Choosing Between Life and Death During COVID-19: The A.I. Trolley Problem

Suppose you’re the sole witness of a trolley that has gone out of control, hurtling towards 5 people tied to its track, with no way to stop it in time. Good news: there’s a lever you can pull to alter its direction. Bad news: the other track isn’t safe either as it has one person tied to it. What will you do in this situation? Let the trolley continue on its initial course and kill those 5 people on the way or pull the lever to save them at the expense of that other person’s life? Source: https://www.lionsroar.com/ This ethical thought experiment, known as the Trolley Problem, was put forth by Philippa Foot back in 1967 to challenge different schools of moral thought. In Lodi, Italy, this dilemma is far from theoretical. Doctors had to decide whom to allocate ICU beds to, due to the shortage of resources amidst the COVID-19 crisis. Dr. Di Bartolomeo reports that some patients “are not candidates” for ventilation support due to their old age or frail condition. What if, instead of leaving such morally-challenging decisions to a human, an A.I. would handle this burden? Would it alleviate the psychological toll on the medical staff? However, with A.I. in the mix, people are more likely to be among those on the tracks rather than the one behind the lever. This is because the A.I. will be influenced by the couple of hundreds of programmers deciding on its code and feeding it datasets, as well as the authority overseeing its use. The general public in all t...
Source: The Medical Futurist - Category: Information Technology Authors: Tags: Artificial Intelligence Bioethics Future of Medicine Healthcare Policy covid19 Source Type: blogs