Thinking Cap #5

[albertkun]

Due 5/4

Note: Responses submitted after Monday 2pm will not be eligible for awards.

Consider what are your ethical views when it comes to society and technology? How do your ethics empower civil society?

Completing the readings will be particularly helpful in this thinking cap.

Submission

Make a new comment below and respond to any students comment before class begins.

[rachan2023]

I define ethics as what is morally right and morally wrong. Technology and society are intertwined; technology cannot be separated from society. Specifically, technologically can positively benefit society, but it can also have the ability to further exacerbate social conditions in society. I firmly believe that people who have access and know how to use technology should be responsible for reconciling the use of technology and its impacts on society. For example, when people use technology, such as GIS and digital mapping, they have to consider ethics and ask themselves whether the use of this technology is helping or harming a community. It is necessary to ensure that the data being represented in the maps is accurate to a community’s story, but it is also necessary to understand the impact of this technology outside of the scope of just creating a map to solve a problem. Technology impacts humans and society. If it is realized that these tools are hurting a community then people need to rethink their approach and goal to solving a problem. This is especially important when dealing with platforms such as Facebook and Google, who create social media applications and search engines respectively, that primarily focus on capitalism through marketing ads, taking users’ data, and creating algorithms as opposed to focusing on how they can use this technology and their knowledge to help society. Sacrificing society for profit is unethical. Trying to separate technology and society is unethical. My ethical views empower civil society because it takes a people-oriented approach to using technology and it promotes accountability. Society and the people should always be prioritized. People who use/create technology and follow my ethical views (or even consider ethics) should put people in the forefront and understand the responsibility that they have to help society and the people. Doing so would play a role in alleviating technology’s harm on society. People should always use technology for good (instead of evil).

[albertkun]

@rachan2023 I really agree with your ethics on how technology and society are intertwined. Your post makes me think about how Marxism basically saw that as technology gets better then worker's lives would get worst because the variable value of labor would decrease while the constant value of technology would remain the same.

The final part of your post reminds of how Google took out "do no evil" from their company motto in 2015 and then subsequently all code of conduct:

https://gizmodo.com/google-removes-nearly-all-mentions-of-dont-be-evil-from-1826153393

[ghost]

As I've learned more about deeply rooted societal issues and grown to become more socially aware/present, my views and moral obligations have expanded. While I think that we all have our personal basic level of ethics I also think there is room to build and add to what we consider right/wrong or good/bad. I feel like the relationship between society and technological ethics also has to be recognized as something ever-changing. The growing availability of technology introduces an increasing possibility and likelihood for ethical practices to slip through the cracks. I make this statement in reference to large corporations as well as to individual users because both can readily produce, for instance, web maps or spatial data-based articles that actively and negatively affect communities/humans. Regardless of intent, anything produced using technology and sent out into the world is going to have positive and negative impacts within society. An unethical power relationship common to see is the instance where technology has created the opportunity for something, this is monetized by a large corporation, and then they turn around and exploit their workers to turn a larger profit. Examples can be made out of companies like Amazon, Uber, Doordash, and more because they actively take advantage of their employees or "employ questionable tactics" as is stated by Indian Lee in "The Growth of Corporate Exploitation Worldwide in 2020." The decisions made by these companies affect people and communities that may rely on this door-to-door innovation to make extra money, support their families, and more. When it is considered "normal", or I'll even go as far as to say acceptable, for workers to be denied rightful tips, bathroom breaks, and safety at work then it should be recognized that there is a problem. Yes, Amazon provides convenient services to its users and makes a hefty profit while doing it, because technological advances/innovation has allowed them to do so, but the people who keep amazon running do not receive the same advantages. To touch on an earlier point, ethical practices and accountability often take a back seat to profit, and in the process, this sacrifices the well-being of human beings and society as a whole with little to no real consequences. While my example is not directly tied to web or digital mapping I think the same conclusion can be drawn when thinking in terms of politics, the government, and more who utilize GIS and data to promote their own agendas at the cost of anyone and everyone. My ethical views work to empower civil society by emphasizing accountability, bringing focus to the community level, calling attention to the importance of listening, and ultimately encouraging all of these things in relation to the employment of technology since it is one of the reining pillars in modern society.

https://www.volusion.com/blog/the-growth-of-corporate-exploitation-worldwide/

[rachan2023]

Large corporations try to separate technology and society, which exacerbates a lot of social problems. When companies, such as Amazon, pay their delivery workers minimum wage and offer little to no bathroom breaks, this is an ethics issue. This is because people at the top are blatantly prioritizing profit above all else (including basic decency), which is leading to the exploitation of humans. This is a good example of technology has direct detrimental impacts on society and people. As a result, those that have the privileges to use technology to create applications or tech-based products should always be met with the question: Is what I am creating helping or harming society? Oftentimes it is easy for ethical practices to slip through the cracks because people may be unaware of what they are doing or some may be blinded by greed to really understand the negative implications of technology on society. However, people who are using and creating these technologies should be obligated to think about the ethics and be held accountable for the damage they inflict on society.

[albertkun]

@ktgreenler I do agree with your point that the more technology we develop the more likely it is that ethics will slip through the cracks. I do believe that this is where the inherent capitalistic model of "unending growth" and "exploitation" has a much greater role, because given that technology is always changing alongside social issues, then we can presume that technology has no direct impact on the persistence of poverty. Instead, I would argue that the economic system of trying to pit people against each other and the environment is the driving force. I'm thinking about going over some basic principles of Marxism that outlay this connection between technology and society in class!

[brillianz]

I identify autonomy and a diversity of intellectual ideals as the main ethics that meet at the center of society and technology. As an ever-rising juggernaut within our daily lives, technology should be perceived as a medium or tool instead of the main driving force in our lives. In spite of the plethora of information and learning possibilities available, systems of neoliberalism make it so that any access we desire is prefigured by an ad, paywall, or Google analytics software that gathers more of your personal information. Profit should not beget learning in any capacity. This profit motive, rightly identified in Paris Marx's Jacobin__ article, appear to advance a line of reasoning that places focus on "the invisible hand" and laissez faire politics for technological development. When this motivation is so blindly followed that it pushes a significant portion of an American electorate to believe in wild conspiracy theories, is this still a beneficial goal?
As an alternative to this belief system, I advance autonomy as a philosophy that advances liberatory practices towards learning, self-progression, and self-sufficiency. Instead of placing profit as a motivator, it looks to the advancement of people, their livelihoods, and access to basic necessities through the use of technology as a medium. I place autonomy in tandem with intellectual diversity as principles that may make the internet more ethical. I see intellectual diversity as different types of knowledge available, with no one prevailing or dominant one in place. The rise in attention towards transformative approaches in research, for example, places attention to the dominance of Western ideals and knowledge systems in various facets of American life over time. Allowing a multiplicity of ideas, in turn, allows for different applications of this knowledge, particularly in tech.

