We are now entering an era of robots; they have already entered our daily lives. For instance, they appeared on the stage of the Spring Festival Gala. In many movies, they exist as family members, children, girlfriends, and friends. The most exciting imagination about robots is that they become our lovers.
The author of this book is David Levy. His viewpoint is that in the future, love with robots will be as normal as love with other humans, and now the only obstacle to human-robot romance is perception. In other words, from his perspective, robots can replace human lovers and might even adapt better to modern psychology—human love is too burdensome, yet robots might better meet human needs.
The prospect of companion robots will obviously have a profound impact on human ethics. If a machine passes the Turing Test, then we will consider it capable of thinking. But accepting that robots can think changes the definition of thinking; thinking no longer belongs to humans alone. Conversely, more and more thinking is defined by machines. Similarly, if we accept machine lovers as replacements for human lovers, it might change our definition of love. Eventually, even the standards of love might be preset by robots.
Previously, we believed humans were not machines and vice versa; humans and tools were separate and would not become a community. If we accept machine lovers, the prospect is that we will enter a moral community where humans and machines coexist. This raises a question: In this new moral community, what moral status should companion robots have?
There are many voices now, but perhaps no consensus. This is a fundamental question that will determine the future form of human-machine coexistence and the principles to be followed.
Moral status refers to the position, entitlements, and roles a moral subject holds within a moral community. Discussions on moral status are divided into moral agents and moral patients. Being a moral agent implies bearing certain moral obligations, which is very difficult for robots. Therefore, discussions focus more on robots as moral patients: Should we extend moral concerns to them? Must we treat robots according to certain moral norms?
Several Paths to Granting Robots Moral Status
The first path still views companion robots as tools. They have no unique moral status but simply a derivative moral status as the property of others. For example, I respect it because I respect you; if I break it, I violate your ownership. But many believe this is insufficient, as it lacks an independent moral status based on itself.
Let’s look at the second path, something off the top of your head, that is, imitating how we grant moral status to animals. Animals have consciousness, so applying this way of thinking to robots is difficult. It’s hard to prove that a machine can directly feel pain. It might only act as if it were in pain, but internally, it’s nothing but algorithms. Therefore, this path is somewhat impassable.
Mark Coeckelbergh took another path. He said we should not start from properties, but from relationships. My moral concern for a robot is not because it possesses certain properties, but merely because the way it appears to me imposes a certain demand for moral concern. For instance, I shouldn’t kick a robot dog, not because the robot dog can feel pain, but because its display of pain morally forbids me to kick it.
The second path fails to notice a kind of cultural aphasia. Our moral concern for robots is hard to separate from our life context, and this life context is imbued with culture.
Nancy Jecker explored whether it’s possible to expand the concept of personhood to cover it. Her conclusion is that it’s difficult in the West because the Western concept of personhood is based on the inner spirit. It is hard to access a machine’s interior because it’s driven by algorithms. But she believes African and Confucian concepts of personhood are relational. And they are not based on innateness but are acquired later. By adopting this open, relational concept, we might be able to grant personhood to machines.
I agree with this point. Confucianism would grant robots some moral concern.
“All things are complete within me. There is no greater delight than to be conscious of sincerity on self-examination.”
This passage from Mencius means Confucianism is different from the Western concept. It does not classify beings into different hierarchies based on properties. Confucianism is a continuous network of existence; we are all within relationships. We are different yet interconnected.
In this relational cosmic view, Confucianism naturally places all beings within a civilizational narrative and grants them certain care. It is more ethics preceding ontology than ontology preceding ethics. Ethics brings all beings into an interconnected ethical narrative, granting humans the most prominent moral status and requiring them to extend moral concern to all things in the universe.
But why is this still not enough? The previous discussions are too linear, focusing only on the unilateral human-machine relationship. Confucianism is not like this; it places the relationships of all beings within a network of relations. For example, when it comes to the discussion of the parent-child relationship, it is within the family network; the family relationship is placed within the intergenerational network, and then within the network of unity between heaven and earth. So, Confucianism seeks to confirm our moral status within a network. Confucianism would agree that robots should be given certain moral status and moral concern, but this does not mean they have the same status as humans. We must not confuse the ethical roles of humans and robots, because our setting of ethical roles is constrained by the relational network. Given that humans are always simultaneously in multiple relationships and bear multiple roles, the way humans interact with robots is not only constrained by the “human-machine” relationship but also by other relevant interpersonal relationships. This means that for clarifying the ethically permissible use scope of sex robots, a relational practical perspective is indispensable: Introducing robots into human intimate practices would negatively affect relevant interpersonal relationships and their inherent moral commitments, so this way of treating robots is ethically questionable.
Therefore, I believe a problematic tendency in current machine ethics is the inclination to confuse robots with humans, viewing that robots can replace human lovers. But from a Confucian perspective, confusing the ethical roles of robots and humans will shake the foundation of the relational network, thereby dissolving Confucian humanistic relationships. Confucianism believes humanistic relationships are the key arena for our inner virtue and life growth.
