By Levi Checketts, PhD
Pope Francis began this year with his message for the World Day of Peace, seeking the development and use of Artificial Intelligence [AI] for global peace and justice. On October 16 and 17, the Hong Kong Baptist University’s [HKBU] Centre for Applied Ethics [CAE] affirmed this message at its “Social and Ethical Concerns of AI from an East Asian Perspective” conference.
The conference marked the culmination of three years of conversations with the Dicastery for Culture and Education’s Centre for Digital Culture [CDC].
Last December, the CDC announced the publication of Encountering Artificial Intelligence: Anthropological and Ethical Investigations, a work produced by North American scholars through the Markkula Centre for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University. The CAE conference marks the centre’s attention to non-Western concerns with AI.
The conference opened with messages of welcome, including HKBU vice presidents, Dr. Albert Chau and Professor Jiming Liu; dean of Arts and Social Science, Daniel Lai; the dicastery’s secretary for Culture, Monsignor Paul Tighe; and conference organisers Dr. Levi Checketts [CAE] and Angel Gonzalez-Ferrer [CDC]. The joint interests of university and dicastery in responding to AI were made clear, echoing Pope Francis’s emphasis on dialogue.
East Asian societies should engage AI with the richness of our cultural traditions and with attentiveness to the common good for our various societies
In attendance throughout the two days were representatives from the United Board, faculty from religious and public institutions around Hong Kong, students and guests from the broader community. All told, over one hundred people attended the six themed sessions.
Speakers for the conference came from South Korea, Japan, the Philippines, Thailand, Taiwan, Vietnam, India, the UK, the US, Macau, mainland China and, of course Hong Kong, to discuss what issues are unique to Asia’s engagement with AI.
Far too many issues were raised to cover adequately, but in summary, they included how Confucian ethics can guide the design and use of AI, how different religious traditions consider AI as a person, how to develop AI to protect human rights, ways that users of AI from different countries engage the technology, how to train values into AI, and how AI connects to specific problems like war and the environment.
As sometimes happens at such events, the multifaceted concerns can be viewed as interconnected despite their divergence: East Asian societies should engage AI with the richness of our cultural traditions and with attentiveness to the common good for our various societies. While these concerns are shared across the globe, in the spirit of subsidiarity, answers specific to the Philippines or China will be different from the answers one hears in Silicon Valley or Washington.
While these concerns are shared across the globe, in the spirit of subsidiarity, answers specific to the Philippines or China will be different from the answers one hears in Silicon Valley or Washington
In contrast to most academic conferences, the format of this particular event included long discussion portions where audience members could address points from the presentations with the speakers and articulate their own ideas. Participants seemed hesitant at first, but by the second day, the conversations were lively and often had to be cut short for time. The aim of this, apart from facilitating greater connections between people, was to gain some sense of clarity on what are the most relevant considerations to raise.
In the concluding session, Gonzalez-Ferrer appealed to the various participants to continue dialogue in the coming one to two years.
Due to the unique perspectives raised in the conference, the CDC hopes to promote Asian voices as an important response to AI conversations. Participants were interested in creating some unified voice, but also expressed concern that the diversity of Asia should not be glossed over as though the continent is a single culture.
Checketts expressed hope that the diversity could, in fact, be to the strength of such a response by noting how complex social problems are when it comes to AI. Whether and in what form the conference speakers will respond remains to be seen, but for now, guests are returning to their home countries with new insights and connections, and CAE staff are taking a well-deserved break!
Levi Checketts is assistant professor of Religion and Philosophy and the associate director for the Centre for Applied Ethics at Hong Kong Baptist University. Originally from the United States, Checketts researches on social ethics related to new technologies and recently published Poor Technology: Artificial Intelligence and the Experience of Poverty. After moving to Hong Kong,
Checketts set up the Asian research group to study AI with the Dicastery for Culture and Education’s Centre for Digital Culture.
