Why artificial intelligence is a human right

2018 is a monumental year regarding human rights; it’s the 70^th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a remarkable document to be read in conjunction with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. This year also marks the Convention’s 10^th anniversary.

As the artificial intelligence (AI) era inexorably unfolds across every dimension of our life, the principles enshrined in these two human rights documents can steer this great innovation in a direction that will benefit all humanity.

It is essential that society reflects upon these documents and the opportunities – and some possible challenges – that AI presents to human rights, dignity and the advancement of society.

“The Convention (on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities)… takes to a new height the movement from viewing persons with disabilities as ‘objects’ of charity, medical treatment and social protection towards viewing persons with disabilities as ‘subjects’ with rights, who are capable of claiming those rights and making decisions for their lives based on their free and informed consent as well as being active members of society...”

The impact of technology innovation on inclusion and accessibility is well known: humans have always sought to augment their own capabilities. The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities is remarkable drafting and deeply perceptive, because it pushes innovation into the realms of each person’s individual expression of our shared humanity.

The Convention calls out the right of freedom of expression and opinion, and access to information – including by accepting and facilitating “augmentative and alternative communication” so that people with disability can “receive and impart information and ideas on an equal basis”.

When closely read, the Declaration and the Convention open the mind to AI as an inherently exponential innovation that both shapes, and is shaped by, humanity. It is this visceral connection to our humanity that establishes AI as a human right, because without it, one’s opportunities are diminished or not provided with the potential for advancement.

For many people, accessing government and commercial services, including of course healthcare, can range from just plain difficult to frightening and isolating. As a mother and grandmother of family members with disability and chronic health problems, I know this first hand.

As a technologist, I also know that AI is not a ‘tool’, an ‘enabler’ nor a ‘platform’ – it is neither ‘IT’ nor ‘UX’. Every day we ask, explain, analyse, understand and create. AI’s role is to help everyone, regardless of capability, to perform these basic communication and cognitive functions with dignity on an equal basis.

The structured systems and rigid processes of past decades created barriers for most people: the website, forms, call centre paradigm significantly impacts and disadvantages people with different needs and abilities. And this impacts us all as we age.

Governments and many other organisations send letters and forms to people who physically cannot open them; to people who cannot comprehend the bureaucratic language. Letters, forms and brochures point to complex websites and over-burdened call centres which cannot meet the needs of people who are non-verbal or have cognitive impairment.

A self-feeding maze of complexity. Regardless of social status, education or ability, when vulnerable, our humanity yearns for empathy and conversation.

Yet most organisations, health sector organisations and governments alike, have told us that we can no longer afford conversations. Driven by budget and rationing philosophies, the first two decades of the ‘online century’ simply pasted an electronic veneer over the existing byzantine structures.

This forced people to interact through a maze of complex websites, portals, understaffed call centres and thousands of online forms, none accessible. Only the wealthy had the means to avoid these barriers.

And even with the multi-billions of dollars invested in technology and systems, the experience of people with disability is traumatic to the point of systemic discrimination.

No amount of fiddling with website structures, apps, so-called ‘digital standards’ and outsourcing call centres, changes that experience. This situation will not improve or change simply by using new technologies to repeat the same patterns of service delivery.

Nor will it improve by reverting to the manual patterns of the past by simply creating more opportunities for direct face to face communication in the belief that this will provide the disadvantaged with a better service experience.

From a practical perspective there is no way that the millions of people involved in everyday service delivery can be trained to deal with the myriad of communication difficulties they might encounter every day.

As an example, modern pharmacy in most western countries already provides such an ‘enriched’ manual experience: skilled and empathetic professionals who understand medical and psychological conditions providing face to face interaction but still struggling to provide medications assistance to just one patient with say, dementia, on a busy morning.

The insight is that this formerly intractable problem can be solved by combining these two approaches: by using new technologies to provide a human to human style empathetic experience but in a style and pace that enhances communication, and in a location that ensures dignity.

A question of human rights, first

Early in 2015, I led a small but highly capable team that began to investigate what it would take to achieve what the Convention describes as ‘augmentative and alternative communication’ and the ability for people to be able to ‘receive and impart information and ideas on an equal basis.’

