International Robotics & Automation Journal
Mini Review
Open Access
Ethics in robotics and automation: a general view
Abstract
Volume 4 Issue 3 - 2018
Most robotics and automation scientists believe that many new aspects currently
emerging in robotics and automation (R&A), and aspects that are expected to emerge
in future, call for the development of new cultural, ethical and legal regulations that
can face efficiently the most delicate issues that may arise in real practice. Over the
last two decades the subject of ethics in R&A has received great attention and many
important theoretical and practical results were derived in the direction of making
robots and automation systems ethical. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the issue
of ethics in robotics and automation, and outline major representative achievements
in the field.
Spyros G Tzafestas
School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, National
Technical University of Athens, Greece
Correspondence: Spyros G Tzafestas, School of Electrical and
Computer Engineering, National Technical University of Athens,
Greece, Tel 0030-210-6524000, Email tzafesta@cs.ntua.gr
Received: April 02, 2018 | Published: June 27, 2018
Albert Einstein: Relativity applies to physics, not to ethics.
Sholem Asch: Now, more than any time previous in human history, we must arm
ourselves with an ethical code so that each of us will be aware that he is protecting the
moral merchandise absent of which life is not worth living.
Rudolf Steiner: For everyone who accepts ethical norms, their actions will be the
outcome of the principles that compose the ethical code. They merely carry out orders.
They are a higher kind of robot.
Daniel H Wilson: We humans have a love-hate relationship with our technology. We
love each new advance and we hate how fast our world is changing…..The robots
really embody that love-hate relationship we have with technology.
Introduction
Ethics or moral philosophy is a branch of philosophy that studies
in a systematic way, defends, and suggests concepts of right or wrong
performance. The branches of philosophy are metaphysics/ontology,
epistemology, teleology, ethics, aesthetics, and logic. The branches
of ethics are meta-ethics, normative ethics and applied ethics.
Robotics and Automation Ethics is the branch of applied ethics which
investigates the social and ethical issues of robotics and automation
in the broader sense which includes all kinds of automated systems
through the use of computer, information, communication, and control
science and technology, and develops ethical methods for resolving
them via the exploitation of traditional and novel ethical theories (such
as deontological, utilitarianism, value-based theory, case-based theory,
etc.) In particular, Robot Ethics (Roboethics) covers the entire range
of ethical issues related to robot design, operation, and use. Today the
central aim of robotics research is to create robots that possess full
autonomy, i.e., the capability of autonomous decision making. Here is
exactly where the major robo ethics issues arise. Actually, present day
robots are still not fully autonomous. They are partially autonomous.
At the lowest end they possess low level (operational) autonomy (i.e.,
autonomous execution of programmed operations without any human
intervention), and passing from medium level-autonomy (functional
autonomy), they approach the level of full autonomy (at which there is
not any human intervention in decision-making, planning/scheduling,
functioning, and action performing). The same is true for the issues of
ethics, where we have several levels of morality, namely:1
a. Operational morality (moral responsibility lies entirely in the
robot designer and user).
b. Functional morality (the robot has the ability to make moral
judgments without top-down instructions from humans, and the
Submit Manuscript | http://medcraveonline.com
Int Rob Auto J. 2018;4(3):229‒234.
robot designers can no longer predict the robot’s actions and their
consequences).
c. Full morality (the robot is so intelligent that it is fully
autonomously choosing its actions, thereby being fully
responsible for them).
But could a robot be ethical? As argued by many authors, the
minimum requirements for a robot to be ethical are:
a. complete ability to predict the consequences of its own actions
(or inactions),
b.
a set of ethical rules against which to test each possible action/
consequence, so it can select the most ethical action,
c. Legal authority to carry-out autonomous decision making and
action, accompanied by associated liability (e.g.).1-9
Fundamental Ethics Questions in R&A
The ield of R&A ethics was developed over the years by
addressing fundamental general and speciic philosophical questions:
General questions
a. Are the general ethics principles suficient for facing the issues
raised by R&A? The total answer is NO!
b. Is there a need of a speciic ethics framework applied to R&A?
