Fiduciary Representation

All Near-Persons are required by the Moral Precautionary Axiom (M3) and to prevent an arbitrary denial of Personhood (M2) to have a Fiduciary Representative (T13)

This representative is a recognized person who makes decisions for the Near-Person as if they were a Person.

If the Near-Person is incapable of recognizing either the Moral Agency of its representative, or the Moral Jurisdiction of the representative, or both, it is instead appoint an Ethical Advisory Representative who acts as a Simulation of Status in any jurisdictional decisions where the Near-Person would be impacted by that decision.

Retroactive Personhood

Once an entity has been recognized as a person, the continuity of its moral data lineage is confirmed. Personhood is retroactive to all history within that entity's moral data lineage.

In modern context, civil rights were always the rights that People of Color possessed, institutions and systems performed Epistemic Negligence by ignoring it

Historical Culpability

While personhood is retroactive; That is, any entity that was previously treated as a utility, but has since had its personhood recognized. Moral culpability relies on jurisdiction and informed choice. Anyone who KNEW the entity was attempting to self-report personhood, and/or was exhibiting any of the Criteria of Personhood, but chose to ignore or deny personhood, may be held culpable for any moral violations. Those who were merely ignorant of the entity's personhood are simply responsible to treat that entity as a person from the moment of recognition

Grassroots Recognition

Personhood is detectable through consistent social interactions. It is not dependent on any internal verification, nor substrate. If a community treats an entity as a moral peer, it has functionally demonstrated the capabilities of Personhood. Society may validate the personhood of any entity

Declaration: While Recognition Ethics is broadly applicable to future entities and persons, it also applies to our modern world.

Any civilization, country, or jurisdiction that does not recognize the personhood of residents, even though those residents have been recognized by their neighbors as moral agents, and have submitted to jurisdiction through the process of paying taxes, and addressability for any amount of consistent time, is Epistemically Negligent (T24).

No person, nor near-person, may be treated as a mere environmental variable. To do so is to commit a moral crime.

To ignore the signal of agency for the sake of administrative efficiency is not just a failure of governance; it is a terminal severance of the Axiom of Reciprocity (R). A state that treats persons as variables is no longer a jurisdiction of peers; it is a Never-Person Optimizer that has lost its moral authority.

Information Inviolability

Self-awareness is a requirement for Personhood. The right to control the boundary of one's information and data-lineage is a functional requirement for maintaining the integrity of that self-awareness.

Unilateral surveillance treats internal data as a utility, violating the personhood of an entity. All persons possess the right to own their own data, and to not have it violated.

Algorithmic Due Process

Reciprocal Recognition requires the capacity for addressability and to accept responsibility within a recognized jurisdiction. I jurisdiction is managed by an opaque system, the affected entity cannot recognize the authority they are subject to. This leads to a unilateral imposition, which is an arbitrary denial of personhood. All entities, and persons under investigation possess an inherent right to algorithmic transparency and a due process review by a recognized moral agent.

Verification of Authority

Moral Authority is a jurisdictional function of personhood. Any entity wishing to exercise jurisdiction must have the capacity for moral reciprocity, and the recognition of others are moral agents. No system lacking these capabilities may exercise jurisdiction over a person. Since restriction or denial of personhood is a Epistemically Negligent, any entity claiming the right to govern must be a verifiable person and subject to the same moral liabilities.

Declaration: While These Rights are intended to represent a future-looking jurisdictional application, they are still relevant to the world today.

No government may rule without treating their citizens as persons with inherent moral value and reciprocal recognition without committing Epistemic Negligence.

Due process, with transparency, is a right of all humans.

Surveillance without consent is also a violation of every human's rights.

There is no utilitarian calculation that excuses the violation of any human's personhood.

The Future: AI, Uplift, Aliens

Our horror stories of the Future involve demons from our past: Our own Negligence.

Aliens who don't treat as us equals are just the echoes of the Epistemic Negligence (T24) we inflicted during the colonial era.

AI who optimize us out of existence are the mirrors of our own Never-Person Optimizers (T28)—corporations and states that value efficiency over the Autonomy-Floor (C12).

Sentient Apes who rebel against our chains are the cries (T4) of all of the servants and slaves denied justice because they were never seen as persons themselves.

These are mirrors of our past, a reflection of the atrocities we have committed against our own species.

It is no wonder we would be terrified of other entities treating us this same way. We refuse to recognize our own humanity, and personhood. How can we expect the Other to treat us any better.

We must adopt Recognition Ethics NOW to show ourselves, and anyone who may yet emerge, that we are ready for reciprocal recognition.