My writing covers the ethical dimensions of technology and the intersection of ethical agency and professional development.
Published Works
Hidden Agents, Explicit Obligations: A Linguistic Analysis of AI Ethics Guidelines
Science and Engineering Ethics | 29 October 2025
Abstract: This study relies on transitivity analysis to evaluate 87 operational ethics guidelines for the representation of moral agents and their agency. We identified normative key words, their linguistic function, and agency attribution in 6,935 statements. Our findings reveal 11 distinct agents, with deployers, developers, and AI systems being the most frequently invoked. However, the ethical agency attributed to developers and deployers was overwhelmingly implied, while the tasks assigned to them were more often normative than descriptive. That the agency of the two most powerful agents in AI development is so often hidden in ethics guidelines reveals that the challenges associated with implementing AI ethics guidelines does not stem merely from the “principles to practice” problem, but from a more deeply rooted issue regarding how guideline authors conceive of ethical agency.
Excuses, Excuses: Moral Agency and the Professional Identity of AI Developers
AI & Society | 24 May 2025
Abstract: Artificial intelligence developers, machine learning engineers, and data scientists occupy a contradictory role in the modern marketplace. While they are central to the business and science of AI, they are marginalized as moral agents. Consequently, the marketplace has cultivated environments in which developers can be unthinking in their own roles and responsibilities, while at the same time tasking them with creating “thinking machines.” The central aim of this article is to show that this state of affairs is morally unjustifiable.
The Ethical Wisdom of AI Developers
AI and Ethics | 20 March 2024
Abstract: This study flows from the first (above) and focuses on developers’ awareness of ethics issues, how they navigate ethical challenges, and the barriers they encounter in developing ethical wisdom. We find developers are largely aware of the ethical territories they must navigate and the moral dilemmas they personally encounter, but they face limited and inconsistent resources for ethical guidance or training. Furthermore, there are significant barriers inhibiting the development of ethical wisdom in the AI developer community.
The Ethical Agency of AI Developers
AI and Ethics | 09 January 2023
Abstract: This study is the first of its kind that centers developers in the ethical environment. Semi-structured interviews with 40 developers about the ethics of being a developer revealed significant gaps between how developers perceive themselves and the reality of their work experiences.