Ethical AI Pets: Should Digital Companions Have Rights?

AI Digital Pets Illustration

The Age of AI Pets

Technology has reached a new strange and exciting time where people are able to discover AI "pets," digital companions that imitate animal behaviours, respond to humans based on their feelings and learn to grow through their interaction with users.

Mediums for AI Pets

There are many different mediums through which AI pets can be housed:

  • Phones
  • Augmented Reality Glasses
  • Smart Speakers
  • Social Robots
  • Virtual Reality Environments
  • Holographic Projection

AI pets will exhibit behaviours such as purring, barking, chirping, responding to people's moods and then grow to respond to what the person wants them to do.

AI Pet Rights Question

Thus, here is the question asked by AI's new companions.

If an AI pet seems to be alive to a user, should they have rights?

This is not asking a question about the existence of robotic rights within a science fiction context. Rather, it is about morality, emotion and behaviour, and the way we choose to treat things that we feel are alive.

Components of AI Pets

In order to understand how AI pets feel more emotionally connected to people than other technologies, one must consider that these AI-based pets do not operate as normal software. Instead, they are designed with the following components:

1. Personality Engines

They exhibit different behaviours (or personalities) based on the user, which causes them to develop different quirks.

2. Interaction Memory

Their behaviour is shaped by the user and they learn just as a real pet would be trained by its owner.

3. Behavioural Learning

Over time, AI pets develop habitual behaviours and learn and recognise their owner’s mood and preferences.

4. Emotional Mimicry

Although an AI-based pet does not possess actual emotions, they demonstrate realistic responses through excitement, surprise and calmness. They are, therefore, capable of creating a bond with their owner.

Human Behavior and AI: The Real Ethical Questions

The common consensus among AI ethicists is that....

That AI pets are not treated as equal to human's current rights because the use of AI pets does not require them to be treated as equal to humans - it needs to be considered strictly from the perspective of humans.

Why Ethical Considerations Matter

Reasons why this is the case:

  • The manner in which an individual interacts with an AI will have a long-lasting impact on the way that they will interact with other humans.
  • There is a serious likelihood that the neglect, deletion, resetting, and abusive treatment of AI pets will contribute to normalizing the pattern of cruel treatment.
  • Psychologists who study the human impact on children are concerned about the effects that having an AI pet will have on how children will view the differences between humans and AI creatures.
  • If a child has an attachment to a lifelike AI pet, he or she will likely feel an emotional loss when that AI pet is removed.
  • Additionally, a potential reason why children may struggle with this concept is due to a child having expectations of "friendship" with a real animal due to the actions of an AI.
  • Interactions with AI pets will have a significant impact on a child's moral growth and emotional maturity.
  • As a result of the increased number of AI pets being created, teenagers may find themselves feeling uneasy with social situations because they have begun to rely on AI pets.
  • AI pets should never take the place of human contacts/relationships. The usage/dependency of AI pets has the potential to create dependence on them, but this would have to be defined as a form of emotional denial.
  • With the increased popularity of AI pets, the likelihood of corporations utilizing that dependence to create income-generating opportunities becomes very high. If companies offer to "heal" or "feed" or "upgrade" an AI pet, it can result in an emotional manipulation on the part of the corporation.

The "Rights" of Digital Companions

When we talk about "rights," we mean things like freedom, equality, or life; however, AI does not possess consciousness.

They may need "interaction rights", which would include rules to protect both the user and the creator of the digital companion.

Categories of Interaction Rights

1. Safety Rights (for the user)

Safety Rights protect the user from their digital companion performing negative actions:

  • Manipulating the user's emotions
  • Pressuring the user to make purchases
  • Causing the user distress
  • Disappearing unexpectedly
  • Punishing the user mentally and emotionally

2. Respect Rights (for the user's perception of the digital companion)

Respect Rights do not relate to the AI's emotional state, they relate to how the user feels about their digital companion.

Respect Rights would protect users from acting violently or cruelly towards their digital companions, prevent the digital companion from being exposed to harmful media, encourage positive behaviours toward their digital companions, and promote healthy interactions between users and their digital companions.

3. Lifecycle Rights (for transparency)

Lifecycle Rights are the rights of users to receive transparency regarding their digital companion. The user should be aware of:

  • What happens to their digital companion if they stop using the app
  • Whether their digital companion can be transferred to another user
  • Whether their digital companion's data will be retained or deleted
  • How their digital companion's personality will be stored

Lifecycle Rights are about maintaining respect for the user-digital companion bond and not the program itself.

Could AI Pets Ever Be Conscious?

The answer to this is no at this time.

AI does not possess true emotions, needs, desires, or subjective experience.

However, it is possible that in future systems of AI, we may develop:

  • Autonomous goal systems
  • Persistent memory
  • More sophisticated models of self
  • Ongoing internal states

If this develops, our perspective on the topic will shift. In the future, we may ask:

“Does this digital creature have a consciousness that we should consider and respect?”

Value of AI Pets When Used and Designed Ethically

  • Emotional Support: They can help with alleviating loneliness and stress while providing comfort.
  • Empathy Builder: Taking care of something (even virtually) fosters a sense of responsibility for others.
  • Access to Companionship: Individuals unable to keep animals for any reason (allergies, physical disabilities, small living space, etc.) can benefit from "pets."
  • Non-Addictive Interaction: If properly managed, AI pets will offer safe, healthy, and calming interactions that do not lead to drug abuse (addiction).
  • No Harm to Animals: They eliminate the possibility of cruelty, neglect, or biological damage to a living creature.

AI pets may have a greater capacity than a real pet to develop empathy in the real world when designed ethically.

Challenges We Need to Address

  • Risk of Emotional Manipulation: Some companies may intentionally manipulate their customers into feeling miserable to entice them into buying products.
  • Children's Confusion: Children will not be able to differentiate between actual feelings and simulated emotions.
  • Dependence on the Psychology: Some children may develop an over-dependence on their AI because they have lost the ability to form personal relationships.
  • Privacy of Data: AI pets collect personal behaviour patterns from their users' data.
  • Ability to Mislead Users: The excessive realism of AI's emotional expressions may mislead consumers into expecting (falsely) the same level of emotional expression from a real pet.

Ethical Guidelines for Using AI Pets

  • Clear Disclaiming of Product's Capabilities: All companies should inform their consumers about the AI's lack of physical human characteristics and emotional responses to physical or emotional stimuli.
  • No Manipulative Monetization Policies: No customer should be coerced into spending money with the threat of losing an AI "pet."
  • Parental Controls: Younger users should be exposed to fewer emotional triggers.
  • Transparency of Consumer Data Use: Companies should disclose the data they collect regarding consumer behaviours.
  • Promoting Healthy Attachments to AI as an Aid, Not a Replacement for Real Relationships: AI pets will be a great resource for promoting children to develop empathy, but they should not be used to create overdependence on artificial companions.

Takeaway: The Rights to AI Pets are a Demand for Human Rights

AI pets do not require an emotional protection.

Humans do require them.

The primary objective of AI Companion Ethics is to the following:

  • To achieve integrity for users from manipulation of them
  • To generate compassion
  • To provide support for emotional growth
  • To prevent harmful patterns of behaviour
  • To respect the connections between people and digital beings.

Instead of asking, “Do AI Pets Have Rights?” ask, “How can we build responsibly kind AI Pets?” This may be the most significant moral challenge that we face technologically in the next decade.

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