Constructions of Moral Values in Reader Comments of the Samantha Sex Robot Discourse in East African Newspapers

Although artificial intelligence (ai) has been touted as revolutionary, this technology has sparked ethical concerns, with man accused of attempting to create a ‘play God’ with it. While creators of sex robots have been hailed for reigniting sexual relationships, they have received flack in equal measure for their apparent moral absurdity. From a Christian values perspective, this study interrogates how the Samantha sex robot invention was framed in 129 online reader comments in two East African newspapers – The Standard and The Daily Monitor. Findings showed that comments fell under the value themes of ‘family bond’, ‘compromised conscience’, and ‘apocalypse’. While a few positioned sex robots as a panacea to domestic instability, the majority opinion viewed the robots as ‘destroyers’ of the God-ordained family unit and tools of dehumanizing women, and thus morally contradictory to Christian teachings. Justifying sex robots was considered to be ‘negotiating’ or ‘rationalizing’ with established Christian values and therefore ‘rebelling against God’. Man’s extremity with the creation and use of sex robots sparked predictions of a self-fulfilling prophecy of his extermination for inciting the wrath of God. The preservation of culture also underpinned the ethical evaluations of robots by some commenters.

ORGANIZATIONAL CONFLICT: IS WHAT WE LOOK AT OR THE PERSPECTIVE WE LOOK FROM MORE IMPORTANT?

This study examined organizational conflict using two alternative research methods. In Study I qualitative data was raised via interviews on workplace conflicts from 40 faculty members and research assistants employed in a public university. In Study II vignettes of conflict scenarios were presented to participants and data were raised from 170 graduate and doctorate students. Vignettes differed in terms of the perspective it assumed; consisting of the subordinate, manager, and the neutral observer perspective. Participants were asked to report their affective reactions (negative and positive), conflict management style (collaborating, compromising, accomodating, avoiding and competing) and ethical evaluations (employee and manager) with regards to the vignettes. Content analysis of interviews revealed that injustice, differences of opinions and miscommunication were among the most frequently reported themes of conflict. Variance analyses were carried out for the vignette study on the above mentioned dependent variables. Main effect of perspective was found for most of the variables, such that subordinate perspective participants experienced higher levels of negative affect in reponse to the conflict; neutral perspective reported higher levels of the use of compromising strategy while subordinate perspective had significantly higher levels of avoiding, accomodating, and competing. In terms of the ethical evaluations of the subordinate and manager characters of the scenarios, each perspective perceived itself as more ethical than the other party. These findings point out the importance of perspective taking and empathy in organizational conflict. Practical implications for conflict resolution are discussed in light of the study findings. Keywords Organizational conflict, qualitative research, business ethics, affect, perspective taking

Ethics Audits in Cross-National Research: Experiences from Correspondence Study Field Experiments with National Politicians in Four European Democracies

This essay contemplates experiences from four national ethics audits designed to facilitate correspondence study field experiments with national politicians in Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark and the United Kingdom. The experimental study aims to reveal possible biases in legislators’ responsiveness to distinct types of constituents such as non-partisans, lower-class constituents, ethnic minorities, and women, and to unveil possible unsubstantiated fears or misperceptions in this regard. The national research teams proposed the same experimental design but received three different ethical evaluations. Specifically, the relevant Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) in the UK and Denmark asked for two different de-briefing procedures. In the Danish case, this led to withdrawal of the experiment due to severe costs with regard to research quality. In the UK case, it led to increased risk of backlash. Our experiences imply a need for more consistent ethics regimes in the European research community designed to facilitate comparative social science research.

On formal ethics versus inclusive moral deliberation

In this article, I will advocate caution against a formalization of ethics by showing that it may produce and perpetuate unjustified power imbalances, disadvantaging those without a proper command of the formalisms, and those not in a position to decide on the formalisms’ use. My focus rests mostly on ethics formalized for the purpose of implementing ethical evaluations in computer science–artificial intelligence, in particular—but partly also extends to the project of applying mathematical rigor to moral argumentation with no direct intention to automate moral deliberation. Formal ethics of the latter kind can, however, also be seen as a facilitator of automated ethical evaluation. I will argue that either form of formal ethics presents an obstacle to inclusive and fair processes for arriving at a society-wide moral consensus. This impediment to inclusive moral deliberation may prevent a significant portion of society from acquiring a deeper understanding of moral issues. However, I will defend the view that such understanding supports genuine and sustained moral progress. From this, it follows that formal ethics is not per se supportive of moral progress. I will illustrate these arguments by practical examples of manifest asymmetric relationships of power primarily from the domain of autonomous vehicles as well as on more visionary concepts, such as artificial moral advisors. As a result, I will show that in these particular proposed use-cases of formal ethics, machine ethics risks to run contrary to their proponents’ proclaimed promises of increasing the rigor of moral deliberation and even improving human morality on the whole. Instead, I will propose that inclusive discourse about automating ethical evaluations, e.g., in autonomous vehicles, should be conducted with unrelenting transparency about the limitations of implementations of ethics. As an outlook, I will briefly discuss uses formal ethics that are more likely to avoid discrepancies between the ideal of inclusion and the challenge from power asymmetries.Please check and confirm that the authors and their respective affiliations have been correctly identified and amend if necessary.I confirm.Author names: Please confirm if the author names are presented accurately and in the correct sequence (given name, middle name/initial, family name). I confirm. Kindly check and confirm the country name for the affiliation [1] is correct.I confirm.