[avaitt]

I definitely agree that autonomy and having a diversity of intellectual ideas will help maintain a sense of ethics. Although it will be difficult to achieve I think that we allow for innovation without having our privacy targeted for the purpose of profit. I love the analogy you make to "the invisible hand" because it helps pinpoint that laissez-faire politics have defined the Western World for the last few centuries - and come with a slew of problems (chief of which is lack of accountability).

[nnhimichelle]

Society and technology have to grow together, but it can only be done so if technology is able to be open enough for communities to insert input but private enough in order for individuals protect themselves. With the creation of open source platforms, users can come together as a collective whole to uplift one another and help each other out. Users can also educate one another or showcase their perspectives on those platforms in order to create a progression not only beneficial for the understanding and clarity of issues and bring civil society together. However, I do believe that to some extent, technology can harm society more than society can harm technology. For instance, technological approaches of capitalism can be harmful because it can invade the privacy of individuals. Another thing that can happen is that technology can also misrepresent the data, which can create a dangerous interpretation that can only hurt marginalized communities. Data without narratives attached lose its meaning for communities, and it’s why many perpetuations of disempowered groups still exist. Society and technology have to grow together in order to create progression of education and better community conditions.

[rachan2023]

I agree that society and technology have to grow together as well as the idea that technology, to a certain extent, can benefit society, if used in the right ways. It cannot be denied that technology has made many beneficial contributions to society, such as creating an online application for CalFresh or a website that indicated where community fridges are located in LA to help those in need. However, technology can be used to inflict immeasurable harm onto underrepresented communities, such as using biometric technology in surveillance systems to target people of color. Those who have access to technology should consider the implications of the technology that they are using or creating on society and people. As you've mentioned, a solution can also be providing more open source technologies for people to have access to, which can give voice to underrepresented communities. I also think encouraging people to take ethics into account when using technology is crucial because it closes the gap between technology and humans. If people realize the impact that their technology can have on humans and society, people would be more careful in how they are using it (or so I hope).

[albertkun]

@nnhimichelle I do agree about "data without narratives" serving to harm others. One question I might bring up is do you believe this is intentional or not? Personally, I think people in tech are unintentionally doing it because they are unaware, as you said, about the connection between tech and society. However, I do think that the economic model, capitalism, is the intentional driving force. So while, software engineers are unintentionally doing the oppression, the society is intentionally doing it.

[lvalles10]

Thank you for this response! I really enjoyed reading it. I want to hone in on your claim that joint growth of society and technology "can only be done so if technology is able to be open enough for communities to insert input but private enough in order for individuals protect themselves." This is an incredibly interesting point to me, because it demands that even in an equitable framework of technology, protection of the individual is still required. Perhaps then this begs the question that if there always needs to be some sort of framework for the individual in place within technology, its capitalist utilization can never fade? Is equity in technology ever possible if there will still always be an individual ownership component with it? Does individual ownership necessitate capitalist utilization in our society? Your claim really spurred these questions in my mind- thank you!

[jason-muljadi]

Daryl Koehn and Dawn Elm stated that, "we do not study ethics merely for the sake of clarifying problems. We study ethics with a view to living better, fuller and wiser lives." (Grobman & Ramsey 2020)

If ethics is to live "better, fuller and wiser lives," we ought to ask what constitutes these clarifications for our lives? A more pressing question to ask is, "Why isn't community a part of this argument for ethics?"

Technology has always been bred by people as a means to ease productivity and to exploit other individuals. The flexibility of the usage of technology will always be intertwined with anything that we do with society; it has been since the inception of human civilizations. Technology, such as granaries, aqueducts, and writing, have been considered beneficial to all members of the society, yet there are those who strictly benefit from these technologies and those who have labored to provide resources to other members of the community (not barring communal societies where work can be equally shared, but even still, disparities are to be found in this format)

It is simple to abstractisize actions by labeling them into the binary category of "good" or "bad," with the "good" being supportive of social norms and elevating societal members to be "better versions" of themselves, while "bad" is going against social norms and harming members of the community. Yet, it is difficult for there to state what is an objective good or an objective evil if everyone has different agendas and perspectives. For some, civil societies may never be a part of ethics, as ethics rely on an individual basis. But I believe in an ethic that encourages different perspectives in order to actually improve society through multiple manners, not pigeon-holing oneself to a certain methodology.

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My personal ethics involves somewhat of Artistotelian Ethics, in which that I do believe that there is a state that humans achieve when we fully achieve a "good life"; that state is called eudaimonia. In a good life, we achieve that perfect happiness, in which allows us to do good. Yet, we might feel that we are flourishing in many aspects of our life, but in reality, it does not align with our telos, or our purpose in life. This is not the true happiness that allows us to reach eudaimonia because it lacks virtue (Dimmock & Fisher 2017). In everything that we do, we ought to be virtuous.

Where my argument potentially falls from Aristotelian Ethics is the argument in which defines virtuosity. Virtue, for me, is defined as that in which benefits civil society. A society that disallows predatorial behavior, reliance on simply technological and philosophical means, and reductionism is a virtuous society in which true happiness resides in. I ascribe to a Thomistic ideology in which Aquinas comments from Rhetoric Bk. II “to love is to will the good for someone (amare est velle alicui bonum)” (Gallagher 1999) Although, I disagree with the wording of "to will" means to do good on to others (for who are we to dictate our ideation of "good" to someone?) But rather, we serve the community through people-based organizations and interdisciplinary studies. Inclusivity in viewpoints is exceptionally crucial when wanting to do what is right by a community. To elevate civil society is to listen to the needs of the community and to serve them. For ethics often lacks in the social connectivity that binds us all as humans, which is the nucleus of civil society.

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RESOURCES

Dimmock, Mark, and Andrew Fisher. "Aristotelian Virtue Ethics." In Ethics for A-Level, 49-63. Cambridge, UK: Open Book Publishers, 2017. Accessed May 3, 2021. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1wc7r6j.7.

Gallagher, David M. (1999). Thomas Aquinas on self-love as the basis for love of others. Acta Philosophica 8 (1):23-44.

Grobman, Laurie, and E. Michele Ramsey. "Ethics." In Major Decisions: College, Career, and the Case for the Humanities, 158-67. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2020. Accessed May 3, 2021. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv16t6dzr.19.

