Mapping out AI Functions in Intelligent Disaster (Mis)Management and AI-Caused Disasters

TL;DR

This paper explores the roles, risks, and ethical considerations of AI in disaster management, including potential AI-caused disasters, and discusses strategies for prevention, regulation, and accountability.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive classification of AI functions in disaster management and introduces hypothetical AI-caused disaster scenarios with ethical and regulatory insights.

Findings

AI plays a dual role in disaster management and mismanagement.

Ethical repercussions of AI use in IDM require careful regulation.

Strategies for preventing AI-caused disasters include pre-design, in-design, and post-design methods.

Abstract

This study maps the functions of artificial intelligence in disaster (mis)management. It begins with a classification of disasters in terms of their causal parameters, introducing hypothetical cases of independent or hybrid AI-caused disasters. We then overview the role of AI in disaster management and mismanagement, where the latter includes possible ethical repercussions of the use of AI in intelligent disaster management (IDM), as well as ways to prevent or mitigate these issues, which include pre-design a priori, in-design, and post-design methods as well as regulations. We then discuss the governments role in preventing the ethical repercussions of AI use in IDM and identify and asses its deficits and challenges. This discussion is followed by an account of the advantages and disadvantages of pre-design or embedded ethics. Finally, we briefly consider the question of accountability and liability in AI-caused disasters.