What — AI ethics tries to achieve

Understand
concept by
concept

Learn the Key Concepts of the Aligned Groups Framework

Concepts are power. Shared concepts help us share and build power together.

Align

People or things are aligned insofar as they can be understood to share goals. Individuals, organizations, communities, countries, and AI systems can all be more or less aligned, within themselves and between each other. They can share more or fewer goals, and they can share those goals more or less deeply. All else being equal, sharing goals more deeply increases alignment.

Groups

Groups are sets of individuals. Individuals can belong to many groups. The kinds of groups that we focus on here are ones that have a shared sense of what they should do, and how they should be, which is their ethos. Successful human groups consistently depend on a shared ethos to help them create and maintain their identity, and coordinate their actions.

Ethically

We do things ethically when we explicitly do them in ways that align with the ethos of at least one group. Whenever we talk about what we should do, or how we should be, we are doing ethics. Things are ethical insofar as they align with the ethos of a group, and more broadly to the degree that they respect the ethical agency of all.

The core of the Aligned Groups Framework

The Core of the AGF

Cultivate Human Groups Ethically

Which concept would you like to focus on?

Cultivate Human Agency
Concept I
Cultivate Human Agency
Agency is the capacity to make meaningful choices and act on them. The AGF emphasizes cultivating human agency so that people are empowered to make good choices about AI use — choices they genuinely understand and can stand behind.
Communicate Holistically
Concept II
Communicate Holistically
Holistic communication means sharing factual, ethical, and authentic information across your organization. It goes beyond data transfer to include the full picture — context, experience, and values — so that people can build genuine understanding together.
Reflect on Whole Systems
Concept III
Reflect on Whole Systems
Reflection on whole systems means stepping back to see how your workflows, structures, culture, and AI integrations fit together as a coherent whole — and making deliberate choices about how to coordinate them ethically.

The AGF is designed to help you align groups ethically, so that you can ethically align AI systems to yourselves.

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