[albertkun]

@jason-muljadi Your post about "being unable to define good" because of culture, I believe refers to moral relativism. Essentially, it boils down to the question of is there true good or true evil? The point about where you disagree about Aristotle regarding "virtuosity" is exactly why I can't stand him! But I'm glad you shared your views and that you were nuanced enough to share where you disagree with him too. I do like your take on serving the community! 👍

[brillianz]

@jason-muljadi your comment on "a good life" as a human state via an Aristotelian understanding makes me think about the ideals and values that we bring forward as a society. Particularly in the 21st century, we must begin to wonder if the true commitment is with material development, or human development?
This brings me to think about decolonial, socialist alternatives to government and economic development. I believe it's Bolivia's constitution, for instance, that places an emphasis on _un buen _vivir, __ or a good living, as a vision that places a priority on human development first. This also places an emphasis on nature and the ecosystem, with nature being given the same rights as people in the constitution. I think this may be a responsible alternative going forward.

[epham36]

In my opinion, though technology is a tool that is neither inherently good nor bad, technology and society both have the capability to mutually reinforce systems of inequity and oppression. While data sets and algorithms are not inherently oppressive, the ways they are envisioned, created, developed, and implemented may very well be.

In a very technologically-deterministic manner, technology, data, and algorithms have been used to justify racist and oppressive policing. This can occur when tech is concluded to be able to enact justice -- under the assumption that an inherently "objective" tool such as data can be what produces law and order.

PredPol, a predictive policing software that was developed by a UCLA professor, Jeff Brantingham, uses mathematical models that have been used to predict earthquake aftershocks in order to predict future crimes. While original predictive model for earthquakes may not inherently be good or bad ethically -- they could even be used to provide a benefit to sicety as a whole -- the way in which this technology has been adapted and used is incredibly oppressive.

On its face, data can seem to be objective and devoid of sociopolitical bearing. However, to assert that patterns of crime can be simplified to map onto seismographic patterns is incredibly reductionistic and technologically-deterministic, for fails to account for the societal structures that drive crime and that construct crime. Technology, in this way, turns a blind eye to the systems of oppression and denies both the existence of systems of unjust criminalization, as well as its role in perpetuating them.

At the same time, police departments' and society's use of this tool reinforces its bias. The nature of this algorithn primarily predicts future crimes to occur where previous ones have already happened. While this works effectively for earthquakes, this does not properly predict crime save for subjecting certain neighborhoods and areas to heightened police monitoring and surveillance -- revealing an increased amount of criminal activity in these areas -- but by and large a result of police use of this tool. When police are encouraged to look for crime that is predicted by PredPol and other softwares -- this creates drastic biases in the distribution of "criminal activity" and policing activity. This can be used to reinforce and be reinforced by disproportionate amounts of policing of certain racial-ethnic communities over others. In this sense, society's use of tools, desire to use data for "objective" means, and own definitions of crime perpetuate and permit the oppressive use of tools such as these. Police use of data such as this reinforces this flawed reliance on technology to produce "objective" outcomes.

Software such as PredPol, Palantir, and Operation LASER are used extensively by police departments like LAPD to justify police presence. The assertion that technology can make policing and law enforcement more effective and further encourages the militarization and increased spending on the carceral system.

This understanding of technology and the way it can create more oppression is key to civil society and community organizations like Stop LAPD Spying that are critical of the role that technology and data can play in our criminal justice system and the carceral systems that operate in our society generally. The recognition that technology itself is not inherently good nor bad but -- can be used in violent ways -- is key to challenging the power it has over the systems that uphold anti-Blackness in our punitive systems. To critique technology in this way is to challenge technologically-deterministic understandings of justice and recognize that technology is not infallible nor all-powerful. Rather it has its own pitfalls and to create a society that is more civil, more just, and more equitable, a person-focused system that places emphasis on social change that is supported by technology -- and technological change that is supported by society -- must be instated. And abolitionist organizations like this that are skeptical and interrogative of the tools being used to currently enact justice are powerful and necessary.

[nnhimichelle]

Hello! I really enjoyed reading your response. I liked your word choice of how technology and society "have the capability" to do bad as a way to acknowledge how both can do good and bad at the same time. It's extremely important how you brought up data in terms of pattern and crime and how police departments can use it to reinforce their biases, especially since it could deepen further and demonstrate how that data upholds systemic racism in our society. This makes me wonder about how data with the school-to-prison pipeline can be interpreted in such way in order to create the same end result.

[albertkun]

@epham36 AHHH!!! I'm so glad you mentioned PredPol and the algorithm it used! I believe that the facial recognition debate that is happening now is the next stepping point that I hope we as a society do not allow. I totally agree with you about the point about data upholding systemic racism, as a matter of fact, I believe that the inability for people of color to make it into tech is ingrained in to similar institutional biases.

[latishasumardy]

Emily! I really enjoyed reading your response :))
I love how you brought up how data seems objective, when in reality it is the way that you use it that really determines whether or not it is biased. You could take the same data and create hundreds of different charts that all show different things, and this is the reason why it's so important that we don't just claim that because the data shows a trend that something is justifiable. It was also really disturbing for me when I read about how the professor used the mathematical models to create something that he claims will predict future crimes, which I agree can definitely be adapted badly and used to create an even more oppressive society.

[skarakas1]

Great response! Predictive policing is infuriating. I think you make a great point that technology and society are mutually constituted--society shapes tech and vice versa. I have seen some opinion polices lately proposing predictive policing and surveillance as one method to decrease actual officers as a roundabout way of defunding the police. I am maybe not surprised but still stunned that anyone could think this is a good idea.
I think that your critique of the supposed objectiveness of tech is an important argument. I feel like this is one part of something I see as a kind of "tech mysticism"--if something is considered tech, than it is considered innovative automatically in media coverage, it must be revolutionary, and the person who created it is a genius. For example, Uber is often described in this way, or Facebook, but we have had taxis and internet profiles for a long time--Uber just figured out how to de-regulate the industry by using technology that most politicians are too old to understand (or they don't attempt to) and skimming money off the top (even if it's not enough money to be profitable...).
With predictive policing especially, it's not really that innovative, it's basically a digitized form of profiling, and it will do exactly what profiling does--create self-fulfilling prophecies. If police disproportionately target Black Americans they will produce statistics that can be used to argue that more Black people are arrested, etc. PredPol will do the same thing by concentrating police activity in neighborhoods that are already targeted in a positive feedback loop.

