Moral Mediators in HCI

Author(s):  
Lorenzo Magnani ◽  
Emanuele Bardone ◽  
Michele Bocchiola

Our contention is that interactions between humans and computers have a moral dimension. That is to say, a computer cannot be taken as a neutral tool or a kind of neutral technology (Norman, 1993).1 This conclusion seems a bit puzzling and surely paradoxical. How can a computer be moral? All computational apparatuses can be generally considered as moral mediators, but for our considerations, computers are the best representative tools. First of all, they are the most widespread technological devices, they are relatively cheap in comparison to other technological utilities, and, very importantly, they can be easily interconnected all over the word through the Internet. This last feature allows people to keep in contact with each other and, consequently, to improve their relations. Computers require interactions with humans, but also allow interactions between humans. Since morality relates to how to treat other people within interactive behaviors, computers can help us to act morally in several ways. For instance, as the concept of moral mediators suggests, computers can help us to acquire new information useful to treat in a more satisfactory moral way other human beings.

2013 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rudolf Maresch

Durch den digitalen Medienwandel ist der Begriff der Öffentlichkeit problematisch geworden. Die Debatte fokussiert sich zumeist auf die Frage, ob die sogenannte bürgerliche Öffentlichkeit durch das Internet im Niedergang begriffen ist oder eine Intensivierung und Pluralisierung erfährt. Rudolf Maresch zeichnet die berühmte Untersuchung der Kategorie durch Jürgen Habermas nach und zieht den von ihm konstatierten Strukturwandel der Öffentlichkeit in Zweifel. Dagegen verweist er auf die gouvernementalen und medialen Prozesse, die jede Form von Kommunikation immer schon gesteuert haben. Öffentlichkeit sei daher ein Epiphänomen nicht allein des Zeitungswesens, sondern der bereits vorgängig ergangenen postalischen Herstellung einer allgemeinen Adressierbarkeit von Subjekten. Heute sei Öffentlichkeit innerhalb der auf Novitäts- und Erregungskriterien abstellenden Massenmedien ein mit anderen Angeboten konkurrierendes Konzept. Mercedes Bunz konstatiert ebenfalls eine Ausweitung und Pluralisierung von Öffentlichkeit durch den digitalen Medienwandel, sieht aber die entscheidenden Fragen in der Konzeption und Verteilung von Evaluationswissen und Evaluationsmacht. Nicht mehr die sogenannten Menschen, sondern Algorithmen entscheiden über die Verbreitung und Bewertung von Nachrichten. Diese sind in der Öffentlichkeit – die sie allererst erzeugen – weitgehend verborgen. Einig sind sich die Autoren darin, dass es zu einer Pluralisierung von Öffentlichkeiten gekommen ist, während der Öffentlichkeitsbegriff von Habermas auf eine singuläre Öffentlichkeit abstellt. </br></br>Due to the transformation of digital media, the notion of “publicity” has become problematic. In most cases, the debate is focused on the question whether the internet causes a decline of so-called civic publicity or rather intensifies and pluralizes it. Rudolf Maresch outlines Jürgen Habermas's famous study of this category and challenges his claim concerning its “structural transformation,” referring to the governmental and medial processes which have always already controlled every form of communication. Publicity, he claims, is an epiphenomenon not only of print media, but of a general addressability of subjects, that has been produced previously by postal services. Today, he concludes, publicity is a concept that competes with other offers of mass media, which are all based on criteria of novelty and excitement. Mercedes Bunz also notes the expansion and pluralization of the public sphere due to the change of digital media, but sees the crucial issues in the design and distribution of knowledge and power by evaluation. So-called human beings no longer decide on the dissemination and evaluation of information, but algorithms, which are for the most part concealed from the public sphere that they produce in the first place. Both authors agree that a pluralization of public sphere(s) has taken place, while Habermas's notion of publicity refers to a single public sphere.


2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 448-451
Author(s):  
L. Aripzhanova ◽  
M. Mukhitdinova

The article deals with the use of the Internet in teaching a foreign language. With the advent of the information age, both the scheme of knowledge transfer and the model of the learning process are changing sharply, which requires the improvement of professional training from the position of activation of cognitive processes.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 ◽  
pp. 1-11
Author(s):  
Liying Pan ◽  
Muhammad Ahmad ◽  
Zohaib Zahid ◽  
Sohail Zafar

A source detection problem in complex networks has been studied widely. Source localization has much importance in order to model many real-world phenomena, for instance, spreading of a virus in a computer network, epidemics in human beings, and rumor spreading on the internet. A source localization problem is to identify a node in the network that gives the best description of the observed diffusion. For this purpose, we select a subset of nodes with least size such that the source can be uniquely located. This is equivalent to find the minimal doubly resolving set of a network. In this article, we have computed the double metric dimension of convex polytopes R n and Q n by describing their minimal doubly resolving sets.


