lecture 13 computer ethics

Computer and Information Ethics Instructor: Viola Schiaffonati May,9th 2013

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Overview Representative examples of issues and problems Some definitions and concepts Logical malleability

Some debates The uniqueness debate

Intelligent machines and machine ethics

Philosophical Issues of CS

Computers in the workplace Many workers replaced by computerized devices Short run: computer-generated unemployment Long run: more jobs than those eliminated

Radical alteration of some jobs De-skilling of workers (passive observers and button pushers) New jobs requiring new sophisticated skills to perform

Health and safety in workplaces


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Computer crime

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New types of crimes Not the physical security of the hardware, but rather logical security Privacy and confidentiality Integrity (assuring data and programs are not modified without proper authority) Consistency (ensuring data and behavior we see today will be the same tomorrow) Controlling access to resources


Privacy and anonymity

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Huge variety of privacy related issues generated by computer technology Easiness and efficiency by which information can be collected, archived, compared, shared

Re-examination of the concept of privacy Information society as surveillance society influencing individual behavior and individual self-perception Political problem (and not just ethical): legislative limits to the control and collection of personal data


Intellectual property

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Intellectual property rights connected with software ownership Different aspects of software that can be owned The source code (written by the programmer in a high-level computer language) The object code (machine-language translation of the source code) The algorithm The look and feel of a program (the way the program appears on the screen)

Different types of ownership Copyrights Trade secrets Patents Philosophical Issues of CS

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Globalization

For the first time in history efforts to develop agreed standards of conduct, and to defend and advance human values, are being made in a truly global context Global laws: if national laws become local laws, which are the laws enforced? Global education: what will be the impact of this global education upon political dictatorships, isolated communities, coherent cultures, religious practices? Information rich and information poor: will gaps between the rich and poor became even worse?


What is computer ethics?

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Analysis of the nature and social impact of computer technology and the corresponding formulation and justification of policies for the ethical use of such technology (Moor 1985) Logical malleability: computers are shaped and molded to do any activity that can be characterized in terms of inputs, outputs, and connecting logical operations Understanding logical malleability important to set policies for the use of computers

That branch of applied ethics which studies and analyzes such social and ethical impacts of ICT (Bynum 2008)


The uniqueness debate

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Walter Maner claims computer technology has generated new kinds of problems Computer ethics as a branch of applied ethics

Deborah Johnson (1985) claims computer ethics deals with traditional ethical problems under a new light However, even if the structure of problems is not new, computer ethics is not just applied ethics but requires new conceptual analyses To investigate ethical problems related to computer viruses’ widespread diffusion it is necessary to understand what a computer virus is


Perspective change, evaluation change?

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Is there a significantly moral difference between stealing (copying and selling copies) of a software and stealing a car? Are harassments on the Internet different from face-toface ones? Types of questions arising because actions and interactions over the Internet have some distinctive features Major possibility of anonymity Reproducibility that doesn’t deprive the owner of the property (even if the market value diminishes)


Internet issues

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The Internet seems to have some very special features having both positive and negative aspects (Johnson 2004) Permitting many-to-many communication very easily Facilitating a high degree of anonymity Promoting reproducibility


The invisibility factor

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Most of the time and under most conditions computer operations are invisible Invisible abuse Intentional use of the invisible operations of a computer to engage in unethical conduct Invasion of the property and privacy of others

Presence of invisible programming values Values embedded in a computer program some for invisible abuse (biased reservation service) or just latent (maybe even invisible for the programmer)

Invisible complex calculations How much we should trust a computer’s invisible calculation Invisibility dilemma


Intelligent machines

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What happens if we succeed? Current and forthcoming issue: legal responsibility If a doctor uses an expert system for making a diagnosis, who/what is responsible in case of errors? (expert systems assimilated to textbooks) Electronic commerce and legal responsibility of programs

Future issue: rights Should ‘intelligent’ machines have rights? How these machines should interact with human beings? Will artificial agents be moral agents?


Machine ethics

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Ethics for machines of for who use such machines? To make ethics computable and insert it in AI systems To enlarge the traditional boundaries of ethics to include new problems arising by the use of intelligent machines


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References

Bynum, T. (2008) "Computer and Information Ethics", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2008 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = Johnson, D. (1985), Computer Ethics, First Edition, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall; Second Edition, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1994; Third Edition Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 2001 Johnson, D. (2004), “Computer Ethics,” in L. Floridi (ed.), The Blackwell Guide to the Philosophy of Computing and Information, Oxford: Blackwell, 6575 Moor, J. (1985) “What Is Computer Ethics?” Metaphilosophy, 16(4): 266-75