The Ethical Implications of the Moral Boundaries for Companion Robots
If we establish the moral boundaries for companion robots from a Confucian perspective, it means there should be ethical concern for robots, but not confused with humans. This will impact our human-machine coexistence. The first impact is that it will open a virtue perspective for evaluating companion robots.
This virtue perspective is actually very important. This perspective can address some difficult issues in current companion robots. For example, using popular Western theories to handle sex robots presents puzzles: Is it wrong for a human to rape a robot? Is it wrong to design a therapeutic child robot for pedophiles?
From a utilitarian perspective—one that evaluates actions based on their consequences, the robot will not be harmed, so it’s hard to say why it’s wrong.
From a Confucian virtue perspective, one can instead offer the clearest and most powerful objection: The reason why these practices involving sex robots are morally unacceptable is that they shape the user’s desires and motivations in the wrong way, corrupting the user’s inner character. Thus, even if using sex robots in this way does not violate anyone’s rights or cause any visible negative consequences, designing, selling, and using such robots is still morally repugnant.
Second, using machine lovers to replace human lovers might disturb human relations, leading to the disintegration of our life order and life’s meaning.
The disintegration of life’s meaning occurs on two levels. On the private level, when an individual is induced to replace a human lover with a virtual intimate relationship, he/she is deprived of the precious opportunity to construct a meaningful life. Intimate relationships with human partners are growth-oriented and constitutive. By forming partnerships with human companions and building families, we establish a long timeline in our lives, deeply interwoven with our life journeys, settling and realizing the meaning of life. In contrast, relationships with robots can only produce fragmented, bubble-like, transient “happiness.”
On the public level, from the overall societal perspective, if choosing machine lovers becomes a trend pursued and emulated by everyone, it will accelerate social atomization and fragmentation. Advocates of companion robots argue that robots can provide social support for the lonely, using this as an ethical defense for developing companion robots. However, this might just be a beautiful illusion, because no matter how the machine acts with love, there is no genuine care here, only programmed performances of care.
More dangerously, the most vulnerable groups with the least social capital often become the most deeply deprived. The lonelier a person is, the more likely he/she is to indulge in machine companionship. And the more time, emotion, and money invested in the machine, the more it weakens their ability to gain support from interpersonal networks. A robotic solution aimed at solving modern intimacy issues instead brings about a dispersed society and the loneliest individuals. Such a prospect is clearly seriously morally flawed and violates the ideal social order advocated by Confucianism that helpless widows and widowers, orphans and the lonely, as well as the sick and the disabled, are well cared for.
Third, from the perspective of experience, some say that if the experience with a robot is better than that with a human lover, shouldn’t we be happy for humans? Here, I want to raise the Confucian view: experience is not sufficient.
When a person chooses a sex robot that will never reject him out of fear of being hurt or a desire for control, perhaps he can gain temporary satisfaction from this choice, but he will pay a long-term moral cost for it. Borrowing from Mencius’s debate on the great and little parts of the self:
“Those who follow that part of themselves which is great are great men; those who follow that part of themselves which is little are little men.”
Being engrossed in virtual relationships with robots typically involves choosing the little part over the great part, indulging in the desires of the ears and eyes while abandoning the cultivation of inner virtue. What one loses is a kind of responsibility towards the growth of one’s inner moral self. Confucianism would agree with the view of some humanist critics that being serenely connected to a lifeless machine is a kind of wanton technology use without scruple.
Confucianism has a particular view of the self, believing that in life, we have a moral responsibility to achieve a moral self, and the growth of this moral self must necessarily originate from interpersonal relationships. You cannot get such an opportunity with a robot, so it is a kind of self-abandonment.
Using a virtual machine solution to replace real interpersonal relationships will undoubtedly damage the meaning-making mechanisms at the root of self-existence, erode the sense of life belonging supported by community, and make our inner selves wither and hollow.
How we treat companion robots essentially reflects how we understand ourselves and our current lives. The Confucian viewpoint is that we should care for our companion robots and grant them moral status. But the foundation of this moral status comes from one’s relationship with the robot, one’s relationships with others, and ultimately, one’s relationship with oneself.
Finally, I want to say one more thing. In fact, I do not intend to completely resolve this issue. I merely want to offer a reminder about what might be lost by choosing to be with a robot. I think we need this kind of sobriety for culture right now.
Our current machine culture is permeated with an anti-fragility narrative. Humans have many fragile aspects—for example, robots can provide care when we are old; finding a human lover is hard, hence the machine lover. Now, artificial intelligence offers a narrative that all your fragility can be solved by machines.
In my view, this anti-fragility narrative makes society more atomized. People expect more and more from machines, yet less and less from others. Is this a future worth aspiring to?
My view conforms to the Confucian view: We should not want to eradicate human vulnerability. Vulnerability is an important source of humanity.
Our vulnerability means we give ourselves to others who may get the opportunity to hurt us. In our real-life relationships with others, especially in love relationships, we have vulnerability. Loving someone gives them the power to break your heart. But this vulnerability actually allows for deeper connections. These connections are the source of the meaning of our lives, serving as an indispensable basis for our inner moral growth.
- AI
- ethics
- companion robots