The answer is yes!
c. Is ethics applied to R&A an issue for the individual scholar or
practitioner, the user, or third party? The answer here is ‘TO
ALL”.
229
© 2018 Tzafestas. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which
permits unrestricted use, distribution, and build upon your work non-commercially.
Copyright:
©2018 Tzafestas
Ethics in robotics and automation: a general view
Speciic questions
I. Can we act ethically through, or with, robots and automated
systems? If yes, how?
II. Can we design robots to act ethically? If yes, how? Or,
could robots be truly moral agents?
III. Can we explain the ethical relationships between human
and robots? If yes, how?
IV. Is it ethical to create artiicial moral agents (machines/
robots, software agents, automated systems)?
V. How far can we go in embodying ethics in robots and
automation?
VI. What are the capabilities that a robot should have in order to
be characterized as a moral/ethical robot?
VII. How people should treat robots, and how should robots treat
people?
VIII. Should robots have rights?
IX. Should robots be considered as moral patients?
X. Should moral/ethical robots and intelligent machines have
new legal status?
XI. What role would robotics and automation have into our life
of the future?
XII. Which type of ethical codes is correct for robots and
machines?
XIII. Who or what is responsible if a robot or other automated
system causes harm?
XIV. Who is responsible for actions performed by human-robot
hybrid beings?
XV. Is the need to embed autonomy in a robot contradictory with
the need to embed ethics to it?
XVI. Are there any types of robot that should not be designed?
Why?
XVII. How do robots decide what the proper description of an
action is?
230
XXVI. How do robots decide what the proper description of an
action is?
XXVII. If there are multiple rules, how do robots deal with
conlicting rules?
XXVIII. Are there any risks to create emotional bonds with robots?
XXIX. How can ethics and law be jointly applied in robotics and
automation?
XXX. How might society and ethics change with R&A?
To formulate a sound framework, all the above questions/issues
should be properly addressed.
Short review of R&A ethics
The literature of R&A ethics is very vast. Our aim here is to provide
a short review of some major contributions. The term robo ethics,
for robot ethics, was irstly introduced by G. Veruggio in the First
Symposium on Robo ethics held in San Remo, Italy (Jan/Feb. 2004),
and the irst ethical system in robotics was proposed by Asimov10,
consisting of the so-called Asimov Laws. These deontological laws are
anthropocentric (human-centered) in the sense that the role of robots
is to operate in the human service, and imply that robots have the
capability to make moral decisions in all cases. Roboethics concerns
ethics that occur with robots, such as whether robots pose a threat
to humans in the long or short run, whether some uses of robots are
problematic, such as in healthcare or as killer robots of war, and how
robots should be designed such as they act ethically. Very broadly,
scientists and engineers look at robotics in the following ways:11
a. Robots are mere machines (surely, very useful and sophisticated
machines).
b. Robots raise intrinsic ethical concerns along different human and
technological dimensions.
c. Robots can be regarded as moral agents, not necessarily possessing
free will mental states, emotions, or responsibility.
d. Robots can be conceived as moral patients, i.e., beings that can be
acted for good or bad.
Veruggio deines robo ethics as follows:
XXII. Which type of ethical codes is correct for robots and
automated systems?
“Roboethics is an applied ethics whose objective is to develop
scientiic/cultural/technical tools that can be shared by different social
groups and beliefs. These tools aim to promote and encourage the
development of ‘ROBOTICS’ for the advancement of human society
and individuals, and to help preventing its misuse against humankind.”
Actually, roboethics shares many ‘crucial’ areas with computer ethics,
information ethics, communication technology ethics, automation
ethics, management ethics, and bioethics. Galvan2 argues that robots
possess an intrinsic moral dimension because technology is not an
addition to mankind, but provide a way to distinguish man from
animals.
XXIII. Who is responsible for actions performed by human-robot
hybrid beings?
Veruggio and Operto5 points-out that the principal positions of
scientists and engineers about roboethics are:
XXIV. Is the need to embed autonomy in a robot contradictory with
the need to embed ethics to it?
Not interested in roboethics: These scholars argue that the action
of robot designers is purely technical and does not have an ethical or
social responsibility.
