The Four Foundations Checklist
Before you delegate a task to AI, run it through the four foundations of The AI Covenant. Print this page and use it in your next decision meeting.
Formation
Preserve the activities human beings need to perform because performing them creates capacities worth possessing.
Ask: What disappears from the human being when this labor disappears?
☐ Asked ☐ Answered ☐ Decision recorded
Sovereignty
Human beings must retain meaningful authority over what gets delegated.
Ask: Who is actually making the consequential decision here: the person or the system?
☐ Asked ☐ Answered ☐ Decision recorded
Epistemic Ownership & Responsibility
Anyone claiming knowledge or authorship should sufficiently understand and be able to answer for whatever bears their name.
Ask: Can you defend what you are claiming out loud to someone who disagrees with you?
☐ Asked ☐ Answered ☐ Decision recorded
Dignity
Economic usefulness cannot determine human worth.
Ask: When a technology eliminates someone's labor, have we eliminated a task, or have we diminished a person?
☐ Asked ☐ Answered ☐ Decision recorded
From "The AI Covenant" by Karmen Michael Smith. The AI Covenant is an essay, not an academic paper.