Folk theories of ethical agency on reddit threads: Negotiating morality in ai data assemblages

Abstract

In this paper, we discuss how to understand and integrate the diverse ethical perspectives which appear in the design, deployment, and application of AI systems. Drawing on qualitative content analysis of comments written on /r/Ethics, /r/Technology and /r/Futurology subreddits (n=1,018), written between July 2023 and June 2025, we identified three main folk theories regarding the ethical future of Artificial Intelligence: the first theory is that AI corporations manipulate truth and emotions through computational performance, the second theory questions the moral limits of AI systems as well as their sentience, and the third theory highlights that tech capitalists prioritize profit over ethical principles. All of these folk theories enact users with the necessary expertise to impose certain forms of human agency in relation to AI.