XVIII. If there are multiple rules, how do robots deal with
conlicting rules?
XIX. Are there any risks to create emotional bonds with robots?
XX. Is it ethical to program robots to follow ethical codes?
XXI. Is it ethical to create robotic nurses and soldiers?
XXV. Are there any types of robot that should not be designed?
Why?
Interested in short-term ethical issues: These scholars advocate that
Citation: Tzafestas SG. Ethics in robotics and automation: a general view. Int Rob Auto J. 2018;4(3):229‒234. DOI: 10.15406/iratj.2018.04.00127
Copyright:
©2018 Tzafestas
Ethics in robotics and automation: a general view
certain ethical and social values should be adhered by robot designers
in terms of good or bad.
Interested in long-term ethical issues: These scholars accept that
robot designers have global and long-term moral responsibility (e.g.,
digital divide between societies).
Asaro4 describes how it is possible to make robots that act ethically,
and how humans must act ethically and take the ethical responsibility
on their shoulders, and discusses the question whether robots can be
fully moral agents. Wallach10,12 describes the three typical approaches
for creating ethical machines and robots, and artiicial moral agents
(AMAs) in general. These approaches are:
a. Top-down approach in which the desired rules/laws/principles of
ethical behavior are prescribed and embedded in the robot system.
b. Bottom-up approach in which the robot develops its moral behavior
through learning. This is analogous to how children learn morality
(what is right or wrong) based on social context and experience
from their family and human environment.
c. Mixed approach in which proper combinations of the top-down
and bottom-up approaches are followed.
The ethical concerns of robot use include the following:
Loss of privacy (guidelines should be developed to guard against
robot misuse, e.g., when drones and robots collecting data enter our
home).
Safety issues (when robots work closely with humans).
231
Assistive roboethics/Ethics of assistive robots
Assistive robots constitute a class of service robots which is
focused on the enhancement of the mobility capabilities of impaired
people (people with special needs: PwSN) so as to attain their
best physical and/or social functional level, and have the ability of
independent living.7 Assistive robots/devices include the following:
a. Assistive robots for people with impaired upper limbs and hands.
b. Assistive robots for people with impaired lower limbs
(wheelchairs, walkers).
c. Rehabilitation robots for upper limb or lower limb.
d. Orthotic devices.
e. Prosthetic devices.
The issues of assistive roboethics have been a strong concern over
the years the evaluation of assistive robots can be made along three
main dimensions, namely: cost, risk, and beneit. Since these evaluation
dimensions are contradictory we cannot get full points on all of them
at the same time. Important guidelines for these analyses have been
provided by World Health Organization (WHO) which has approved
an International Classiication of Functioning, Disability and Health
(ICF).19 A framework for the development of assistive robots using
ICF, which includes the evaluation of assistive technologies in users’
life is described.20 A full code of assistive technology was released in
2012 by the USA Rehabilitation Engineering and Assistive Technology
Society (RESNA),21 and another code by the Canadian Commission
on Rehabilitation Councelor Certiication (CRCC) in 2002.22
Liabilty issues (with regard to who is responsible for errors or
faults/failures during robot operation).
Social roboethics or ethics of social robots
Lin, Abney and Bekey8 present a number of contributions by
world-wide researchers that address many of the questions listed
above. Three comprehensive books on ethics of machines, robots,
and information are the following: Capurro R et al.13-15 Two important
books on the more general ield of techno ethics are those of Galvan2
and Tavani.16
Sociorobots (social, socialized, socially assistive, socially
interactive robots) are assistive robot that is designed to enter the
mental and socialization space of humans. This can be achieved by
designing appropriate high-performance human-robot interfaces: HRI
(speech, haptic, visual). The basic features required for a robot to be
socially assistive are:7,23.24
Branches of roboethics
The branches of roboethics are:
Medical roboethics or health care robotics ethics
This branch refers to medicine and health care assisted by
robots.7,17,18 The initiation of medical ethics goes back to the work of
Hippocrates who has formulated the well-known Hippocratic Oath,
which requires a new physician to swear upon a number of healing
gods that he will uphold a number of professional ethical standards.