2004 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 243-268
Author(s):  
Wiesław Dyk

The discussion about the rights of animals is always up-to-date. The dichotomy division into philoanimalists and philohominists, although reasonable, is not satisfactory to everyone. It is too strongly associated with the division into people and things in Roman law. To avoid this association in the context of biocentric trends in ecological ethics, accomplishments of evolutionary psychology and the concept of animal welfare, it is suggested that a third moral dimension dealing with creatures with highly developed nervous system be introduced between moral objectivity of creatures with high perception and moral subjectivity of people - creatures characterized by self-awareness and reflexive awareness. Human beings on the one hand are responsible for recognizing their rights given by nature and on the other hand, they are obliged to create a law to protect themselves.


Author(s):  
Iulian Marius COMAN

Technology has become the Intelligence Community’s new reliability, as well as its new challenge. The new transnational adversaries – international terrorists foremost among them – the flood of new information technologies, the easing of export controls on encryption technology and global access to the Internet, has led the security agencies to charting new directions in identifying, gaining access to and successfully exploiting target communications, through cooperation with all related bodies.


Author(s):  
John O. McGinnis

This chapter deals with dispersed media. New information technology has created a more dispersed media that, in combination with empirical inquiry and prediction markets, have the capacity to create a politics more focused on the consequences of public policy. Just as the government in the nineteenth century helped distribute policy and political information through the post office, so today it should be careful to facilitate distribution of such information through contemporary technologies. It is argued that our laws should give as much protection to the new, dispersed media as to the old media. The government should also encourage universal access to the Internet—the portal to much of the dispersed media. Finally, the government should deregulate and subsidize the provision of information in political campaigns, because campaigns remain the most effective route for public policy information to reach the mass of citizens who do not follow specialized media or even the news more generally.


Author(s):  
Shalin Hai-Jew

An ideology is defined as a set of ideas that “explains and evaluates social conditions, helps people understand their place in society, and provides a program for social and political action” (Ball & Dagger, 2011, p. 4). As such, these concepts underpin the actions of various groups and organizations, including that of the Anonymous hacker group, which professes no ideology or creed. Rather, the group has styled itself as a kind of anarchic global brain connected by various spaces on the Internet. This work explores four main data streams to extrapolate the group’s ideology: the current socio-political context of hacking and hacktivism; the group’s self-definition (through its professed values); the group’s actions (through the “propaganda of the deed”); and the insights of others about the group This chapter defines the socio-technical context of this Anonymous hacker socio-political movement, which draws ideas from the Hacker Manifesto 2.0, which suggests the advent of a new economic system with the new technological vectors (mediums of communication). This movement is apparently pushing forth the advent of a new information regime in which the abstraction of ideas adds a “surplus” economic value that may be tapped. Styled as fighters against government tyranny, they are pushing hard against an international regime of intellectual property and information control by governments and corporations. This is being published in the spirit that (some) information wants to be free and that there is a value in direct discourse.


2015 ◽  
pp. 1452-1473
Author(s):  
Ana-Cristina Ionescu

The Internet is definitely the most complex and dynamic technical and cultural phenomenon that humanity ever experienced. Nevertheless, despite its positive impact on the Western world, Web 2.0 has yet to prove its power in the undeveloped regions of the globe, where the Internet Era is still at its dawn. In developing countries, the barriers that women face, such as poverty or social imbalances, establish significant challenges that hinder connectivity and access to modern technologies. In this context, the chapter discusses the evolution of gender speech in relation to new Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs). The authors determine whether the declarations and plans for action that were issued subsequent to the 1995 Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing enhanced the establishment of gendered policies on ICTs, particularly in the undeveloped regions of the world, and whether, in this way, they empower women, contribute to combating women's poverty, and promote gender equality.


Author(s):  
Shilpa Suresh Bisen ◽  
Yogesh Deshpande

The internet is an essential and integral part of our lives, whether it's about looking for a meaning of a word, searching for a journal, shopping, or connecting to others. Human beings cannot think of life without the internet. Although it's having a positive impact, the negative side is there. Problematic internet use is defined as non-chemical or behavioral addictions, which involve human-machine interactions and can be harmful as it leads to numerous forms of psychological disorders. The chapter addresses various psychopathologies arising due to excessive internet use (e.g., problematic internet use, online gaming, online gambling, and compulsive cybersex). The chapter frames a strong theoretical background along with recent controversial issues related to the disorder. The chapter is delineated to acquaint readers with new concepts arising in clinical psychology that will help mental health professionals to be well equipped with skills required for the prevention and treatment of internet-related psychological disorders.


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