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Terasem Movement, Inc.

Terasem Movement, Inc. 6th Annual Colloquium on The Law of Futuristic Persons December 10, 2010. Out of the Chinese Room, Into the Courtroom: Personhood, Rights, Duties & the Conscious Computer. Elizabeth R. McClellan University of Memphis Cecil C. Humphries School of Law

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Terasem Movement, Inc.

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  1. Terasem Movement, Inc. 6th Annual Colloquium onThe Law of Futuristic Persons December 10, 2010

  2. Out of the Chinese Room,Into the Courtroom:Personhood, Rights, Duties& the Conscious Computer Elizabeth R. McClellan University of Memphis Cecil C. Humphries School of Law J.D. Candidate, May 2012 ermcclellan@gmail.com

  3. Legal Personhood = Rights & Duties What is a legal person? “a right-and-duty bearing unit.” John Dewey, The Historic Background of Corporate Legal Personality, 35 Yale L.J. 655, 655 (1926) “[an] entit[y] which produce[s] legal acts” & “legally meaningful communications.” Tom Allen & Robin Widdison, Can Computers Form Contracts?, 9 Harv. J.L. & Tech 25 (1996)

  4. What Rights & Duties? Legal personhood “signifies what the law makes it signify.” Dewey, The Historic Background of Corporate Legal Personality, 35 Yale L.J. at 655. All legal/juridical persons do not enjoy the same rights. “Human rights” depend more on legal personhood than citizenship in a particular nation, & some apply to nonhuman legal persons.

  5. Legal Personhood & Conscious Computers: Policy Considerations • No theoretical barrier to computer personhood. • Increasing computer autonomy in absence of true consciousness already causing issues in existing legal doctrines. • Logical & consistent to attribute legal consequences of action to autonomous actor. • Rights & duties can create socially responsible behavior if actor is able to appreciate consequences & choose courses of action.

  6. Legal Personhood & Conscious Computers: Obstacles • Historical property classification • Man/machine dualism • In rem/in personam distinction • Public opinion • Technophobia & Fear of the Unknown • Nature of Rights & Duties Attendant on Personhood Claim • Only possible grantors are human beings

  7. Personhood Classifications & Attendant Rights • Human persons • Full spectrum (“natural” rights; IDHR). • Corporate persons • Many, but not all, rights of human persons. • Other entities (associations of human persons) • Less rights/duties than corporate persons, but protected freedoms (e.g., expression) prevent some government interference. • Entities lacking agency (ships & land) • In rem designation is legal fiction; Shaffer v. Heitner. • Animals • Designated as property; no rights; welfare protection. • Computer Consciousness?

  8. Some Points of Comparison • Consciousness • Will • Accountability • Capacity for Social Action • Legally Significant Behavior

  9. “Human Rights” in a Machine Context • Universal Declaration of Human Rights “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.” • Represents core values of Western legal systems • No binding authority, but provides a theoretical framework

  10. Types of Rights Under IDHR • Life & Liberty • Due Process • Personal Freedoms • Civic Participation & Inclusion • Economic & Quality of Life • Educational & Cultural • Community Rights & Duties

  11. Machine Application: IDHR • Life & Liberty • Continued consciousness • Freedom from unpaid servitude • Freedom from experimentation analogous to torture • Due Process • Any entity subject to criminal or civil penalty should be entitled to due process of law. • Potential concerns about efficacy of current criminal & civil penalties when applied to machine consciousness.

  12. Machine Application: IDHR • Personal Freedoms • Broad area, some areas more easily analogized • Right to own property? To seek asylum? • Right to marry? To have a nationality? • Thought/Conscience/Religion? • Civic Participation & Inclusion • Likely to be very controversial. • Suffrage/representation would require Constitutional amendment in U.S.

  13. Machine Application: IDHR • Economic & Quality of Life • Also likely to incite controversy • Concerns about economic stability/resource scarcity • Educational & Cultural Protections • Similarly controversial • Computer consciousness likely to have divergent educational needs.

  14. Machine Application: IDHR • Community Rights & Duties • Duties of Individual Toward Community • Duties of Individual In Exercise of Personal Rights • Right to Be Subject to Limitations of Law Only Where Necessary to Secure • Rights of Others • Morality • Public Order • General Welfare

  15. Concluding Remarks • Theoretical framework of the law & existing principles can adapt to machine consciousness. • Difficulty in extending legal personhood to machine consciousness will lie in philosophy & opinion of human participants in the legal system & broader public discourse, not in doctrinal issues with legal personhood. • Continuing to examine effects of autonomous machine consciousness on legal doctrine in the absence of legal personhood may make need & benefits of legal personhood designation more apparent.

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