“All AIs are Psychopaths”? The Scope and Impact of a Popular Analogy
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 19563245 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Elina Nerantzi (0000-0001-5770-4664, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security and Law, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 38 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Publication date | 2025-03-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Philosophy & Technology (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2210-5433 • E-ISSN: 2210-5441 |
| Publisher | Springer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1007/s13347-025-00856-x |
| OpenAlex | W4407940717 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
| References cited | 74 |
Artificial Intelligence (AI) Agents are often compared to psychopaths in popular news articles. The headlines are ‘eye-catching’, but the questions of what this analogy means or why it matters are hardly answered. The aim of this paper is to take this popular analogy ‘seriously’. By that, I mean two things. First, I aim to explore the scope of this analogy, i.e. to identify and analyse the shared properties of AI agents and psychopaths, namely, their lack of moral emotions and their capacity for instrumental rationality. Second, I aim to examine the impact of the analogy. I argue that both agents, as ‘amoral calculators’, present the perfect candidates to revisit two long-standing debates on moral and criminal responsibility, regarding the necessity of moral emotions for ‘moral-agent-capacity responsibility’ and the necessity of ‘moral-agent-capacity responsibility’ for criminal responsibility. Finally, cross-examining the debates on the moral and criminal responsibility of psychopaths and AI agents is instructive and revealing. Instructive since the moral and legal treatment of psychopaths can be telling about the future treatment of AI agents (and vice versa) and revealing since it makes explicit our often-implicit philosophical commitments on the criteria of moral agency and the overarching purpose of criminal law
Analogy · Epistemology · Philosophy of science · Philosophy of technology · Computer Science · Crime, Deviance, and Social Control · Philosophy · Psychology · Psychology of Moral and Emotional Judgment · Psychopathy, Forensic Psychiatry, Sexual Offending
Responsibility and the moral sentiments
Moral Machines
Affective Computing
Responsibility and Control
The neuroscience of empathy
The emotional basis of moral judgments
Corporate psychopathy
Killer Robots
A cognitive developmental approach to morality
Law and Emotion
An Evaluation of Studies on Ultrastructure of Tonoplast in Sieve Elements
Psychopathy as a Clinical and Empirical Construct
In the Belly of the Beast
The Homo Economicus as a Prototype of a Psychopath? A Conceptual Analysis and Implications for Business Research and Teaching
The human biological advantage over AI
In search of the moral status of AI
In principle obstacles for empathic AI
Moral zombies
Liability for Robots
AI Systems Under Criminal Law
Psychopathy and Culpability
Growing Moral Relations
Neuroscience of Emotion
Moral Emotions and Moral Behavior
| Citations per year | 2 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2026 - 2026 (1) |
| Highly cited | No |