[brillianz]

It looks like there's several people in the class that are interested in the topic of facial recognition software and predatory policing software at UCLA and beyond! I appreciate the interest in these practices, and believe there are ongoing organizations on campus that are actively using web development and coding languages in order to address these issues. One such example is Million Dollar Hoods, which uses active programming languages like arcGIS in order to track the potential GDP growth of communities that are ravaged by mass incarceration. Another organization, which I am a part of, is NoUCPD. This organization places policing and anti-blackness to a critical light by holding town halls and open dialogues for informal learning spaces.

[KenNL42]

I wonder how far back do we cover the term "technology". Technology generally means an application of knowledge. Then can we say a car is good or bad? The article by Paris Marx also mentions how people either ignore or condemn bicycle. Don't cars and bicycles help society by efficiently transporting people? However, those transportation may also harm people when they are crashed. I think this is when ethics plays a part and people start to recognize how to transport people while maximize safety. Hence, regulation like seatbelts and helmets are enforced, which is for safety sake.

Maybe because I grow up in a Buddhist community, I always think that things, like technology and society, exist as they are, and people have to find the right balance. I believe that both society and technology are existed and improved by another, while one can also harm another. But they can definitely coexist (this sounds like yin and yang). We then should regulate technology to a certain limit so that it does not improve the society, while not ignoring them so that technology completely control society. One example of how they can be brought back to balance is the recent US election. People used social media to ignite hatred among us, but society and big tech companies then limit damage from technology by banning accounts and flagging inappropriate posts. This shows how society can bring technology back when it gets out of control.

In terms of empowering civil society, I think that aligns with how I think that as long as people realize how to make the society balance with technology, then they can improve another. If either one goes down way too much, the other will bring it back to balance. This is from my assumption that people, who are products of society and technology, always look after society and technology, and they always unite together to bring back the balance (insert thanos meme).

[ghost]

I think you make a very good point by mentioning that society and technology can, and do, coexist. I think it is important to recognize that technology, while not inherently good or bad on its own, needs an ethical basis in order to truly benefit communities and ALL various groups that it impacts. Your example about the election is especially thought-provoking and a great recent instance where the relationship between technology and civil society was intertwined. Balance, as you mention, is a key factor in keeping technology and humans from exploiting each other. Overall, I believe that technology is a great tool by which to help people but ultimately it needs to be kept in check with ethical standards that maintain a human-first perspective.

[jsxu315]

I really like the points you made about balance and maximizing the amount of good that technology can do! I agree that technologies need to be regulated, possibly by the companies that made them; to add on to your point, I think that tech companies themselves should also be regulated (maybe by the government or another outside organization) to increase accountability and reduce the potential harm that tech can do.

[latishasumardy]

I like the point you made about how technology and society can coexist, and that they do have an impact on one another. I agree that there definitely needs to be a balance between how much technology we should utilise to try and improve society, as there are many possible negative impacts that technology has on different communities. I also think that there should be some sort of regulation, because unfortunately many big tech companies often put profit ahead of societal needs, which can further perpetuate problems that we're trying to solve in society.

[skarakas1]

I believe in a dialectical approach to ethics. Because we all have implicit biases and different experiential backgrounds (educational, cultural, etc) I think that an openness to critique is essential. Theoretical knowledge is irrelevant without being in conversation with experiential knowledge, which should take precedence to avoid technocracy.
Constant reevaluation is necessary in the social sciences: there are always unintended consequences, failures, new information, and different perspectives. Crampton suggests consideration of external ethics and critiques, while essentialist and reductionist theorists tend to blame unintended consequences on 'externalities' rather than critique their models. The essentialist model tends to be self-reinforcing.
A dialectical approach assumes that there is always room for improvement, and that is only possible through dialogue. One of my core intellectual goals is to choose complication over simplification. Action is necessary, and will never be perfect, so we must be willing to reevaluate at any time. I think that civil society is necessary to push back against top-down government/corporate strategies that do not take local circumstances into account and that tend to value profit over quality of life.
An example that comes to mind is Green Revolution agriculture (diffused from the industrial core to 'peripheral' or 'developing' countries via the UN, World Bank, etc). Reductionist thinking, aimed at improving crop yields in food-insecure countries, led to the development of high-yield variety seeds, fertilizers, pesticides, tools, and techniques, which were promoted to farmers as packages. This reflects a view of agriculture that sees yield (and, consequently, human nutrition) as part of a sort of equation that can be optimized through accurate modelling: plants need light + water + nutrients, they need protection from weeds and insects (to create a more controlled environment in the experimental sense), etc. Soil was seen mostly as a medium for nutrients that could be externally supplied (fertilizer). The unintended consequences of these technologies, aggressively promoted worldwide, including in the agricultural sectors of industrial core countries, was the destruction of both the natural diversity of crops and of the complicated equilibrium of the soil biome.
Soils are extraordinarily complex ecosystems and the use of industrial fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides, and tilling can quickly destroy an equilibrium that has evolved continuously over the Earth's history. Likewise, use of GMO/high-yield variety monoculture undermines crop diversity that is necessary for natural resilience. In Central America, for instance, high-yield maize varieties developed in the US lead to frequent catastrophic crop failure and require the use of harmful chemicals--traditional farming methods utilize multiple heirloom varieties, some of which thrive in wet years, others in drought years, and so on for different conditions.
"Development" logic takes a high-yield crop, that only works under "ideal" circumstances, and then attempts to engineer the environment to create those circumstances. The often devastating unintended consequences then are not taken to fault the ideology, but only imply the need for "better" seeds, fertilizers, pesticides, etc.
This logic is inextricably tied up with the logic of capitalism that permeates much of the sciences. Someone (like Dow or Monsanto) sells these seeds, fertilizers, and pesticides--often to charitable organizations who actually distribute them. There is a profit-incentive to attempt to solve problems through ever-more new technology. The same companies also steal heirloom seeds through coercive "development aid" and then copyright them under intellectual property laws.
This is just one (incomplete) example of how reductionist thinking, technocratic attitudes, and capitalism can easily work together to destroy the environment, threaten livelihoods, and cause food insecurity through seemingly well-intentioned "problem solving."
In Central America, for instance, some of this might be avoided by asking communities what they think are the real reasons for food insecurity. Is it supposedly "low-tech" (ie traditional) farming techniques, or are the export economies of banana and coffee plantations part of the problem? What about violent, corrupt, governments and extractivist mining multinationals supported by the US and Canada that displace people and dispossess them of land, which then also leads to the loss of place-specific tradition-based knowledge?
This is just one example of the potentially disastrous effects of reductionism and technocracy. I believe that an ethics that values complication and dialogue is necessary to avoid repeating and further entrenching mistakes

[albertkun]

@skarakas1 Oh, nice example with Monsanto!!! The Green Revolution is a great reminder as to why focusing on "technology" is very problematic. Hopefully we will touch upon dialectical approaches at some point during lecture!

