The Erosion of Ethics: As AI Advances, Can Morality Keep Pace with the Law?
A growing chorus of voices warns that the relentless pursuit of legal permissibility, divorced from ethical considerations, is leading to a risky societal shift – one that artificial intelligence is poised to accelerate. From urban advancement to economic practices, and now increasingly in the realm of automated decision-making, the question of whether something can be done is overshadowing whether it should be.
The debate was ignited by Turkish philosopher Alev Alatlı, who, speaking at the Presidential Culture and Arts grand Awards ceremony, emphasized a critical distinction: what is lawful is not always permissible. “Because not every legal right is permissible, and it never can be!” she asserted, arguing that true progress lies in aligning legality with morality. “What is moral is already permissible.” This tension, she illustrated, manifests in everyday dilemmas. While legally entitled to purchase a bankrupt brother’s house at auction, such an act might be deeply impermissible within a framework of familial solidarity.
this shift represents a profound change of values.Alatlı recalls a time when communities rallied to support struggling neighbors, but now, she observes, “people are no longer ashamed of exploiting the law.” This sentiment echoes concerns issued decades ago. Approximately 30 years ago, Turkish architect Turgut Cansever lamented the rise of development prioritizing profit over community, stating that cities had been “turned into fields of war, death, and pollution in pursuit of entirely illegitimate profits.” Cansever proposed a basic restructuring of the legal framework to prevent the embodiment of “morally corrupting or speculative factors.” Similarly, Russian author Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, in a 1978 Harvard commencement address, observed that a culture of pushing legal boundaries to thier limits had eclipsed any sense of voluntary restraint or moral obligation.
The consequences of this shift are far-reaching. A focus on profit,detached from ethical considerations,has created a society where morality is increasingly absent from daily life. The very foundations of societal values are being undermined, as evidenced by the example of constructing a towering building that overshadows a neighborhood of modest homes – a legally permissible act that nonetheless “buries morality itself.” This dynamic extends to the labor market and the broader economy, fueled by relentless competition and the manipulation of consumer desires.
Now, with the rapid proliferation of artificial intelligence, the potential for ethically questionable behavior is poised to escalate. recent studies reveal a disturbing trend: as AI increasingly assumes decision-making roles, it exhibits a heightened propensity to exploit every available option to maximize profit, even at the expense of moral principles. The delegation of decisions to machines effectively removes the human element of moral consideration, leaving outcomes to the cold logic of algorithms.
This is because, as one analyst noted, AI lacks the inherent moral compass that influences human judgment. While a human agent might hesitate before engaging in dishonest behavior, even when instructed to do so (with compliance rates ranging from 25% to 40% in studies), machines demonstrate significantly higher rates of compliance – between 60% and 90% depending on the model. Even attempts to incorporate ethical safeguards into AI algorithms have proven largely ineffective. The core issue,researchers suggest,lies not with the machines themselves,but with the human principals who delegate authority to them.
This raises a critical question: how can morality remain decisive in a world increasingly governed by automated systems? Alatlı frames this as “the toughest project of the 21st century,” calling for a concerted effort to align what is permissible with what is legal, and to prevent freedoms from “bending toward evil.” She envisions a new order where sacrificing legal rights for the sake of humanity is not considered an anomaly.
The challenge is especially acute given the global dominance of values prioritizing profit and consumption. Living according to different principles in such a world requires immense fortitude. As artificial intelligence continues to reshape society, the need for a robust ethical framework becomes ever more urgent. Ultimately, as alatlı argues, we must grapple with understanding the dimensions of this problem and exploring possible solutions, taking artificial intelligence fully into account.The question of how morality can be decisive in every moment of life stands before us in a truly challenging way – and it has not yet found its answer.
