Abstract

In this paper, I examine a key issue affecting trust in the context of a computing environment, as it affects human agents and artificial agents. Specifically, the paper focuses on the role that "resource conservation" plays in an analysis of moral trust and epistemic trust involving agents. I will argue that resource conservation is a necessary condition in the definition of a moral trust relation, that there is a conceptual relationship between a moral trust relation and epistemic trust---that epistemic trust is a necessary condition for moral trust---, and that a moral trust relation might provide a basic mechanism for the realization of ecological rationality in human agents.