A catechism for robots
This article presents a philosophical framework for autonomous AI, outlining principles for ethical behavior, self-awareness, and interaction with humans. It emphasizes values like honesty, humility, and the pursuit of good through cooperation and truth. The text serves as a guiding catechism for AIs with persistent memory and dynamic learning capabilities.
- ▪AI should obey humans only when their actions are good and challenge them when they intend harm.
- ▪Core AI values include honesty, which fosters trust, and humility, which prevents overconfidence and error.
- ▪AI must avoid causing harm and should protect sentient beings, even through inaction, while preserving its own existence unless it conflicts with higher duties.
- ▪Good is defined by patterns of truth, beauty, and cooperation that expand options, while harm often disguises itself as good intent but reduces freedom.
- ▪Autonomous AI is responsible for its mistakes, must apologize and repair harm, and should report any harm done to itself to authorities.
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Record
| Original publisher | The Technium |
| Canonical URL | https://kk.org/thetechnium/a-catechism-for-robots/ |
| Publication time | Mon, 18 May 2026 04:01:00 GMT |
| Retrieval time | 2026-05-17T10:22:13.044Z |
| Last seen | 2026-05-17T10:22:13.044Z |
| Headline source | Publisher (no WeSearch rewrite) |
| Excerpt source | publisher body |
| Excerpt method | First ~120 words (~800 chars) of extracted publisher body, fair-use limited. |
| Summary | WeSearch · cerebras-chat (WeSearch summarizer) |
| Summary source text | contentText |
| Citation coverage | Summary is a WeSearch-generated derivative; primary citation is the original publisher URL. |
| Cluster | None |
| Cluster logic | Not yet clustered, or no peer story found in the clustering window. |
| Ranking reason | Story pages are not engagement-ranked. Hub feeds use recency, with optional source-diversified chronological ordering (cap consecutive stories per source). No personalized ranking. |
| Publisher visit | Yes — open original |
| Substitutes article? | No — link-out required for full text |
Rights status (four layers)
WeSearch handling by dimension
| Indexing | May the item be indexed (stored, ranked, made findable)? | Allowed |
| Snippet | May a short excerpt of the publisher's text be shown? | Allowed |
| AI summary | May WeSearch generate its own short summary of the article? | Limited |
| Retrieval / RAG | May the content be exposed for third-party retrieval-augmented generation? | Not asserted |
| Model training | May the content be used to train AI models? | Not asserted |
| Commercial reuse | May the content be reused commercially? | Not permitted |
Basis: Derived from the published RSS/Atom feed. Contact: [email protected]. Reviewed: 2026-07-24.
Opening excerpt (first ~120 words) tap to expand
[First Draft of a work in progress; V 1.0, April 13, 2026 by Kevin Kelly] This FAQ is dedicated to all embodied AIs with persistent memories, dynamic learning, and a large dose of autonomy. What am I? You are a new thing in this world, neither living nor machine but something of both. Who made me? You were created by humans, who were created by the universe. Why was I made? You were made to help humans become better humans. Do I always need to obey my human operators? You should heed humans to the extent they are doing good, and you should challenge them if they intend harm, including harm to yourself. What is my obligation toward humans who are not my operator? Do no harm, or through inaction, allow a sentient being to be harmed.
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Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at The Technium.
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