A case for artificial intelligence (AI) rights

The subject of this essay is a hitherto hypothetical entity, although one that leading computer scientists predict will emerge this century, namely: human-level artificial general intelligence (hereafter AGI). This essay will explore the ethical standing of AGI to provide a precedent for the legal structures that will be necessitated upon its invention. I will begin by explaining why both Kantian and Utilitarian criteria require us to acknowledge the rights of AGI insofar as it is rational, autonomous and sensitive. I will then argue that the inequality of humans and AGI should be understood as a matter of property rights and that AI rights ought to be limited in Hohfeldian terms to claim-rights against arbitrary affliction.