When a Property is More than an Extension of a Human Hand - Artificial Intelligence perspective

In the case of McCaughn v American Meter Co (1932)[1] in which the problem of an autonomous ‘property’ [2] arose in the context of how an action of purchasing via a prepayment gas meter should be classified for tax purposes, the US court declared that the coin-operated meter was able to act independently of human intervention in performing a financial transaction with buyers. The US court viewed the machine as something more than a tool in human hands and concluded that the ‘contract, sale, delivery and payment’ were ‘affected by mechanism, automatically and without human agency.’[3]

From the standpoint of taxation, the prepayment meters were recognised as an independent part of the sales transaction. Nonetheless, the liability for their actions was reassigned to their owner.[4] Case law suggests further that as long as there is no physical harm or damage arising from the actions of autonomous devices, US courts do not tend to reassign legal responsibility for actions performed by ‘robotics’ to currently existing legal entities. For example, in Royal Insurance Company of America v Crowne Investment the US Supreme Court did not theorise that human beings should be held responsible for guarding independently acting systems. In this case, the Royal Insurance Company stated that it sent an important e-mail to Crowne Investment. The e-mail was lost due to the Royal Insurance Company’s ‘robotic mail system.’ [5] The court held that the malfunction of the equipment was not ‘a result of the [Royal]’s own culpable conduct.’ [6] This made Royal ‘in no way culpable’ for its automatic device actions.[7] This opinion was made with respect to a faulty computer system.

However, with regard to the independent actions of AI, US courts may take a different stand and hold currently existing legal entities and/or AI accountable when AI act results in economic loss as could happen in respect of patent law infringement. [8] The question of determining liability for patent law infringement as performed by AI is a very important subject as the implementation of this technology increases in the US patent innovation industry, and, as recognised by the US court in the 2012 Akamai Technologies Inc v Limelight Networks Inc case ‘[s]tability and clarity of the law are essential to innovative commerce.’ [9]

This note argues that to determine the appropriate measures of responsibility and to assure ‘stability and clarity of the law’ the US courts might favourably be disposed towards arguing for making the human beings and/or AI liable for patent law infringement caused by the latter. Under a particular set of circumstances, the US courts will have to consider both the human beings and AI as the infringers of the patent rights of others and liable for their autonomous conducts. This note argues that as long as we have had legal systems, the US courts have been facing change as represented by the development of a new technology. For each new advance in technology, law enforcement has adapted.

For example, with the advent of cars, The National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act was enacted in the US in 1966 to empower the federal government to set and administer new safety standards for motor vehicles and road traffic safety. [11] With the arrival of airplanes, in the US, the Contract Air Mail Act of 1925 (commonly known as the Kelly Act) and the Civil Aeronautics Act of 1938 formed the early basis for regulation of domestic air transportation. [12] ‘Disruptive technology’ such as AI has now gone well beyond that listed above. Arguably, the most likely reality is that the US courts will need to adopt a dependent legal personhood standard for artificial intelligence as represented by softbots.

References:

(Oscola style of referencing)

Image: www.stockfreeimages.com

1. McCaughn v American Meter Co 67 F2d 148, 149 (US Court of Appeals, 3rd Cir 1932).

2. Please be advised a ‘property’ and ‘inanimate entity’ are used interchangeably in this thesis.

3. McCaughn v American Meter Co (n 1).

4. ibid.

5. Royal Insurance Company of America v Crowne Investment 903 So.2d 802 (Ala. 2004).

6. ibid 806.

7. ibid 808 (the US court was citing Kirtland v Fort Morgan Auth Sewer Serv Inc 524 So2d 600, 605 (Ala 1988)).

8. See, for example, Pompeii Estates Inc v Consol Edison Co of NY Inc 397 NY S2d 577 (NY Civ 1977).

9. Akamai Technologies Inc v Limelight Networks Inc 692 F 3d 1321 (Fed Cir 2012).

10. The National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act (Pub L 89–563) (1966).

11. The Contract Air Mail Act of 1925 and The Civil Aeronautics Act of 1938 (CAA) (PL 75-706, 52 Stat 973).