[skarakas1]

Thanks! I have been reading a book by John Friedmann on transactive planning ("Insurgencies: Essays in Planning Theory") in my spare time and he has is really concerned with dismantling technocracy and promoting dialectical/social learning in urban and regional planning. He has really well thought-out ideas on how to realistically combine local community-based approaches with more globalized movements. He also gives credit to Eastern philosophers for advancing dialectical approaches, whereas I have normally only seen reference to Marx or Hegel--he is very much a proponent of the middle path and acknowledging the responsibility for consequences of action before undertaking it. And he used to be a professor at UCLA! Highly recommended book for anyone interested in urban planning or ethical frameworks for community-based/local action more generally.

[latishasumardy]

I believe that society and technology are intertwined, and that ethics means the difference between what is morally right and morally wrong. I disagree with technology determinism, because I think that technology cannot solve all problems inherent in our society, and it can sometimes even perpetuate these problems. Just like how eating too much of one food can be bad for you, I believe that the same goes for technology.

For example, facial recognition is a very hot topic in the tech field. Many people claim that it has great benefits for society, for example allowing for more accurate criminal profiling or increasing security, but there are many possible negative impacts as well. If used incorrectly, it can perpetuate racial profiling, something already prevalent in our society. Not only that, but because of the fact that technology is developed by humans, it is created with people's unconscious biases in mind. Going back to the facial recognition example, there have been many cases where this technology has caused a lot of harm in people's lives because of the way that it was programmed. When tested with law enforcement agencies, they found that it misidentified many people of color, and this led to many false arrests. One really interesting article I read was this one by Alex Najibi, where they analyzed the accuracy of various facial recognition software, and found a disturbing disparity between the accuracy rates of the software when using it to identify a white male versus a POC. Most facial recognition software averaged 90% accuracy when identifying white males, but the accuracy dropped an alarming 34% when identifying females of color.

I think that when people decide to utilise technology within society, they must find the right balance. People also need to be aware of the possible impact that the use of technology can have on the community around them, and weigh the pros and cons before making any decisions. Just as I had stated before, society and technology are intertwined, and using technology can have negative impacts on society if used incorrectly. For example, when using GIS and making maps, it's important to really understand the data you are trying to display before you begin your project because the way you choose to analyse and show that data can have a big impact on the community of which the data comes from. As a person who creates software, I believe that it important for people like me, who understand how programs are made, to be held responsible for what we make. It isn't enough to just release the code to the public and say that I have nothing to do with what other people do with the code that I created, we must thoroughly think about what the technology can be used for and drive it towards something that can benefit society.

I believe that my ethics empowers society because it forces people to take responsibility for the things that they make. When people stop and think about the impact the things they create can have on the community around them, it can drive them to make something that will positively benefit our society, instead of making something for their own profit.

[alizezila]

Hey Latisha! Thanks for sharing your thoughts and for sharing that article! It's a great read and a long-running controversial topic. Facial recognition systems feels very dystopic to me, very 1984. The rates at which those programs recognize POC are alarmingly low, and is a great reminded that the coding/software that goes behind this work is created by a person with their own presumptions and biases. It is so important that people are held responsible and accountable for their work and the possible harm it can do towards specific communities.

[annyrviloria]

Lathisha I really appreciate the comment you make about personal responsibility. I am certainly many degrees removed from the software creation world and up until very recently had very little understanding of how the internet "really" works. It simply felt like something that some people put together with magic. With such limited awareness of the behind the scenes work of developers it might be difficult to even begin to define what accountability and responsibility in tech development looks like internally (making reference to the Crampton paper), so it really is on developers to take the lead on that. Your post was so refreshing because it offered a perspective of what that internal responsibility might look like internally.

[albertkun]

@latishasumardy I like your example about "eating too much being bad for you" and tying that to too much technology, it's a good way to analyze it. Your point about facial recognition (which was also the main focus of the Coded Bias extra credit film) is going to come up again during lecture for a second, so I'm glad you brought it up! I also like that you raised the point about "just releasing the code to the public" not being good enough! And I like your ethics on how it focuses on people taking responsibility! I wish big tech, government, and even non-profits would do that more.

[okcirE]

My ethical views stemmed out from the biblical teachings of Christianity, or I hope it does. There may have been tweaks since even religion sometimes needs to adapt to the society and era in which it currently resides. I believe ethical views are shaped by the person's perspective in life and other factors that may have impacted the person's choices in life. There is a right and a wrong, but even those terms can be subjective. My pastor preaches that there are only "good" and "Godly" which I do agree with. Everything that we do is good, but not everything good deeds that we do is Godly. For example, in the technology sector, we can build the most advanced AI technology to solve housing problems. The first solution is AI would map out areas that could potentially be people's new homes, but they are located far and remote from where they are originally located which the people do not want. The second solution is to use AI to help urban planners and architectures to design housing that can accommodate people with reasonable pricing near the original location. Breaking it down, the first solution is good and it helps people find housing, however, it strips away the autonomy of the people by giving them only an option to relocate far and remote in order to find a house. The second solution is good and can potentially be "Godly" by genuinely helping and listening to what the people want, us as the playmakers can adjust our innovative housing plans to fit the need of others.

There is a miracle from the bible that Jesus performed a miracle that multiplied the little food they have to be able to feed thousands. Imagine, Jesus wants to help and performs a miracle for these hungry people, but instead of providing food, He provided clothing instead.

Society and technology often times have a good purpose to help humans live their lives better and more efficiently. So in general, I don't think people that innovate in tech necessarily are bad people that want to rule the world with their tech and steal all their users' data (maybe this me trying to have a positive outlook). Again, it goes back to perspective because everyone has different opinions on what is good or bad and in what environment are they defining these terms.

I hope that as society moves forward into this new technological era, leaders in this space will constantly remind themselves of the potential impact of their technology and by bringing their products into the market, "Will it impact the world positively or would it leave those that are behind more behind?".

[jason-muljadi]

Really cool idea Ericko! However, I am also just wondering, who gets to create and monitor the AI? What makes an A.I. good for civil society? Is it possible for an A.I. to play the role of Jesus as a savior or does that feed into the savior-complex that often leads to corruption due to ego?

I still feel that, regardless of moral relativism, there ought to be some objectivity so that civil society can benefit from technology and not be harmed by it.