The fundamental ethical principles of medical roboethics involve
irst of all the principles of the Charter of Medical Professionalism,
namely: Autonomy (The patients have the right to accept or refuse
their treatment). Beneicence (The doctor should act in the best interest
of the patient). Non-maleicence (The practitioner should “irst not to
do harm”). Justice (The distribution of scarce health resources and
decision of who gets what treatment should be just.). Truthfulness
(The patient should not be lied and deserves to know the whole truth).
Dignity (The patient has the right to dignity).
a. Understand and interact with its environment.
b. Exhibit social behavior (for assisting PwSN, the elderly, and
children needing mental/socialization help).
c. Focus its attention and communication on the user (in order to
help the user achieve speciic goals).
A socially interactive robot possesses the following additional
capabilities:23,24
I.
II.
Express and/or perceive emotions.
Communicate with high-level dialogue.
III.
Recognize other agents and learn their models.
IV.
Establish and/or sustain social connections.
V.
VI.
VII.
Use natural patterns (gestures, gaze, etc.).
Present distinctive personality and character.
Develop and/or learn social competence.
Citation: Tzafestas SG. Ethics in robotics and automation: a general view. Int Rob Auto J. 2018;4(3):229‒234. DOI: 10.15406/iratj.2018.04.00127
Copyright:
©2018 Tzafestas
Ethics in robotics and automation: a general view
Well known examples of social robots are:
AIBO: a robotic dog (dogbot) able to interact with humans and play
with a ball (SONY).
KISMET: a human-like robotic head able to express emotions (MIT).
KASPAR: a humanoid robot torso that can function as mediator of
human interaction with autistic children.24
QRIO: a small entertainment humanoid (SONY).
Automous car roboethics
Autonomous (self-driving, driverless) cars are on the way.
Proponents of autonomous cars and other vehicles argue that within
two or three decades autonomously driving cars will be so accurate
that will dominate in number human-driving cars.25,26 The speciics of
self-driving vary from manufacturer to manufacturer, but at the basic
level cars use a set of cameras, lasers and sensors located around the
vehicle for detecting obstacles, and through GPS (global positioning
systems) help them to move at a preset route. Currently there are cars
on the road that perform several driving tasks autonomously (without
the help of the human driver). Examples are: lane assist system to keep
the car on lane, cruise control system that speeds-up or slows down
according to the speed of the car in front, and automatic emergency
braking for emergency stop to prevent collisions with pedestrians.
SAE (Society of Automotive Engineers) International (www.sae.org/
autodrive) has developed and released a new standard (J3016) for the
“Taxonomy and deinitions of terms related to on-road motor vehicle
automated driving systems”.
War/military roboethics
Military robots, especially lethal autonomous robotic weapons, lie
at the center of roboethics. Supporters of the use of war robots argue
that these robots have substantial advantages which include the saving
of the lives of soldiers, and the conduct of war more ethically and
effectively than human soldiers who, under the inluence of emotions,
anger, fatigue, vengeance, etc., may over-react and overstep the laws
of war. The opponents of the use of autonomous killer robots argue
that weapon autonomy itself is the problem and not mere control of
autonomous weapons could ever be satisfactory. Their central belief
is that autonomous lethal robots must be entirely prohibited. The
ethics of war attempts to resolve what is right or wrong, both for the
individual and the states or countries contributing to debates on public
policy, and ultimately leading to the establishment of codes of war.26,27
The three dominating traditions (doctrines) in the ‘‘ethics of war and
peace are):28
a. Realism (war is an inevitable process taking place in the anarchical
world system).
b. Paciism or anti-warism (rejects war in favor of peace)
c. Just war (just war theory speciies the conditions for judging if
it is just to go to war, and conditions for how the war should be
conducted).
