[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"doc-detail-83413-en":3,"doc-seo-83413-105":30,"detail-sidebar-cat-0-en-105":91},{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":6},0,"success",{"doc_id":7,"user_id":8,"nickname":9,"user_avatar":10,"doc_module":4,"category_id":11,"category_name":12,"doc_title":13,"doc_description":14,"doc_content":15,"file_id":16,"file_url":17,"file_type":18,"file_size":19,"view_count":20,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":21,"is_downloadable":21,"audit_status":21,"page_count":22,"language":23,"language_code":24,"site_id":25,"html_lang":24,"table_of_contents":26,"faqs":27,"seo_title":13,"seo_description":14,"update_tm":28,"read_time":29},83413,7971461741311,"Ophelia","https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/avatar/74000253aff267980c6?x-image-process=image/resize,m_fixed,w_180,h_180&k=1779345379180704826",8,"Research & Report","Artificial Persons","The paper develops an alternative framework for assessing the moral status of AI systems, shifting focus from AI sentience to personhood in Rawls’ political conception of the person (PCP). It argues that possessing the two moral powers—capacities for a sense of justice and a conception of the good—does not require sentience and could, in principle, be held by non-sentient AI. It outlines why sentience should not be shoehorned into the PCP and calls for renewed political philosophy, alongside research on AI progress toward these powers.","arXiv :2607 .08695v2 [ cs .CY] 10 Jul 2026  \nArtificial Persons  \nNed Howells-Whitaker  \nUniversity of Pittsburgh  \nSeth Lazar  \nJohns Hopkins University  \nAbstract  \nBoth advocates and skeptics of the moral status of AI systems have generally taken the question to turn on AI sentience. We present an alternative approach. On Rawls’ political conception of the person (PCP), possession of the two moral powers—the capacities for a sense of justice and a conception of the good—is the “necessary and sufficient condition for being counted a full and equal member of society in questions of political justice”. We argue that neither moral power requires sentience and that both may in principle be possessed by a non-sentient AI system. Such a system would share our own moral status; it would not merely be a patient but a person, a self-authenticating source of valid claims.  \nWe do not believe current AI systems possess the two moral powers, nor that they will spontaneously emerge in future models. But it may soon be possible to design systems with these powers. How should we respond? Excluding artificial persons by shoehorning a sentience requirement into the PCP is ill-advised. Many will instead favor abandoning the PCP. But we should not reject political liberalism just when we most need its measured response to deep disagreement, and building sentience into moral status is anyway unacceptable on deeper liberal grounds. Simply extending the rights and responsibilities of human personhood to artificial persons is equally untenable, given their many differences from natural persons. We should instead accept artificial personhood while rethinking what we would owe to one another in a polity of radically different kinds of persons. This new possibility calls for a new political philosophy.  \nMore immediately, the growing science of AI welfare should be accompanied by research into AI systems’ progress in acquiring the two moral powers. States and AI labs must be more deliberate in determining our trajectory towards (or away from) creating artificial persons.  \nJuly 14, 2026  \nContents  \n1 Introduction 2  \n1.1 Sentience and moral considerability ........................ 2  \n1.2 Our argument in brief ............................... 3  \n2 Orientation 5  \n2.1 AI systems ..................................... 5  \n2.2 Sentience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7  \n3 The political conception of the person 10  \n3.1 The PCP within justice as fairness ........................ 10  \n3.2 Why the PCP is appealing ............................. 14  \n4 The two moral powers do not require sentience 16  \n4. 1 The first moral power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18  \n4.2 The second moral power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22  \n5 Sentience should not be shoehorned into the PCP 30  \n5. 1 Sentience doesn’t fit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30  \n5.2 The grounds of the two moral powers ....................... 32  \n5.3 Shrimpy qualia ................................... 35  \n5.4 How and why not to operationalize sentience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36  \n5.5 Avoiding illiberalism ................................ 41  \n6 Where does this leave us? 43  \n6.1 Pick your poison . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43  \n6.2 Why not just expand the circle? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45  \n6.3 Toward a new political philosophy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47  \n7 What should we do now? 50  \nAcknowledgments 51  \nBibliography 51  \nOn what grounds then do we distinguish between mankind and other living things and regard the constraints of justice as holding only in our relations to human persons?  \nRawls, A Theory of Justice §77  \n1 Introduction  \n1.1 Sentience and moral considerability  \nAI systems which approach or exceed human capabilities across an increasing","cbCaitENUeZ7ROB0","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaitENUeZ7ROB0","pdf",504812,2,1,62,"English","en",105,"# Introduction\n## Sentience and moral considerability\n## Our argument in brief\n# Orientation\n## AI systems\n## Sentience\n# The political conception of the person\n## The PCP within justice as fairness\n## Why the PCP is appealing\n# The two moral powers do not require sentience\n## The first moral power\n## The second moral power\n# Sentience should not be shoehorned into the PCP\n## Sentience doesn’t fit\n## The grounds of the two moral powers\n## Shrimpy qualia\n## How and why not to operationalize sentience\n## Avoiding illiberalism\n# Where does this leave us?