Most AI companies will tell you their systems are ethical. Wendell Wallach — one of the founding voices of AI ethics — says that's not even close to true.

In this episode, we sit down with the author of "Moral Machines" and "A Dangerous Master" to ask the question nobody in Silicon Valley wants answered: if AI can't feel, can't reflect, and has no conscience — who is actually responsible when it goes wrong?

The answer is more unsettling than you'd expect.

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00:00 Introduction 00:44 From Moral Machines to A Dangerous Master: What Changed 02:25 Can AI Actually Be Moral? (Spoiler: Probably Not) 04:01 Why Emotions Are Non-Negotiable in Ethical Decisions 05:00 The Silent Ethic: Wendell's Framework for Inner Moral Guidance 08:12 The Training Data Problem: AI Learns From a Flawed Internet 10:12 Who's Liable? Self-Driving Cars & the McDonald's Coffee Case 14:26 "Unknown Unknowns Is Not an Excuse" — Ethics as a Discipline 17:18 If AI Gains Consciousness, Can It Be Held Accountable? 19:52 Corporate Self-Governance: Why It Has Never Worked 23:41 What Still Gives Wendell Hope After 20 Years

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Wendell Wallach is one of the most cited voices in AI ethics globally. He is the author of "Moral Machines: Teaching Robots Right from Wrong" (2009, co-authored with Colin Allen) — one of the first comprehensive books on implementing moral decision-making in AI systems — and "A Dangerous Master: How to Keep Technology from Slipping Beyond Our Control" (2015). Widely regarded by colleagues as a "godfather of AI ethics," Wallach has spent over two decades studying the intersection of technology, morality, and human accountability.

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The people shaping your industry are already using AI — and they have concerns they don't say publicly. Human Layer AI is the podcast where leaders, professionals, and practitioners get honest about how AI is actually changing their field, what happens when people rely on it too much, and the human cost of getting it wrong.

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