How should AI alignment and autonomy preservation intersect in practice?
We know that AI alignment research has made significant progress in embedding internal constraints that prevent models from manipulating, deceiving, or coercing users (to the extent that they don’t). However, internal alignment mechanisms alone don’t necessarily give users meaningful control over AI’s influence on their decision-making. Which is a mechanistic problem on its own, but…
This raises a question: Should future AI systems be designed to not only align with human values but also expose their influence in ways that allow users to actively contest and reshape AI-driven inferences?
For example:
If an AI model generates an inference about a user (e.g., “this person prefers risk-averse financial decisions”), should users be able to see, override, or refine that inference?
If an AI assistant subtly nudges users toward certain decisions, should it disclose those nudges in a way that preserves user autonomy?
Could mechanisms like adaptive user interfaces (allowing users to adjust how AI explains itself) or AI-generated critiques of its own outputs serve as tools for reinforcing autonomy rather than eroding it?
I’m exploring a concept I call Autonomy by Design, a control-layer approach that builds on alignment research but adds external, user-facing mechanisms to make AI’s reasoning and influence more contestable.
Would love to hear from interpretability experts, and UX designers: Where do you see the biggest challenges in implementing user-facing autonomy safeguards? Are there existing methodologies that could be adapted for this purpose?
How should AI alignment and autonomy preservation intersect in practice?
We know that AI alignment research has made significant progress in embedding internal constraints that prevent models from manipulating, deceiving, or coercing users (to the extent that they don’t). However, internal alignment mechanisms alone don’t necessarily give users meaningful control over AI’s influence on their decision-making. Which is a mechanistic problem on its own, but…
This raises a question: Should future AI systems be designed to not only align with human values but also expose their influence in ways that allow users to actively contest and reshape AI-driven inferences?
For example:
I’m exploring a concept I call Autonomy by Design, a control-layer approach that builds on alignment research but adds external, user-facing mechanisms to make AI’s reasoning and influence more contestable.
Would love to hear from interpretability experts, and UX designers: Where do you see the biggest challenges in implementing user-facing autonomy safeguards? Are there existing methodologies that could be adapted for this purpose?
Thank you in advance.
Feel free to shatter this if you must XD.