Abstract
Assume that a researcher uncovers a major problem with how social media are currently used. What sort of challenges arise when they must subsequently decide whether or not to use social media to create awareness about this problem? This situation routinely occurs as ethicists navigate choices regarding how to effect change and potentially remedy the problems they uncover. In this article, challenges related to new technologies and what is often referred to as ‘Big Tech’ are emphasized. We present what we refer to as the AI ethicist’s dilemma, which emerges when an AI ethicist has to consider how their own success in communicating an identified problem is associated with a high risk of decreasing the chances of successfully remedying the problem. We examine how the ethicist can resolve the dilemma and arrive at ethically sound paths of action through combining three ethical theories: virtue ethics, deontological ethics and consequentialist ethics. The article concludes that attempting to change the world of Big Tech only using the technologies and tools they provide will at times prove to be counter-productive, and that political and other more disruptive avenues of action should also be seriously considered by ethicists who want to effect long-term change. Both strategies have advantages and disadvantages, and a combination might be desirable to achieve these advantages and mitigate some of the disadvantages discussed.
Highlights
Assume that a researcher uncovers major problems related to the increased usage of AI and AI based social media
While related to dilemmas experienced by ethicists in other fields, we argue that the dilemma is salient for those who work in the field of AI ethics
Just as Marxists may lament the emergence of social democracy, as it potentially pacifies the working class and prevents their revolution from unfolding, so could the AI ethicist’s efforts to effect change from within the system be seen as an activity that undermines the possibility for real change
Summary
Assume that a researcher uncovers major problems related to the increased usage of AI and AI based social media. The dilemma extends beyond social media, and entails These examples relate to what we refer to as the ethicist’s dilemma, which emerges when an ethicist has to consider how their own success in communicating an identified challenge is associated with a high risk of decreasing the chances of successfully facing the challenge. This dilemma occurs in situations in which the means to achieve one’s goals are seemingly best achieved by supporting that which one wishes to correct and/or practicing the opposite of that which one preaches. Serious efforts to achieve change may require the ethicist to partly distance themselves from the system in question and instead, or at least aim at mobilising the power of politics and civil society to effect change
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