research-article

Epistemic Side Effects: An AI Safety Problem

Authors:

Toryn Q. Klassen,

Parand Alizadeh Alamdari,

Sheila A. McIlraithAuthors Info & Claims

AAMAS '23: Proceedings of the 2023 International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems

Pages 1797 - 1801

Published: 30 May 2023 Publication History

Abstract

AI safety research has investigated the problem of negative side effects -- undesirable changes made by AI systems in pursuit of an underspecified objective. However, the focus has been on physical side effects, such as a robot breaking a vase while moving (when the objective makes no mention of the vase). In this paper we introduce the notion of epistemic side effects, which are side effects on the knowledge or beliefs of agents. Epistemic side effects are most pertinent in a (partially observable) multiagent setting. We show that we can extend an existing approach to avoiding (physical) side effects in reinforcement learning to also avoid some epistemic side effects in certain cases. Nonetheless, avoiding negative epistemic side effects remains an important challenge, and we identify some key research problems.

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Cited By

Klassen TMuise CMcIlraith SMarquis PSon TKern-Isberner G(2023)Planning with epistemic preferencesProceedings of the 20th International Conference on Principles of Knowledge Representation and Reasoning10.24963/kr.2023/76(752-756)Online publication date: 2-Sep-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.24963/kr.2023/76

Index Terms

Epistemic Side Effects: An AI Safety Problem
1. Computing methodologies
  1. Artificial intelligence
    1. Knowledge representation and reasoning
      1. Reasoning about belief and knowledge
    2. Philosophical/theoretical foundations of artificial intelligence
      1. Theory of mind
2. Theory of computation
  1. Theory and algorithms for application domains
    1. Machine learning theory
      1. Reinforcement learning
        Sequential decision making

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cover image ACM Conferences

AAMAS '23: Proceedings of the 2023 International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems

May 2023

3131 pages

ISBN:9781450394321

General Chairs:
Noa Agmon
Bar-Ilan University, Israel
,
Bo An
Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
,
Program Chairs:
Alessandro Ricci
University of Bologna, Italy
,
William Yeoh
Washington University in St. Louis, USA

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International Foundation for Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems

Richland, SC

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Published: 30 May 2023

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AAMAS '23

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SIGAI

AAMAS '23: International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems

May 29 - June 2, 2023

London, United Kingdom

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Overall Acceptance Rate 1,155 of 5,036 submissions, 23%

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Cited By

Klassen TMuise CMcIlraith SMarquis PSon TKern-Isberner G(2023)Planning with epistemic preferencesProceedings of the 20th International Conference on Principles of Knowledge Representation and Reasoning10.24963/kr.2023/76(752-756)Online publication date: 2-Sep-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.24963/kr.2023/76

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