The ethical and legal rules of conducting wars using robotic
weapons, in addition to conventional weapons, includes at minimum
all the rules of just war, but the use of semiautonomous/autonomous
robots add new rules for iring decision, discrimination of lawful from
unlawful targets, responsibility, and proportionality.27,28
232
Cyborg ethics
Cyborg technology aims to design and study neuromotor prostheses
in order to store and reinstate lost function with replacement that is
different as little as possible from the real thing (a lost arm or hand,
lost vision etc.).29 The word Cyborg stands for cybernetic organism,
a term coined by Manfred Clynes and Nathan Kline.30 A cyborg is
any living being that has both organic and mechanical/electrical parts
that either restore or enhance the organism’s functioning. People with
the most common technological implants such as prosthetic limbs,
pacemakers, and cochlear/bionic ear implants, or people who receive
implant organs developed from artiicially cultured stem cells can be
consired to belong to this category. The irst real cyborg was a ‘lab
rat’ at Rockland State Hospital in 1950 (New York). The principal
advantages of mixing organs with mechanical parts are for the human
health. For example:
a. People with replaced parts of their body (hips, elbows, knees,
wrists, arteries, etc.) can now be classiied as Cyborg.
b. Brain implants based on neuromorphic model of the brain and the
nervous system help reverse the most devastating symptoms of
Parkinson disease.
Disadvantages of Cyborg include:
a. Cyborgs do not heal body damage normally, but, instead, body
parts are replaced. Replacing broken limbs and damaged armor
plating can be expensive and time consuming.
b. Cyborgs can think the surrounding world in multiple dimensions,
whereas human beings are more restricted in that sense. A
comprehensive discussion of Cyborgs is given.31
Automation technology ethics: Automation technology ethics is
the part of applied ethics and technology ethics (technoethics) which
studies the application of ethics to processes and systems automated
in one or the other degree.36,32 Today, automation is achieved using
digital computers technology, digital feedback control technology,
information technology, and modern communication technology.
Therefore the ethical issues of automation naturally overlap
considerably with the ethical issues rising in all of these areas, and
can be studied in a uniied way. As noted33 many people feel that
using a computer to do something which is illegal or unethical is
somehow not as “wrong” as other “real” criminal or unethical acts. A
crucial fact regarding the application of ethics and ethical standards
in information-based practice is that many professionals in this area
do not belong to professional organizations, and many others do not
belong to any professional organization. Three fundamental questions
about information and automation ethics addressed are:34-36
a. What constitute substantive ethical issues and how can we learn or
know about ethics related to automation?
b. Do we need better ethics for automation systems? What is this
better ethics?
c. Does anticipatory ethics that studies ethical issues at the R&D and
introduction stage of a technology, via anticipation of possible
future equipment, applications, and social implications, help to
determine and develop a better automation ethics?
Three principal information and service requirements in
automation systems are the following, and their achievement depends
on ethical performance of engineers and professionals:
Citation: Tzafestas SG. Ethics in robotics and automation: a general view. Int Rob Auto J. 2018;4(3):229‒234. DOI: 10.15406/iratj.2018.04.00127
Copyright:
©2018 Tzafestas
Ethics in robotics and automation: a general view
Accuracy: Information must be as more accurate as possible such
that the conclusions or decisions based on it are correct. Today the
information which is viable and being accessed is suficiently accurate.
Accessibility: Information must be accessible. Accessibility involves
the right of accessing the required information, as well as true
payments of charges to access the information.
Quality of service: In contrast to goods, services are intangible
and heterogeneous. Production and consumption of service are
inseparable. Quality of service (QoS) is deined and evaluated by
the client, and is not evaluated only on the basis of outcomes but on
processing delivery. The key requirements for QoS are:37
a. Reliability (promised service should be performed dependably and
accurately).
b. Competence (the company has the skill and knowledge to carry
out the service).
c. Responsiveness (readiness and willingness to provide the service).
d. Access (service personnel easily approachable by customers).
e. Courtesy (politeness and friendliness of service personnel).
Other areas of ethical concern in R&A are:
I.
II.
Criminal behavior.
Ownership and copyright.
III.
Privacy and anonymity.
IV.
Autonomy.
V.
VI.
Identity.
Professional conduct.
Automation can have positive and negative impacts for the people,
the organizations, and the society in general.38 Basic questions related
to R&A social impact are the following:
a. How might R&A affect the everyday life of human society
members?
