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The moral problems of autonomous vehicles

Publication at Faculty of Science |
2019

Abstract

New technology of autonomous vehicles (henceforth AVs) is expected to save human lives, benefit the environment and save commuters time. Programmers of guiding software wish to make their AV "moral" therefore they appeal to philosophers what type of decision should be implemented in case of lethal collision.

Analogous problems of saving lives and letting die has been solved in "trolleyology". This paper uses contribution of models of the moral judgment to the collision of AV.

The aim of the essay is to point out on series of philosophical discussion of relevant problems which comes with the introduction of new technology of AV. Problems which we solve in both hypothetically and practically on AV we will be able to apply to other instances of robotics with additional degrees of freedom.

The main problem is not the possibility of a suboptimal solution of moral problem of AV from consequentialist perspective. It is the internal fear of a driver of loosing moral agency so they become a mere subject.

This essay offers proposals how to face this worries about loosing agency by means of car sharing and choice of variety of types of AV behaviour.