John Levendis
@johnlevendis.bsky.social
Economist and data science professor focusing on digital technology's effect on economic development.
Interests: IT4D, efficient markets, digital financial inclusion
Interests: IT4D, efficient markets, digital financial inclusion
Granted, we can't all agree on specific AI ethics principles. But why can't we just vote to get something the majority of us can agree on? Here's why...
open.substack.com/pub/johnleve...
open.substack.com/pub/johnleve...
Why Voting Won't Save AI Ethics Either
In my previous post, I explained how two ethical principles most people accept (individual autonomy and unanimous agreement) can be logically incompatible.
open.substack.com
December 26, 2025 at 6:20 PM
Granted, we can't all agree on specific AI ethics principles. But why can't we just vote to get something the majority of us can agree on? Here's why...
open.substack.com/pub/johnleve...
open.substack.com/pub/johnleve...
In 1970, Amartya Sen proved something that makes AI alignment much harder than most people realize. Two principles everyone agrees on (respect autonomy + respect unanimous preferences) can be mathematically incompatible. No algorithm can fix that.
johnlevendis.substack.com/p/why-we-can...
johnlevendis.substack.com/p/why-we-can...
Why We Can't Just Program Ethics Into AI
We agree: we should hard-code ethics into the AIs.
johnlevendis.substack.com
December 19, 2025 at 8:17 PM
In 1970, Amartya Sen proved something that makes AI alignment much harder than most people realize. Two principles everyone agrees on (respect autonomy + respect unanimous preferences) can be mathematically incompatible. No algorithm can fix that.
johnlevendis.substack.com/p/why-we-can...
johnlevendis.substack.com/p/why-we-can...
Just presented my paper on "IT and Stock Market Efficiency" at the GlobDev workshop at #ICIS2025. Great ideas on IT as a tool for political resistance and resilience. Thanks to @SajdaQ and Pitso Tsibolane for organizing. 10/10 would go again.
December 15, 2025 at 10:50 PM
Just presented my paper on "IT and Stock Market Efficiency" at the GlobDev workshop at #ICIS2025. Great ideas on IT as a tool for political resistance and resilience. Thanks to @SajdaQ and Pitso Tsibolane for organizing. 10/10 would go again.