233
the employment and society is provided.39 Ethics is overlapping with
law but goes beyond it. Laws provide a minimum set of standards for
obtaining a desired human behavior. Ethics often provides standards
that exceed the legal minimum. Therefore, that which is legal is not
always ethical. For good human behavior and development both
law and ethics should be respected. Speciically, ethics and laws are
different in the manner that ethics tells what a person should do and
laws specify what a person must do. The law is universally accepted,
and ethics is ideal human conduct agreed upon by most of the people.
The best results are obtained if the law and ethics go side by side so as
to guide to actions that are both legal and ethical.40,41
Conclusion
This paper has provided a short conceptual review of the ethical
aspects and social implications of R&A. The material presented starts
with the fundamental phisophical questions about R&A ethics which
have been addressed in the literature and still provide motivation
for further research. Then, the core of the paper is presented which
includes:
a. the review of R&A ethics,
b. an outline of the major branches of roboethics (medical robot,
assistive robot, social robot, autonomous cars, war/military robot,
cyborg ethics), and
c. a discussion of automation technology ethics and social
implications. Extensive coverage of the concepts, and topics
reviewed in the paper is provided in the references cited. A global
conclusion is that there is still a strong need to develop more
practical, and easy to understand and apply, ethical rules and codes
for the designers, professionals, and users of R&A products.
Acknowledgements
My Institute’s (National Technical University of Athens)
representative needs not to be fully aware of this submission.
Conlict of interest
The author declares there is no conlict of interest.
b. Could vulnerable people be particularly affected by R&A?
References
c. Could events occurring in the virtual world of R&A have negative
impact on the real world?
1. Wallach W, Allen C. Moral machines: Teaching robots right from wrong.
Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press; 2009.
d. Does R&A seek informed consent where necessary?
From a technical point of view, robotic automation implies a range
of technical advantages and disadvantages, namely:
Advantages: Reliability, Sensitivity, Endurance, Motion velocity,
Mechanical power, Work accuracy.
Disadvantages: Human isolation feeling, Telepresence and virtual
reality.
The interaction between automated systems and robots with
people brings about new legal considerations in respect to safety and
health regulations, law compliance, and assignment/apportioning
of risk and liability. Those using robotic production lines that rely
heavily on multiple technologies should ensure that they have
contractual arrangements agreed with each machine or technology
supplier. A thorough discussion of the implications of robotics on
2. Galvan JM. On technoethics. IEEE Robotics and Automation Magazine;
2003;10:58–63.
3. Veruggio G. The birth of roboethics. Proceedings of ICRA’2005: IEEE
International Conference on Robotics and Automation: Workshop on
Roboethics; 2005 Apr 18; Barcelona, Spain. 2005. p. 1–4.
4. Asaro PM. What should we want from a robot ethic? International Review
of Information Ethics. 2006;6(12):10–16.
5. Veruggio G, Operto F. Roboethics: A bottom-up interdisciplinary
discourse in the ield of applied ethics in robotics. International Review of
Information Ethics. 2006;6(12):3–8.
6. Ramaswany S, Joshi H. Automation and ethics. Handbook of Automation,
Berlin: Springer; 2009: 809–833.
7. Tzafestas SG. Roboethics: A Navigating Overview. Intelligent Systems,
Control and Automation: Science and Engineering, Springer; 2016.
Citation: Tzafestas SG. Ethics in robotics and automation: a general view. Int Rob Auto J. 2018;4(3):229‒234. DOI: 10.15406/iratj.2018.04.00127
Copyright:
©2018 Tzafestas
Ethics in robotics and automation: a general view
234
8. Lin P, Abney K, Bekey GA. Robot Ethics: The ethical and social
implications of robotics. MIT Press; Cambridge, MA, USA. 2012.
26. Walzer M. Just and unjust wars: A moral argument historical with
illustrations. New York. 2000.
9. Lichocki P, Kahn PH, Billard A. The Ethical landscape of robotics. IEEE
Robotics and Automation Magazine. 2011;18(1):39–50.