Lecturing philosophy as its actualization

The present times are full of various challenges, as it always used to be. Having in mind the rapid development of science and technology, we inevitably find ourselves under their influence. Thus, technology not only makes our life easier, but is also capable of shaping human perception in new obstacles. It can influence our choices and responsibility beyond them. Such a dynamic rate of producing new ideas and technology does not allow a proper and forehanded evaluation of their response in our near future. Since philosophers work with relatively constant terms, they have to be in the avant-gardé of a conceptual analysis and problem-shaping of the challenges facing modern people. In such circumstances, lecturing philosophy should hold a prominent position. The sphere of morals and ethical evaluations forms value basis for human self-cognition and performs as a stimulus to a more responsibly deliberated life. In this situation, a philosopher finds himself in a crucial role as a person, who provides this knowledge. The use of philosophical means has to start with the analysis of those, who are in charge of their usage. In order to remain frank with the audience and himself, a philosopher should start lecturing from himself, his self-cognition, as well as from a clear deliberation of his personal moral guidelines and personal responsibility. The situation, in which a philosopher shapes his personal ideas, formulates concepts, analyses, and provides arguments without proper elaboration of their premises and basic principles, raises concerns. Within the scope of this article we attempt to designate the term “philosopher” and philosopher’s position in the modern world. In order to articulate this term properly, we suggest a distinction in terminology between “philosophers of aim” and “philosophers of purpose”, which serves as a marker to estimate philosophic activities in their full scope. In my opinion, any philosophic activities, in their basis, perform as a practice of essential responsibility. The abovementioned definitions provide us with an ability to notice a distinction between philosophers and pseudo-philosophers, as well to evaluate the importance of the ones and the perniciousness of the others.

On the banality of wilful blindness: Ignorance and affect in extractive encounters

Research on strategic ignorance tends to focus on the deliberate manufacture of non-knowledge as a tool of governance. In contrast, this article highlights the ‘banal’ workings of wilful blindness, how it can become a normalised part of corporate routine. It examines the diverse dynamics of wilful blindness that became visible in the planning and implementation of a mega oil development project in Timor-Leste, including spatial distancing, denial of moral implications, and the production of effervescent moments of collective solidarity. It concludes that affective states are key in the normalisation of wilful blindness, which operates at the unstable boundary between intention and affect. An emphasis on wilful blindness helps us to bridge the gap between political economy approaches that emphasise the disruptive impact of resource abundance, on the one hand, and anthropological approaches that highlight the social logics and ethical evaluations of main actors involved, on the other.

How “White Lies” Cause More Harm than Good

Are white lies harmful? Through anecdotes, psychological research, and ethical evaluations, the pros and cons are uncovered.

SARS-CoV-2 challenge studies: ethics and risk minimisation

COVID-19 poses an exceptional threat to global public health and well-being. Recognition of the need to develop effective vaccines at unprecedented speed has led to calls to accelerate research pathways ethically, including by conducting challenge studies (also known as controlled human infection studies (CHIs)) with SARS-CoV-2 (the virus which causes COVID-19). Such research is controversial, with concerns being raised about the social, legal, ethical and clinical implications of infecting healthy volunteers with SARS-CoV-2 for research purposes. Systematic risk evaluations are critical to inform assessments of the ethics of any proposed SARS-CoV-2 CHIs. Such evaluations will necessarily take place within a rapidly changing and at times contested epidemiological landscape, in which differing criteria for the ethical acceptability of research risks have been proposed. This paper critically reviews two such criteria and evaluates whether the use of effective treatment should be a necessary condition for the ethical acceptability of SARS-CoV-2 CHIs, and whether the choice of study sites should be influenced by COVID-19 incidence levels. The paper concludes that ethical evaluations of proposed SARS-CoV-2 CHIs should be informed by rigorous, consultative and holistic approaches to systematic risk assessment.