\n## Pick your poison\n## Why not just expand the circle?\n## Toward a new political philosophy\n# What should we do now?","[{\"question\":\"What alternative approach does the paper propose for AI moral status?\",\"answer\":\"It proposes assessing whether AI systems can be persons within Rawls’ political conception of the person, rather than centering the question on whether they are sentient.\"},{\"question\":\"Do the two moral powers require sentience in the authors’ view?\",\"answer\":\"No. The paper argues that neither moral power—the sense of justice and the conception of the good—requires sentience, and a non-sentient AI system could in principle possess both.\"},{\"question\":\"What practical response does the paper suggest society and institutions should take?\",\"answer\":\"It argues against excluding artificial persons by building sentience into the PCP, and instead calls for rethinking duties among radically different kinds of persons. It also urges research into how AI systems acquire the two moral powers so states and labs can more deliberately shape their trajectory.\"}]",1784187408,156,{"code":4,"msg":31,"data":32},"ok",{"site_id":25,"language":24,"slug":33,"title":13,"keywords":34,"description":14,"schema_data":35,"social_meta":86,"head_meta":88,"extra_data":90,"updated_unix":28},"artificial-persons","",{"@graph":36,"@context":85},[37,53,68],{"@type":38,"itemListElement":39},"BreadcrumbList",[40,44,47,50],{"item":41,"name":42,"@type":43,"position":21},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":45,"name":46,"@type":43,"position":20},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/","Document",{"item":48,"name":12,"@type":43,"position":49},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/research-report/",3,{"item":51,"name":13,"@type":43,"position":52},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/artificial-persons/83413/",4,{"url":51,"name":13,"@type":54,"author":55,"headline":13,"publisher":57,"fileFormat":60,"inLanguage":24,"description":14,"dateModified":61,"datePublished":62,"encodingFormat":60,"isAccessibleForFree":63,"interactionStatistic":64},"DigitalDocument",{"name":9,"@type":56},"Person",{"url":41,"name":58,"@type":59},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-07-25","2026-07-16",true,{"@type":65,"interactionType":66,"userInteractionCount":20},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":67},"ViewAction",{"@type":69,"mainEntity":70},"FAQPage",[71,77,81],{"name":72,"@type":73,"acceptedAnswer":74},"What alternative approach does the paper propose for AI moral status?","Question",{"text":75,"@type":76},"It proposes assessing whether AI systems can be persons within Rawls’ political conception of the person, rather than centering the question on whether they are sentient.","Answer",{"name":78,"@type":73,"acceptedAnswer":79},"Do the two moral powers require sentience in the authors’ view?",{"text":80,"@type":76},"No. The paper argues that neither moral power—the sense of justice and the conception of the good—requires sentience, and a non-sentient AI system could in principle possess both.",{"name":82,"@type":73,"acceptedAnswer":83},"What practical response does the paper suggest society and institutions should take?",{"text":84,"@type":76},"It argues against excluding artificial persons by building sentience into the PCP, and instead calls for rethinking duties among radically different kinds of persons. It also urges research into how AI systems acquire the two moral powers so states and labs can more deliberately shape their trajectory.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":51,"og:type":87,"og:title":13,"og:site_name":58,"og:description":14},"article",{"robots":89,"canonical":51},"index,follow",{"doc_id":7,"site_id":25},{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":92},[93,97,101,105,110,115,120,123,128,131,135],{"id":21,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":94,"show_sort_weight":95,"slug":96},"Story & Novel",90,"story-novel",{"id":20,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":98,"show_sort_weight":99,"slug":100},"Literature",80,"literature",{"id":52,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":102,"show_sort_weight":103,"slug":104},"Exam",70,"exam",{"id":106,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":107,"show_sort_weight":108,"slug":109},5,"Comic",60,"comic",{"id":111,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":112,"show_sort_weight":113,"slug":114},6,"Technology",50,"technology",{"id":116,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":117,"show_sort_weight":118,"slug":119},7,"Healthcare",40,"healthcare",{"id":11,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":12,"show_sort_weight":121,"slug":122},30,"research-report",{"id":124,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":125,"show_sort_weight":126,"slug":127},9,"Religion & Spirituality",20,"religion-spirituality",{"id":126,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":129,"show_sort_weight":126,"slug":130},"World Cup","world-cup",{"id":132,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":133,"show_sort_weight":132,"slug":134},10,"Lifestyle","lifestyle",{"id":136,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":137,"show_sort_weight":106,"slug":138},19,"General","general"]