"Reasons,
Relativity, and Responsibility in Computer Ethic" - by James H. Moor
Computer technology, nowadays, emerged rapidly and plays
an important role in the modern and globalized era in many field of
application. The swift spread of information through computerized communication
and the smooth commercial transactions are just some of the few advantages it
has contributed to the global village. But as the computer evolution
accelerates, life and routine of the global village will also progressively be
dependent to computers which made the quest for computer ethics becoming more
difficult and important. Like any other technology, computing has also a
positive and negative impact on human life and it is vital to establish
computer ethics to control its negative impacts and the flow of information.
The global village must be guided and protected for the negative impacts of computing
for mutual benefit will be achieved.
There are two nature of computer ethics that the author
disagree with, those were Routine Ethic and Cultural Relativity, namely. Those
ethics became disagreeable for him because computer ethics is much more complex
than what it is for the reason of computer technology. Computer technology is
evolving and like the World Wide Web it crosses cultural boundaries which made
the application of the two ethics mentioned impossible.
In his paper, he cited that computer ethics comes in two
main parts ; first is the analysis of
the nature and social impact of computer technology and second is the
corresponding formulation and justification for ethical use of such technology.
For him, computer ethics is unique in terms of the overall range, depth and
routine of ethical issues generated by technology, given the fact that
computers are logical malleable and concepts can be informationally enriched by
computers. And what made it more challenging is that it has a continually large
number of evolving situations which are difficult to conceptualize clearly and
form justified policies. Therefore, computer ethics is definitely a demanding
field of ethics which requires more than routine of application of principles.
All interesting human enterprises, including computing,
are conducted within framework of values. These frameworks of values, such as
those emerging in computer science, undergo rapid evolution and made the
establishment of relative values more difficult. But in another aspect of
values, human values are relative but not simply in the shallow of cultural
relativism. Given the relativity of values there is a hope for rational
discussion in the computer ethics. It should also be stressed out the role of
non-ethical values in our decision making in an interesting human activity,
including computer science. To achieve relativism in frameworks there should be
a consensus to what is valuable. Our core values also provide standards with
which to evaluate the rationality of our actions and policies that could be our
grounds for ethical judgment. Customs might not be relative but it's everyone's
core value to respect others. Therefore, to adopt ethical point of view one
must respect others and their core values with that relativism in computer
ethics can be achieved then by applying a core value framework.
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