DOSSIER · №39 OF 81 · ACADEMIC · ch05
← →
← Back to The 81
39 · A SV ACADEMIC

"The Technomoral Virtue"

Dr. Shannon Vallor

CHAPTER
ch05 · Human-Systems Intelligence Interaction
TIER
Academic
STATUS
Living · Active
ACTIVE
1972 – present
AFFILIATION
University of Edinburgh · Centre for Technomoral Futures
JURISDICTION
AI Ethics / Philosophy of Technology / Virtue Ethics
COLD OPEN
"We don't need rules that tell machines what not to do. We need virtues — cultivated habits of attention, care, and coordination with others. Ethics is not a filter. It is a feedback loop."
OVERVIEW

Applied Aristotelian virtue ethics to artificial intelligence, arguing that the question is not what rules AI should follow but what moral character it should embody. Her concept of technomoral virtues insists that technology shapes the moral ecology of the humans who use it — making design itself an ethical act.

WHY THIS VOICE MATTERS TO KNOWWARE
Vallor brings the third body into ethics: virtue is not a rule applied to an action, but a coordination pattern between agent, situation, and community over time. She argues that AI without embedded virtues disrupts the coordination loops through which humans become good — making ethics inseparable from the coordination intelligence thesis.
OUTSTANDING NOTES
  • ◦Fulbright Award
  • ◦NSF Ethics Award
  • ◦Patrick Suppes Prize in Philosophy of Science
CLASSIFICATION
SV
ACADEMIC · TIER A
ch05
METHODS & FRAMEWORKS
5 entries
Technomoral virtuesAristotelian AI ethicsCare ethics in technologyResponsible AI designMoral ecology
KEY WORKS
  1. 01 Technology and the Virtues
  2. 02 The AI Mirror
  3. 03 Shaping Our Tools: Contestation and Technology
← All 81
← 038 040 →