Driverless Cars Demand Ethical Thinking by Humans

The Wired Word for the Week of July 31, 2016

"Teaching Driverless Cars Whom to Kill" is a deliberately provocative headline from a recent Newsweek article, but, when you read the piece, you see the headline is a succinct statement of a significant ethical dilemma facing those who are developing such vehicles.

Driverless cars, long a futuristic concept, are now in various stages of development at 30 corporations worldwide. And in the United States, four states plus Washington, D.C., have passed legislation permitting testing of prototypes on public roads. But to date, no driverless car is fully ready for sale to the general public.

The startling headline from Newsweek tells one reason why: Programmers must decide what protocols to put into the "brain" of such a vehicle regarding how to choose between saving the lives of those in the car and those outside it when situations bring the two into conflict.

For example, suppose a self-driving car carrying passengers is zooming down a road when some distracted pedestrians step into its path. Given the speed of the vehicle and the proximity of the people in the road, the car may have only two options: mow the walkers down or swerve into a tree, killing the people inside the car.

Newsweek referenced a recent study, "The Social Dilemma of Autonomous Vehicles," in the journal Science that polled nearly 2,000 people regarding the relative morality of an autonomous car's response during a number of hypothetical crashes. In general, those surveyed felt that the more pedestrians were spared, the more ethical it was for the car to sacrifice a passenger -- even when that passenger was one of their family members.

Responses were less straightforward, however, when those polled were asked whether governments should require driverless cars to minimize pedestrian deaths at the expense of passengers, and if participants would actually purchase a car designed to make that choice.

"People liked the idea of autonomous cars that would kill one pedestrian to save 10 others," said the Newsweek article. "They also liked the idea of other motorists owning cars that would sacrifice passengers to protect pedestrians. But they were less likely to want to own such a car themselves or to support the government enforcing this kind of sacrifice."

Lyad Rahwan, co-author of the study, summarized, saying, "Most people want to live in a world where cars will minimize casualties. But everybody wants their own car to protect them at all costs."  

The difficulty, of course, as development of driverless cars moves forward, is that somebody must decide in advance who the vehicles will try to spare in life-and-death situations. "When it comes down to it," Newsweek observed, "nobody wants to be the one to plow into a tree to save the walkers."

More on this story can be found at these links:

Teaching Driverless Cars Whom to Kill. Newsweek
People Want Driverless Cars with Utilitarian Ethics, Unless They're a Passenger. IEEE SpectrumThe Social Dilemma of Autonomous Vehicles. Science (abstract only)
30 Corporations Working On Autonomous Vehicles. CB Insights

Applying the News Story

This news invites a discussion regarding the value of each human life, but also touches on matters of ethical decision making in life-against-life situations.

While driverless cars are objects of technology, the protocols for such vehicles will be decided and programmed by human beings, and thus the whole matter is about human choices and thus ethics.

Ethics, as typically defined, "is the discipline concerned with the evaluation of human conduct, that is, with determining the goodness or evil properly ascribed to human choices." Christian ethics "is this discipline pursued in the perspective of the Christian faith." Christian ethics are sometimes explained as "responsible freedom."

The Big Questions

1. In the hypothetical situation described in paragraph 4 of the "In the News" section above, what "choice" would you want the car to make? Would your answer be any different if you were one of the passengers? if you were one of the pedestrians? Why?

2. If you were in charge of deciding the protocols for a driverless car, what sources of human wisdom might you consult when making those decisions? Why? How might you tap into divine wisdom to aid decision making? Where might human and divine wisdom overlap in this situation?

3. Aside from driverless cars, where else in life might you need to apply similar protocols? If you have had to actually do so, describe what entered into your thinking?

4. How should the commandment "Thou shall not kill" be applied to these protocols?

5. When has deciding how you will respond in advance of a hypothetical situation helped you when an actual situation came along? What commitments regarding behavior, if any, should Christians decide in advance of actually facing circumstances where a clear way forward is not obvious?

Confronting the News With Scripture and HopeHere are some Bible verses to guide your discussion:

Leviticus 19:35-36You shall not cheat in measuring length, weight, or quantity. You shall have honest balances, honest weights, an honest ephah, and an honest hin: I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt. (For context, read 19:1-37.)

These two verses are samples from a whole chapter that deals with real-life ethical applications of serving God. (Another term for faith-driven ethical applications is "moral holiness.")

Question: Why do you think God included the statement "I am the Lord your God" in a command about ethical dealings in the marketplace?

Acts 16:4-5
As they went from town to town, they delivered to them for observance the decisions that had been reached by the apostles and elders who were in Jerusalem. So the churches were strengthened in the faith and increased in numbers daily. (For context, read 15:40--16:5.)

The "they" in the verses above refers to Paul, Silas and Timothy. The three traveled together throughout Asia Minor preaching the gospel, establishing new churches and, as mentioned above, passing along directives from the apostles and elders, who were the leaders of the whole church. In this case, the directives no doubt included the church council's recent decision that Gentiles were welcome in the church without having to observe Jewish practices (see the council's deliberation and decision in Acts 15:1-21).