[Wny-Duong]

This is a pretty unique theology-based view on tech ethics that I didn't expect to find in this discussion, so props on that. The idea of competing notions of "good" is pretty compelling and does help to avert the problem of moral relativism and how there's bias in the idea of assigning good and bad labels based solely on specific, individual viewpoints. The last part you mentioned regarding the impact of technology is pretty important and ties neatly into more traditional utilitarianist ideals of promoting the most good possible for all people, which is a completely different pot of ideas of its own. I think that kind of viewpoint is pretty essential to modern development of tech since it does force people to consider all parts of society instead of just trying to push products that they think helps just because it solves a problem the developer itself can recognize.

[Wny-Duong]

The only ethical frameworks that I'm really familiar with are virtue ethics, deontology, and utilitarianism. The context through which I'm familiar with those frameworks are mostly under the idea of guiding technical development and ensuring a level of quality to the final product. More specifically, those frameworks were taught to me as ways to identify ethical lapses that contribute negatively to the quality of some engineered product and are mostly utilized to encourage whistleblowing or to judge the ethics of technical endeavors. I'm not really familiar with a whole lot of ethical frameworks that relate technology directly to society, even after the readings since I think the frameworks discussed are pretty nuanced and detailed and not suitable for me personally, who prefers a much more generalized framework since it's just simply easier to think about technology that way.

In terms of society and technology however, I'm a firm believer in the idea that technology, in its forms of applications, algorithms, and artificial intelligences, are all tools without any real inherent moral goodness of badness of its own. I'm going to contradict this belief with another opinion I hold, that every developer and every user of the technological product shapes the moral and social value that the product can contain. Good technology therefore, would be things that were developed by people who intended their creation for some good purpose (whether it be Wikipedia and finding information, non-profit web projects, etc.) and are then utilized by society in a good way (to pursue education, enrich their lives by giving them access to aid of some form like monetary or food-related or medical, etc.). This would mean any morally bad piece of technology would follow under at least one of two categories, that it was developed for some purpose that's negative to society (data analytics that exploit vulnerable groups for certain goods/services) or if it can be (and more importantly, demonstrated to be) utilized for a negative purpose (NFTs with heavy carbon footprints, specific machine learning implementations that require excessive amounts of data that would be unhelpful to the algorithm directly).

Attempts to reduce the maliciousness that certain technologies can present to society, namely by putting restrictions on technology itself and passing legislation that bans usage of algorithms would present a good to society by preventing bad from being done, but I don't necessarily agree with it. I personally believe that leaving the door open when it comes to technology, in all forms good or bad, has some merit to offer to society. Efficient development techniques can be analyzed and harnessed on more moral endeavors than bad ones. Algorithms that project discrimination can be reworked and further refined to reduce the inaccuracies of the system. Best way to improve the good done to society through technology is to encourage positive interaction with technology, promoting education on the matter and trying to convince people that there is good that can and should be done, in some cases by them personally, when developing and using tech.

[epham36]

Thank you Wilny for your response! You bring up great questions about what to do and what policies should be implemented in order to reduce harm that is produced by technlogy! Definitely policies that restrict the development of "malicious" technology or seek to reduce their impact on society bring up questions about who gets to determine what tools are "harmful" or morally "good" to begin with? These are such important points and suggestions that you bring up as we take the step beyond just determining whether a tool is ethical or not → but also, what do we do with them thereafter?

[alizezila]

Ethics by itself is a very nuanced topic despite being seemingly simple: what is right is right and whats wrong is wrong. Though, when you try to understand ethic within society and technology, it can get a little fuzzy. Technology and society nowadays are incredibly intertwined, there is not one without the other. Society and our communication with one another is now contingent on the advancement of technology and how we use the tools of technology to inform our decisions. As GIS professionals, it is incredibly important we are cognizant of our positions of power and make informed, ethical decisions. Our use of geodemographics and the surveillance of trends, styles, and choices that are used to inform future trends, styles, choices etc can be unethical if not treated with care. As GIS professionals, we must ask ourselves who our work is empowering, what story is it telling and who's is it, and what message we are sending to the world. Making ethical decisions in GIS means designating power, skill, and resources to uplifting communities in need and coming together to find solutions that aren't necessarily tech-oriented, because often technology only plays into a larger global capitalist framework that actually hurts marginalized communities more.

[nnhimichelle]

I agree, it is especially important for us to be aware of our own personal stance of the world around us in order to make such decisions. We also have to take into account in what way we can create work that is open to the communities around us so that they can use their voices to empower their community. Technology is such an important means of communication across society too to get voices to spread across different open sourced platforms.

[okcirE]

I wish it really was that simple too, but as we can see it isn't and has not been since the start of technology. I definitely agree with the constant need for technological/GIS professionals to constantly remind themselves of the legacy they want to put out in the world. I also believe that each tech stakeholder is required to have a strong foundation on their moral constituent to better humans' lives and not create tech that takes away from people.

[annyrviloria]

My view of ethics is shaped by the concepts of justice and equity. From that lens, ethical behavior is one that both advances AND protects the human rights of everyone, equitable and fairly. Hence, I do not see 'do no harm' as the only landmark of ethical behavior. Ethical behavior must also be proactive in advancing the greater good and in furthering the undoing of harm and suffering (my definition of Suffering is informed by Buddhist philosophy as much as a Marxist view of the dialectical materialism). I am firm in my belief that inaction is reproachable, especially so when we are aware of the unjust circumstances around us.

When it comes to society and technology, thus, my view is that for the use of technology to be ethical, it must be purposefully advancing the common good. I think technology is just a tool and so there is no use in qualifying it as good or bad. It is about the user-impact -- explicitly saying impact as opposed to intention because in the real world, harm is harm no matter whether you intend it or not. The article from The Jacobin aligns with this idea, as the author eloquently describes the pitfalls of labeling social media as evil simply hides the larger structures in society that dictate the true impact of social media use/data capture/data consumption.

I would say that my view of ethics is one that inherently empowers communities by placing action at the core. Because the ethical use of technology is one that actively seeks to improve the material conditions of the communities we work for, we have a chance to directly empower and benefit communities. What change means needs to be determined by the community itself for the process to be fully empowering, highlighting the synergistic interplay of ethics and decolonialism.

[albertkun]

@annyrviloria I really enjoyed how you stayed on topic though and emphasized your ethics of empowering communities at the core! Great that you mentioned "user-impact" as we will be talking about that this week! Oh and the point at the end about the synergistic interplay between ethics and decolonalism, such a nice take! 👍

[epham36]

I love that you bring up the difference between impact and intent! That is definitely a distinction that comes up a lot in my student-run spaces, and definitely this is a concept that applies to all forms of harm.

