Elessar: Ethics in Norm-Aware Agents

Abstract

We address the problem of designing agents that navigate social norms by selecting ethically appropriate actions. We present Elessar, a framework in which agents aggregate value preferences of users and select ethically appropriate actions through multicriteria decision making in different social contexts. Via simulations, seeded with a survey of user values and attitudes, we find that Elessar agents act ethically and are effective than baseline agents, in terms of (1) exhibiting the Rawlsian property of fairness, and (2) yielding a satisfactory social experience to users. Our results are stable across agent societies of different sizes and connectedness.