Society-in-the-loop: the Algorithmic Social Contract

Recent rapid advances in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning have raised many questions about the regulatory and governance mechanisms for autonomous machines. This is not about individual gadgets, but about complex, networked systems of humans and algorithms making decisions in business, government and the media. We need conceptual frameworks for designing new governance architectures for these human-machine social systems. In doing so, it is helpful to learn lessons about human cooperation and governance from political philosophy and cultural anthropology. It is also important to understand the limits of regulation, and whether over-regulation of adaptive systems may even backfire.