27. Coates AJ. The ethics of war. Manchester, UK: University of Manchester
Press; 1997:1–320.
10. Asimov I. Runaround: Astounding science iction, march 1942.
Republished in robot visions, New York, USA: Penguin. 1991.
28. Asaro A. Robots and responsibility from a legal perspective. Proceedings
of 2007 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation:
Workshop on Roboethics, Rome. 2007:1–13.
11. Veruggio G, Solis J, Van der Loos M. Roboethics: ethics applied to
robotics. IEEE Robotics and Automation Magazine. 2001;18(1):21–22.
12. Wallach W, Allen C, Smit I. Machine morality: Bottom-up and top-down
approaches for modeling moral faculties. AI Society. 2008;22(4):565–582.
29. LynchW. Wilfred Implants: Reconstructing the Human Body. Journal of
Clinical Engineering. 1982;7(3):1–263.
30. Clynes M, Kline S. Cyborgs and space. Astronautics; 1960.
13. Capurro R, Nagenborg M. Ethics and robotics. Amsterdam, The
Netherland: IOS Press; 2009.
31. Warwick K. Cyborg moral, cyborg values, cyborg ethics. Ethics and
Information Technology. 2003;5(3):131–137.
14. Dekker M, Guttman M. Robo-and-Informationethics:
Fundamentals. Muenster, Germany: LIT Verlag. 2012.
32. Luppicini R. Technoethics and the evolving knowledge society: ethical
issues in technological design, research, development, and innovation.
IGI Global; 2010:1–323.
Some
15. Gundel DJ. The Machine Question: Critical Perspectives on AI, Robots,
and Ethics. Cambridge, MA, USA: MIT Press; 2012.
16. Tavani HT. Ethics and technology: ethical issues in an age of information
and communication technology. New Jersey: John Wiley; 2004.
17. Mappes TA, De Grazia D. Biomedical ethics. New York: McGraw-Hill.
2006.
33. Phukan S. IT ethics in the Internet Age: New dimensions. Information
Science. 2002:1249–1257.
34. Kendall KE. The signiicance of information systems research on
emerging technologies: Seven information technologies that promise to
improve managerial effectiveness. Decision Sciences. 1987;28:775–792.
18. Pence GE. Classic cases in medical ethics. New York: McGraw-Hill.
2000.
35. Stahl BC. Ethics of emerging information and communication technology:
On the implementation of responsible research and innovation. Science
and Public Policy. 2017;44(3):369–381.
19. International classiication of functioning, disability, and health. World
Health Organization; Geneva, Switzerland. 2001.
36. Brey PAE. Anticipatory ethics for emerging technologies. Nanoethics.
2012;6(1):1–13.
20. Tanaka H, Yoshikawa M, Oyama, et al. Development of assistive robots
using international classiication of functioning, disability, and health
(ICF). Journal of Robotics. 2013;1–12.
21. RESNA code of ethics.
22. www.crccertiication.com/pages/crc_ccrc_code_of_ethics/10.php
23. Tzafestas SG. Sociorobot world: A guided tour for all. Berlin, Germany,
Springer; 2016.
24. Fog T, Nourbakhsh I, Dautenhahn K. A survey of socially interactive
robots. Robot Autonomous Systems. 2003;42:143–166.
25. Notes on autonomous cars. Lessrong; 2013.
37. Pinto MA. Delivery of service quality and satisfying library customers
through web-based services. 2011:1–51.
38. Tzafestas SG. Systems, cybernetics, control, and automation. Ontological,
Epistemological, Societal, and Ethical Issues, Gistrup, Denmark. River
Publisher Publishers; 2017.
39. West DM. What happens if robots take the jobs? The impact of emerging
technologies on employment and public policy, Center for Technology
Innovation at Brookings; USA. 2015.
40. Hazard GC. Law, morals, and ethics. Southern Illinois University Law
Journal. 1995;19:447–458.
41. Self-driving cars: Absolutely everything you need to know.
Citation: Tzafestas SG. Ethics in robotics and automation: a general view. Int Rob Auto J. 2018;4(3):229‒234. DOI: 10.15406/iratj.2018.04.00127