The passage shows us that right from its early days, the church felt an obligation to issue instructions for how Christianity should apply to matters which people in the local churches were dealing with on a daily basis. So in that sense, the church was advising Christians in advance how they should behave in given circumstances.

Questions: What resources help you decide in advance how you will respond in certain difficult situations? How do these beforehand commitments help you when you encounter a situation that is different from those you anticipated and where the right choice is not clear-cut?

Matthew 7:12In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets. (In its location in Matthew 7, this verse appears as a stand-alone statement within the Sermon on the Mount. However, it easily connects with earlier statements Jesus made in that same discourse, especially 5:43-48.)

When speaking in summary about what Jesus taught, it is hard to avoid this verse, the one often called the "Golden Rule." In fact, we have quoted it several times previously in various Wired Word lessons. But it deserves to be heard again and again, and it is especially applicable to the subject at hand, for it is part of the bedrock for Christian ethics.

Questions: How might the Golden Rule apply to driverless car protocols regarding life-against-life choices?
Driverless cars aside, would applying the Golden Rule to our driving be likely to make our roads safer? Why or why not?

1 Kings 3:9Give your servant therefore an understanding mind to govern your people, able to discern between good and evil; for who can govern this your great people? (For context, read 3:3-14.)

Although in later life Israel's King Solomon departed from the Lord, early on he made an excellent start, requesting of God not wealth and power, but "an understanding mind to govern your people, able to discern between good and evil." This request so pleased God that God not only granted it, but granted the unasked-for wealth and power as well.

Solomon's request for the ability to discern between good and evil reveals that the concern for clear guidance in difficult, "unscripted" areas has been around a long time. In short, Solomon was asking God to help him with "casuistry."

Casuistry (KAZH-oo-i-stree) is a word common in the study of morals and ethics. It comes from the Latin word casus, which means "case." Casuistry is the work of determining the right thing to do in unclear situations by applying general principles of moral law to specific situations where a moral or ethical decision is needed. In other words, it's figuring out what to do on a case-by-case basis using the broad guidelines we do have.

Questions: In what situation did you have to make a casuistic decision? What general principles or guidelines did you deduce your decision from? How, if at all, can case-by-case protocols be built into driverless car controls?

2 Timothy 3:16-17
All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, so that everyone who belongs to God may be proficient, equipped for every good work. (For context, read 3:14-17.)

This is a reminder that the Bible is the primary sourcebook for Christian ethics.

Question: What arrangements have you made for learning what's in the Bible and for studying it? What does it mean to "apply scripture" to the circumstances of your life where a clear right and wrong is not obvious?

For Further Discussion

1. Have you heard of the trolley problem? It is essentially this: A runaway trolley is headed toward a group of five people standing on the tracks. You are standing next to a lever, and if you pull this lever, the trolley will be switched onto a different track, with a single person standing on it. Do you pull the lever?

2. Respond to this from one of the people working in the development of autonomous cars: "... we're putting more of a burden on the autonomous car than we do on the human driver. Human drivers, when faced with emergency situations where they might have to make a difficult ethical decision, aren't always able to make a reasonable ethical decision in that short amount of time. What level of performance are we going to hold autonomous cars to? The answer is, quite probably, a higher level of performance than we would hold a human driver to, or most people won't accept the technology. That may be unfair, but it doesn't necessarily mean that it's wrong."

3. Discuss this, from TWW team member David Lee: "The premise for Isaac Asimov's three laws of Artificial Intelligence (where we even got the term!) are that first, a robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm; second, that a robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the first law; and, third, that a robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the first or second laws.
            "Also is self-driving self-autonomous? Some cars already are able to park themselves, and can only park in places that the AI determines the car can fit into without trouble. But we can make cars choose to fit into tighter places."

Responding to the News

This is a good time to remind ourselves that following Jesus includes trying our best to live as people with Christian ethics and morals. And this should apply not only to personal behavior, but also to how we address issues of our society.

TWW team member Mary Sells gives some examples, but you can likely add others:

"To me personally the handgun issue in the United States is a chicken-and-egg conundrum. Do we need guns because we fear others with guns?  If I had a gun, I would need to be prepared to use it, potentially to harm or kill another in self-defense. How does the Bible inform us in that decision-making moment of potentially taking a life?"

"If I believe 'thou shalt not kill,' how do I reconcile the death penalty?"

"When soldiers go off to war zones, we know some will not return, having sacrificed their lives.  Is there moral holiness in this kind of sacrifice, or have we accepted dying soldiers as 'normal' for so many centuries that we have no other view?"

"In other closer-to-home situations, we know cigarette use and working/living with asbestos and taking too many drugs might kill some people. Is that an ethical issue when people choose to accept the danger?"

Prayer

Help us, O Lord, in applying our faith to the nitty-gritty of life, and especially to the situations where the way forward is not clear. In Jesus' name. Amen.