If robots are people, can they be made for profit? Commercial implications of robot personhood

Abstract

It could become technologically possible to build artificial agents instantiating whatever properties are sufficient for person-hood. It is also possible, if not likely, that such beings could be built for commercial purposes. This paper asks whether such commercialization can be handled in a way that is not morally reprehensible, and answers in the affirmative. There exists a morally acceptable institutional framework that could allow for building artificial persons for commercial gain. The paper first considers the minimal ethical requirements that any system of commercial production of such artificial persons would have to meet. It then shows that it is possible for these requirements to be met, and that doing so will make the commercial production of artificial persons permissible. Lastly, it briefly presents one potential blueprint for how such a framework could look like-inspired by the real-world model of compensating the training of athletes-and then addresses some objections to the view.