Ethics of Artificial Intelligence and Robotics (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
by Vincent C. Müller · Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Encyclopedia survey of the main ethical debates about AI and robots: privacy and surveillance, manipulation, opacity, bias, human-robot interaction, autonomous weapons, the moral status of machines, superintelligence, and automation's effect on work. The most authoritative free map of 'what machines owe us / we owe them'. Its bibliography is a ready-made advanced reading list. Revised March 2026.
More resources on Philosophy of AI & Technology
Technology and the Virtues: A Philosophical Guide to a Future Worth Wanting
Academic book arguing that fast-changing technologies call for cultivated moral character rather than fixed rules. It draws on Aristotelian, Confucian and Buddhist virtue ethics and applies them to social media, surveillance, robots and human enhancement. A serious, non-hype monograph that gives a constructive ethical framework for living with technology. It is the deep end of the path.
The Chinese Room Argument (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
Encyclopedia entry on Searle's 1980 thought experiment claiming that running a program cannot produce understanding. It sets out the systems, robot, brain-simulator, virtual-mind and other-minds replies, the syntax-versus-semantics debate, and its bearing on large language models (revised 2024).
Computing Machinery and Intelligence
Turing's 1950 Mind paper, which asks whether machines can think and proposes the imitation game (Turing test). It answers nine objections, including the theological, consciousness and Lady Lovelace objections, and sketches learning machines. Easy to read and short, and it sets up every later debate. Full text, 22 pages.
Philosophy of Technology (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
Peer-reviewed encyclopedia survey of the field. It covers humanities and analytic traditions, technology's relation to science, design and artifacts, and the ethics and politics of technology: agency, control, risk and power. The best free map of the whole field, so it works as an entry point before the AI-specific material. It also covers Heidegger, Winner and the value-ladenness debate, which means no separate resource is needed for each. Substantively revised July 2026.