Animals and AI. The role of animals in AI research and application – An overview and ethical evaluation
Leonie Bossert and
Thilo Hagendorff
Technology in Society, 2021, vol. 67, issue C
Abstract:
Artificial intelligence (AI) technologies and their fields of application are among the most debated developments of recent times. Although being widely discussed academically, publicly and in policy debates, certain aspects of their research, development and application are completely ignored, namely the impact AI has on animals. Animals are affected by the research on and development of this technology since it partially relies on animal testing. In addition, AI is also being applied to improve monitoring and marketing of animals in an agricultural context. We argue that it is insufficient to exclude these aspects from debates around AI. In addition to the surveillance-applications on animals, which can be evaluated as impacting them negatively, AI applications, from which individual animals can benefit, do exist. These can primarily be found in nature and wildlife conservation, as we point out at the end of the paper. By providing an overview on how these technologies are applied to animals and how this affects them, this paper aims to fill a previously existing research gap.
Keywords: Artificial intelligence; Machine learning; Animal experiments; Animal ethics; AI for Conservation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)
Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160791X21001536
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.
Export reference: BibTeX
RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan)
HTML/Text
Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:teinso:v:67:y:2021:i:c:s0160791x21001536
DOI: 10.1016/j.techsoc.2021.101678
Access Statistics for this article
Technology in Society is currently edited by Charla Griffy-Brown
More articles in Technology in Society from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().