I also appreciate your emphasis on intentful ethical behavior. This is such a beautiful point, since given the degree of inequity and systemic oppresion that faces our society today, to be neutral and to not oppose the status quo/intently improve community conditions, one is therefore also upholding those systems of bias and disempowerment.

[skarakas1]

Great post! Inaction is action, in the sense that total inaction isn't possible--for instance, our choices as consumers are actions. Thus one can say they are not political, but by buying a $.39 banana they are participating in a global supply chain that has used political coercion, violence, dispossession, and racialized hatred to keep grocery stores full of $.39 bananas year round for people who have never picked one, or even seen where they are grown.
I think that your point of evaluating impact is also extremely important. There are always unintended consequences, no matter how much research goes into an action. One should have a thought out ethical framework and consider the effects of proposed actions, but it is just as important to evaluate and reevaluate throughout processes.

[avaitt]

Ethics is not a singular issue. The ethics we generally practice as a society are not the same set of rules and beliefs that exist in technology. Technology acts as a medium through which human beings can make (or not make) ethical decisions. By itself, technology is cold and unfeeling and bias is a bi-product of how it was created.

Technology is devoid of any morality on its own and is instead shaped by developers and users alike. Ethical technology is a concept that is likely never going to be achieved. Developers, try as they may, will always create biased products and where there is innovation there is room for abuse by users. However, I believe that using technology to generate some moral and social value is what creates a sense of virtual ethics. Platforms such as Wikipedia and non-profits like Khan Academy use technology to provide services that positively impact millions. The moral framework of technology is molded by thousands of developers and hundreds of companies. However, certain companies do have a monopoly on certain tech practices. Artificial Intelligence - field strife with innovation - is a target of technological bias. Algorithms and A.I. developed at Google often target minorities in instances such as facial recognition for criminal detection. There is a clear indication that technology is not perfect and steps need to be taken to prevent discrimination.

Ethics can help move forward in civil society by serving as a baseline for future innovation to be based off. Rather than creating newer technologies for the sole purpose of profit, we should look into how technologies can be harnessed to do things like promote education, prevent discrimination, and create opportunity. I believe that if we look towards pursuing utilitarianism and ensuring the greatest good for the most amount of people we will find that data infringement is not part of the picture. Technological ethics (be it through legislation or coercion) should be the standard for achieving this greater good.

[albertkun]

@avaitt Yes, I 100% agree with you that ethics can help move the baseline for future innovation. I believe we are in the "teenage" years of technology, and now we have to become more mature and have an ethical approach to tech. I have a slide on utilitarianism if I get to it today!

[Wny-Duong]

I definitely second the idea that tech's morality is shaped by developers and users, but I kind of disagree with the idea that ethical technology is not something that's going to be achieved. Looking at technology less in terms of machines and modern computational models and more in the sense of processes and organizations (think of the idea of green technology, sustainable agriculture, etc.), there is tech that seeks to achieve some ideal ethical stance (like an environmentalist one) with the only troubling point being developers, users, and the society it exists in. Of course, there are always people and things that get ignored in the pursuit of one ethical viewpoint or another, but I don't think it has ever been the case for one single piece or category of the wide pool of different technologies to solve every problem facing humanity. Products that end up biased or available for abuse do exist, but I don't think they paint a complete picture of the moral potential of technology.

[jsxu315]

It’s impossible to look at technology as separate from people’s intentions, and also hard to make any broad statements about “technology”, since tech is defined by how it’s used and therefore the people who are using it. Ethics are complicated and highly dependent on context, but to begin to look at the ethics of a tool we can first look at people’s intentions and then look at the tools they might use. For example, while a discussion board is not harmful by itself, shutting down 8chan was justified because it was a place where people spread harmful ideologies. Technology is an extension of power, (and regulating tech is a way to regulate people) so when thinking about the ethics of tech, it’s important to consider whose power it serves.

Following from that, it’s hard to predict the purposes that a particular tool will end up being used for; even technologies originally created for military purposes, like radar and GPS, can end up improving people's lives. I think one responsible approach is to make something that has a directed purpose, e.g. making a particular nonprofit’s work more efficient, so that you are actively empowering a group.

It’s also important to emphasize education and transparency when considering ethics; for example, Paris Marx discusses how social media ad targeting doesn’t work as well as the general public might believe, because companies overstate how accurate they are. When people think that algorithms are all-seeing, responsibility gets shifted away from the people making the technology and onto the technology itself and misleads them about which figures they should be aware of. Education is important to shift people away from these views, which can feed into techno-determinism; I can see the transparency of open-source software helping in this regard, although it definitely isn’t a silver bullet.

[ninalong]

I thought that was a super interesting point in the article! You make an important distinction about who bears responsibility; techno-determinism encourages people to see the tech (the algorithms recommending products and services) and not the people and systems (capitalism incentivizing tech businesses to sell people's data) as the central bad actor. People believe if the harmful tech is removed, the problem of commodification and invasion of privacy will be solved (it won't!).

[okcirE]

The intention is definitely a key component in determining ethical practices, there is not a fine line between either side and there is going to be a lot of gray area with new technology being pumped into the market each day. I think we as a society need to be careful with misconstruing the intention of technology and its proprietors because of how the technology is being used by users. I definitely agree with education on this matter because even for myself I wasn't introduced to the ethics behind technology prior to this course.

[ninalong]

The Week 5 lecture was my first introduction to techno- and social determinism, and I'm still trying to understand where my own ethics lie on that spectrum. Generally, I believe my ethics are more consequentialist, with an emphasis on social justice and equity. An ethical act has the most positive end result for the most marginalized people.
Previously, I thought more conventionally about issues of tech and society; common narratives typically portray tech as either the savior or source of social ills. In either case, tech is all powerful in its ability to manipulate society. I personally tended to think of tech as an insidious force, particularly in light of its negative effects on democracy; unregulated by the government, it will run rampant. The Jacobin article presented several compelling counter arguments, undermining techno-deterministic claims about the power of data capture and algorithmic curation to influence consumer behavior or spread conspiracy theories. While I maintain the necessity of regulation as an ethical act to restrain tech companies, the article caused me to consider the social deterministic angle of capitalism and income inequality as the root causes of social issues. Our ethical responses to social polarization, mistrust of institutions, and growing isolation must go beyond fixing tech, and address the profit motivations that create these problems.
A similar analysis can be applied to the ethics in GIS article. By exclusively seeking to improve GIS ethics from an internal perspective (more techno-deterministic) or external perspective (more social deterministic) we fail to see how the two can interact. In regard to the ethics of geodemographics, we must adjust our data collection and publicization practices to protect privacy as well as break down the broader capitalistic incentives to use maps to commodify people.
By striking a balance between techno- and social determinism, we can see clearly which reforms on what levels (creating a better platform and regulating ethical practices? or changing the motivations of the system itself?) must be made that will bring about the most benefit for those who are marginalized. Centering the experiences of those most affected by social issues can guide us toward where in the tech-society ecosystem we must intervene.