Their work eventually led to the creation of Nadia, the first digital human for service delivery and co-created with people with disability. Few people outside the team are aware that Nadia’s origins and it’s very purpose was in the Convention: it did not start as various technologies looking to solve a problem. Of course, we had research into cognitive systems, virtual reality, second life, omni-channel and avatars – including public discussions with the community – but what would people with disability actually imagine and want? Only through co-design could this imagination be unlocked and made real.

How could it be that people with disabilities, including those with an intellectual disability, could receive and impart information in their own context, and independently?

Had anyone ever asked or involved them? Had anyone ever acknowledged that the unique insights, skills and experience of people with disability could be imbedded as determinants of design? And that these new design determinants could quickly become mainstream universal design and benefit everyone?

The Convention is remarkable drafting. It calls out this paternalistic view of treating people with disabilities as “objects of charity” to “subjects with rights” based on informed consent. The realisation of augmentative and alternative communications could only be achieved through the imagination and co-design of people with disability, as demonstrated by the following images.

The image on the left is a co-designed sketch of what people with disability imagined; drawn on paper and coloured with crayons well before any of the technologies were brought together.

The experience depicted in this sketch, was that people did not want to deal with confusing websites or call centres; they simply wanted to have a face to face conversation and not necessarily with another human person who might be impatient, judgmental or not available. This was many months before the Nadia face was identified: the face in the sketch was a composite face whose features were chosen through co-design.

Next to the sketched image is the final co-designed and tested Nadia interface. This human rights inspired co-design process established the blueprint through which the component technologies – including the AI system and expressive digital human – were brought to life.

This co-design blueprint encompassed personality, gestures, conversational model, knowledge and market research. University psychology faculty were deeply involved in supporting the co-design with people with intellectual disability, so that the words, expressions and conversational tempo was empathetic and natural.

Importantly, this supported co-design process ensured that information conveyed through the conversation was understood by people with intellectual disability in their context.

For the first time, instead of people having to adapt to systems – this was a vision to have systems adapt to people and so go some way to achieving the objectives of the Convention.

What this human rights inspired co-design process further envisaged, was conversational input and output in non-spoken and non-typed format. A digital human to converse in any language, including signing, and display additional information as videos, pictures and text.

Soon, haptics will enable communication with people who are deaf and blind and for this conversation to occur in parallel formats – such as haptic and spoken – so that the deaf/blind person could interact with the digital human in a multi-party interaction including their sighted/hearing family members.

Co-design had also envisaged that a person who was ‘locked-in’ and could only communicate with their brain activity via a NeuroSwitch – that this NeuroSwitch input could be transmitted and de-coded, with the digital human responding with a natural empathetic spoken response.

And who hasn’t experienced the nightmare of filling out government forms, or endless requests for condition and medications information on paper forms at medical specialist and clinician practices? Just imagine how confronting or impossible this is for people with disability.

Through co-design, people with disability imagined a different experience: a conversation with a digital human to replace the whole concept of forms.

And this significant innovation challenge – the achievement of an adaptive and expressive cognitive system that is inclusive with people with an intellectual disability could only be achieve through co-design.

What we had started upon was a change in the way in which all people and the systems of society and systems of service would interact.

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For everyone, not just the wealthy

All these communication variants are possible and happening now to varying extents and applicable to every facet of life and society; they are available to everyone regardless of advantage or ability.

Innovation driven by the most marginalised in our community and disability entrepreneurs who have had to navigate the world differently, will bring about a level playing field for all. And there are many examples where innovation driven by human rights and accessibility has benefited everyone.

All people experience functional – or situational – disability in different circumstances. Situational disability is a term used to describe a temporary state imposed by a person's current environment that results in an accessibility issue, such as the inability to use one’s hands to operate a phone when driving.

Situational disabilities impact all people universally and there are opportunities and unrealised potential for all people to benefit or leverage technology advancements that were initiated to reduce the impact of physical or cognitive disability.

Take for example closed captioning, originally implemented to assist people with hearing impairments. The first closed captioned television series appeared on TV on March 16, 1980, allowing deaf people in the United States to understand what they were watching.

A range of forward-looking anti-discrimination and disabilities legislation introduced in the United States, ensured that closed captioning access is built into consumer electronics at a level that guarantees its universality. Today, closed captioning features prominently in public environments and public events, accompanies classroom lectures and web content, and even aids ESL students in learning English. 

Another example is SMS, now pervasive, but its introduction into Australia was accelerated as a result of the intervention of the Human Rights Commission so that people with hearing impairment and their families could communicate with one another – with the same access opportunities as the general population – as mobile technology and devices became mainstream.

