Ethics, Love and the Alignment Problem in Artificial Intelligence
One of the largest unsolved problems in artificial intelligence is the so-called "alignment problem", that is, the problem of creating an AI that takes actions that are truly aligned with human desires. It is not really surprising that this problem has not been solved, given that generations of philosophers and prophets have failed to solve it for human beings, let alone for artificial intelligence. I will overview the problem, some of the proposed solutions (and their problems) and then propose a path forward based on the concept of unselfish love.
James Carroll received a PhD in Computer Science with an emphasis on Artificial Intelligence and a minor in Ancient Near Eastern History in 2010 from Brigham Young University. His dissertation was on the Statistics of Machine Learning, and the Computer Assisted annotation of ancient religious texts. As a graduate student he taught classes on Artificial Intelligence, Isaiah, The Book of Mormon, and The Pearl of Great Price in the Ancient Scripture Department. After graduation he worked at Los Alamos National Laboratory, first as a post doc, and then as a scientist, where he worked primarily on radiography. He is currently researching the application of Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence for the analysis of Radiographic Image data. He currently attends the Unitarian Universalist Church of Los Alamos, where he teaches Adult Religious Education classes on comparative religion and the Old Testament. His classes are available online at: https://www.youtube.com/@jlc46