[albertkun]

@ninalong A very mature and nuanced perspective on GIS ethics and how we have to use both the internal and external approaches! I actually plan to briefly mention consequentialism in lecture today! I really enjoyed learning about how you formerly thought of tech as something insidious but now have an understanding from various perspectives on how technology plays into the role of the capitalist systems. Great insights on the ethics of technology!!

[rh5140]

My life philosophy in general is to minimize any harm I do and help others when I can! I will add that even though those were the values that drove me for a really long time, my views on technology’s relationship to society were heavily influenced by the insularity of Silicon Valley since that’s where I grew up. I appreciate this class for introducing me to different perspectives and inviting me to think critically about them!

Before this class, I think I’d say that I believe that technology should have a neutral to positive effect on society. Now, I feel like that is much too general and reductionist a statement since technology and society shape one another. I don’t think technology can be truly neutral since there are consequences that might not be immediately apparent to someone designing the technology. As we’ve discussed in class, impact does not always match intent, and social good initiatives may harm the communities they’re attempting to empower. Other invisible consequences include the labor and materials that are extracted from other countries and the exporting of e-waste back to those countries.

I like the ideal of “establishing a dialectical relationship, which modifies both internal and external perspectives,” which the Crampton paper describes as the last stage of ethical awareness in a discipline. Bridging the gap between developers and people who are affected by those technologies with communication and feedback would help empower civil society. It would balance out what the community actually wants and needs with what is feasible to create.

[albertkun]

@rh5140 I like your life philosophy! Very virtuous! I agree with your emphasis that impact does not always match intent and that bridging the gap between developers and people is an important method to empower civil society!

[lvalles10]

I must preface my ethical views when it comes to society and technology with my ethical views at large- ethics defines what is right and what is wrong. But, as the readings and lecture have shown, ethics are a more nuanced field than the aforementioned binary would suggest.

Before this week’s lecture and readings, I was of the mind that technology has an onus to improve social problems. But I now realize this is a problematic mindset that can lead to techno-facism. Realizations from this week's content lead me to assert that when it comes to society and technology, my ethical views are that we must operate in holist systems that work towards the common good of society.

These ethics empower civil society by combining all aspects of technology and society to create comprehensive solutions to multifaceted issues. I subscribe to ethics of inclusivity- all elements of society (art, environment, etc) must be utilized to work towards the collective good. This, of course, begs the question - what is the collective good? Who defines the collective good?

My response to that question would be that civil society, the community- particularly the most marginalized communities- should define that collective good to which holist systems (combining the merits of technology and all other aspects of society) can respond and work towards that defined goal.

In a nutshell, I believe that my ethics regarding society and technology are defined by what the most marginalized communities perceive as the common good. These ethics empower civil society because they are rooted in the needs of the community, and use those needs as guidance for holist solutions.

[rh5140]

I love how you say you "subscribe to ethics of inclusivity" and involve all elements of society in your response and how you defined your ethics at the end as "what the most marginalized communities perceive as the common good"! Focusing on and meeting the needs of those most disempowered would be the first step towards creating a more equitable society.

[vcta99]

(Apologies in advance for the last minute post week 6 is kicking my butt.) Similarly to a lot of other responses, I also believe that technology itself is a tool, and whether or not it is used to further "good/evil" depend entirely on who is wielding to tool for what purposes. Hank Green's book series (especially his second book, "A Beautifully Foolish Endeavor", is a great realistic sci-fi critique on the ideals of technological determinism. In the novel, a new technological advancement allows individuals to experience another person's consciousness. The tech is promoted as encouraging human empathy for marginalized communities, as privileged individuals can now fully "walk in another's shoes", but in reality the tech relies on and exploits the labor of the workers who need to create/imagine luxurious experiences for the rich to live in. I think this is a pretty good parallel of how technological advances work in the real world, there is always this hope of further connecting humans and encouraging collaboration, but when access to that technology is 1) not universal and 2) not regulated. It is very difficult to use technology to promote equity when technology itself is not yet equitable.

Although I am not a philosopher, I would say that social and technological ethics should be framed around equity. One of my favorite quotes from the book is "The most impactful thing you can do with power is almost always to give it away.” To me, the key to empowering civil society is not to solve the problem for the community, because that doesn't address the existing power imbalance that were the catalyst for the problem in the first place. It must be that social policy/technological projects increase the power and autonomy of the community involved.

[jason-muljadi]

That's a really interesting literature think-piece. As we reach for empathy, we have to be cognizant of the context in which technologies and language can be used to exploit other people. I completely agree that we have to strip away the savior complex that technology might allow us to help if we want to help the community. Without the voice of the community, the work that we would be doing would be more harmful, as the voices that we are trying to amplify are further silenced by our actions and the power of technology.

[gu-ana]

My views on ethics when it comes to society and technology is similar to what one of the readings details, "Capitalism". The forefront of technology is exploitation. Old saying goes, "If you're not paying for it, you're the product." Companies place money before ethics because it maximizes profits, shareholders happy, CEO happy, but you know what? SOCIETY SUFFERS. I believe that in order to keep companies accountable as we all know they won't be imposing truly ethical and moral guidelines themselves, we(in terms of the public) need to be demonstrating and protesting to congress. (But then that get stopped because of corporate lobbying and sometimes even worse when it tax funded lobbying).

Most of us grew up during the .com boom, meaning technology is a central pillar to our daily lives and its effects are immeasurable. As I reap the benefits of these technologies, I tend to forget the other dark parts of technology that is very unethical and immoral. Every piece of data collected from users is always going to be used, whether it be an algorithm, modelling, identifying trends, etc. Palantir with its very questionable and immoral connection with the United States government is just one example of technology hurting society rather than solving a problem of it. I believe that data itself does not have bias, but data collection and data interpretation is another story. It is up to the person to interpret the data, of which there is no impartial way of determining right or wrong. This is why ethics is so important to technology, and cascades down to society. But it's not just one person's point of view that matters, there are many times that something is created for the sake of improving people's lives, but can cause the opposite of what was intended. Collectively, we have an obligation.

I really identified when Albert says that technology alone cannot fix society. I would love to be able to build an application, magically fix systemic oppression, biased policing, but of course that doesn't happen in a simple app.