And the impact of AI will be even more profound. As I wrote in my contribution to Dr Lucien Engelen’s book, “Augmented Healthcare: the end of the beginning”, this triumph of imagination made real, has triggered the start of an exponential change and has already led to digital humans being implemented in multiple sectors: government, banking and financial services to name a few.

Digital humans will be integral to healthcare, as companions and coaches for health consumers and in so doing, upending the e-health model of past decades. Health consumers and people with disability are already asking for their own digital human.

For cultures where traditions and meaning are passed through story-telling, AI digital humans can enable the young to have conversations with past elders. And significantly, it enables elders to tell their stories and have conversations with future generations.

It is my hope that very soon, my grandsons with dyslexia and communication disabilities, can interact with a digital human AI reading coach whenever and wherever they want: a life-long learning companion to build their confidence, stimulate their imaginations and unlock their immense potential.

And perhaps a near future where every student will have their own digital human coach on their own mobile device, which will literally change the face of education for everyone everywhere.

AI: Advancing human endeavour

While this article discusses very significant advancements in technology innovation and design, it started first and foremost as a question of human rights.

I was interested to understand from the the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) what this would mean for the directions of the web. Together with a couple of colleagues, I spent time in 2015 with Sir Tim Berners-Lee, W3C Director and inventor of the World Wide Web, and his team discussing the Human Accessible Web initiative.

Tim Berners-Lee advocates for web neutrality and design universality of access, saying: “The power of the Web is in its universality. Access by everyone regardless of disability is an essential aspect.”

It is also significant that the objectives of W3C (web accessibility) and the Convention (human rights) align with the W3C saying: “The Web is fundamentally designed to work for all people, whatever their hardware, software, language, culture, location, or physical or mental activity.  When the web meets this goal, it is accessible to people with a diverse range of hearing, movement, sight, and cognitive ability.”

The Research and Development Working Group at the W3C further state that to improve the experience of digital interfaces, the interface should be able to dynamically change to suit the person’s needs or preferences. This requires a new type of interface – such as an interface that works like a person. This was what was achieved with Nadia.

Tim Berners-Lee does have some deep concerns for the human dimension; he recently expressed his concerns that AI will become a controlling force in the economy. There are also differing views among other leading commentators: some calling for limitations on AI; the formulation of an ethics framework; or even a pause while governments and society figure it out.

The greatest risk though is to hit the pause button; if that is even possible. Would this mean that the most marginalised and disadvantaged would be told to wait, while the powerful and wealthy pursue their ambitions?

People with disability described AI as a liberator, and that at last, they had hope for a level playing field. What we know is possible and since Nadia, is being delivered commercially in sectors around the world, must be available and accessible for all. We cannot ignore this fact, and deny humanity the fulfilment that comes from AI as a human right.

Therefore, rather than pausing, establishing AI as a human right is a priority and needs to occur first, otherwise any ‘AI ethics framework’ lacks context, policy reference, governance and risks being captured by vested and powerful interests.

Where AI differs from previous technology shifts and accessibility innovations, is that it exponentially changes outcomes and directions in human endeavour. Without AI established as a human right, the gulf between the life outcomes of the wealthy and the marginalised will further fracture and deepen.

In a scenario where only the wealthy have the means to access AI innovations and services, I believe such a scenario would further compromise government budgets and societal outcomes across health, education, disability and aged care.

However, the upside is also profoundly significant. Establishing AI as a human right would drive unprecedented innovation, research and economic activity in the design and co-design of services.

These innovations would be available and accessible for everyone – not just those that can afford them. Governments would be compelled to action, not just to investigate, but to incorporate AI into the design and delivery of services and programs.

AI has a deep connection to the dignity and advancement of humanity regardless of socio-economic status, physical and mental health, disability and nationality.

The 70^th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 2018 provides us with the focus to recognise and protect AI as a human right, and not a privilege to be discretionally granted by others.

Marie Johnson is recognised internationally as an entrepreneurial leader in technology and digital innovation. Marie has led the strategy and implementation of very significant reform programs to the digital machinery of government across service delivery, revenue, identity, payments, authentication and whole-of-government architecture. She is an AIIA Board Director; and former Head of the Technology Authority for the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA) responsible for “Nadia”.