this we discuss the ethics of destroying sentient life, veganism, Jainism, and "where you draw the line" as regards the sanctity of the tiniest of creatures. This brings us back to questions of free will and how they relate to questions of the rights of animals and other types of conscious entities. We discuss the rapid evolution of robotics, then get into AI ethics and consider how it has been left to the arts to confront these issues (there being a severe lack of funding for "serious" research into AI safety and ethics).

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• consciousness
• free will
• Buddhism and AI
• gliders (Conway's Game of Life entities)
• animal rights
• veganism
• Jainism
• plant consciousness?
• Blade Runner (1982 film)
• robot ethics
• incompatibilism
• Black Mirror (UK TV series)
• Nick Bostrom
• Future of Humanity Institute
• Machine Intelligence Research Institute
• Center For Applied Rationality
• The Long Now Foundation
• Eastern grey kangaroo (Macropus giganteus)