An ontic–ontological theory for ethics of designing social robots: a case of Black African women and humanoids

Ethics and Information Technology 23 (2):119-126 (2020)
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Abstract

Given the affective psychological and cognitive dynamics prevalent during human–robot-interlocution, the vulnerability to cultural-political influences of the design aesthetics of a social humanoid robot has far-reaching ramifications. Building upon this hypothesis, I explicate the relationship between the structures of the constitution social ontology and computational semiotics, and ventures a theoretical framework which I proposes as a thesis that impels a moral responsibility on engineers of social humanoids. In distilling this thesis, the implications of the intersection between the socio-aesthetics of racialised and genderised humanoids and the phenomenology of human–robot-interaction are illuminated by the figuration of the experience of a typical black rural African woman as the user, that is, an interlocutor with an industry-standard socially-situated humanlike robot. The representation of the gravity of the psycho-existential and socio-political ramifications of such woman’s life with humanoids is abstracted and posited as grounds that illustrate the imperative for roboticists to take socio-ethical considerations seriously in their designs of humanoids.

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Malesela John Lamola
University of Johannesburg

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References found in this work

The extended mind.Andy Clark & David J. Chalmers - 1998 - Analysis 58 (1):7-19.
Introduction to Phenomenology.Dermot Moran - 2000 - Tijdschrift Voor Filosofie 62 (4):772-773.

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