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Ethical Dilemmas Related to Technology
Anonymous Coward writes "I have a relative who will be teaching a college class on the topic of ethical dilemmas brought about by new technology. Unfortunately, he doesn't keep up with technology news, so he's not sure what the most relevant dilemmas are. For example, 'If robots came alive, would we be justified in killing them?' is one that might come up if nothing more relevant were suggested. (OK, it might not be that bad, but you get the idea. He was using Netscape 4.76 on system 9 until last week.)
So, what are the most relevant ethical dilemmas brought up by technology? Note that I am looking for ethical dilemmas, e.g. 'Is Activity X moral?' rather than legal dilemmas like 'Is the DMCA constitutional?' Now is your chance to guide the young minds of the future toward stuff that matters."
Here are a few I've pondered lately... and per your writeup, I'm not asking if these are legal, but whether these are morally justifiable.
Is it moral for a government to confine a human being (citizen or not) without charging them for any committed crime? Is it moral to confine someone without telling them a definite fixed criteria for their release? Is it moral to confine a non-criminal and disallow any contact with family, representation, or Congress? Contrast with current "material witness" statutes.
Is it moral for the reading records of civilians to be collected by the government? Is it moral for a government to disallow librarians from discussing whether surveillance has been underway? Is it moral for a government to disenfranchise librarians from their First Amendment guaranteed right to go to Congress for redress? Contrast with USA PATRIOT (v1.0).
Is it moral for the government to strip a person of their birthrighted citizenship, to reclassify the person as a non-citizen so as to prosecute under different criteria for detention and punishment? Contrast with the proposed USA PATRIOT (v2.0).
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They did bomb Dresden.
135,000 Germans killed as compared to 120,000 Japanese. Funny that few people agonize over that.
And here comes Baghdad:
Pressures to bring the war - and the Iraqi regime - to a quick end are now so intense that General Franks is not even waiting for the 4th infantry division to join the battle, although it is probably the best mechanized division in the American army. Having been rerouted from Turkey, its troops have only just started arriving in Kuwait, and will not be ready to fight for another two or three weeks. Yet, in the desperate hope of a quick victory, the US is pressing ahead with the attack on Baghdad. There is clearly immense anger, frustration and impatience at Iraq's continued resistance to the invasion. Arabs were not meant to behave like this! They should have surrendered or run away! In its arrogant expectation of a decisive outcome, America may once again have created mirages in the sand.
* Secondly, the US is adjusting its military means to cope with the new situation. Reinforcements are being flown in and greater firepower - giant bunker-busting munitions and carpet-bombing by B-52s - is being used to attempt to destroy Iraq's Republican Guard divisions defending the capital. As a direct consequence of the new strategy, the toll of Iraqi civilian casualties is rising rapidly. The trumpeted 'concern' to avoid civilian deaths is now being abandoned by a desperate United States.
Fascism should more properly be called corporatism, since it is the merger of state and corporate power.
This is a repost.
It's the fall of 1983. Michael Jackson is riding high with Thriller; Ronald Reagan is obsessed with a red menace in the jungles of Central America; humiliated U.S. troops have just slouched out of Beirut following a series of suicide bombings, and America's newest nemesis, the Ayatollah Khomeini is locked in a vicious conflict with America's soon-to-be ally, the secular 'socialist' dictator Saddam Hussein. The fight is vicious indeed.
In November 1983 U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz receives an intelligence report describing how Hussein's troops are resorting to "almost daily use of CW [chemical weapons]" against the Iranians.
A month later, Ronald Reagan dispatches a special envoy to Baghdad on a secret mission. The identity of the envoy is intriguing. He's not a diplomat or a member of Reagan's cabinet - he's a private citizen, the CEO of a Fortune 500 company.
On Dec. 20, the envoy meets with Saddam Hussein. But he is not there to lecture the dictator about his use of weapons of mass destruction or the fine print of the Geneva Conventions. He is there to talk business under orders from high. Reagan had just signed a secret order instructing his charges to do "whatever was necessary and legal" to prevent Iraq from losing the war.
The envoy informs the Iraqi leader that Washington is ready for a resumption of full diplomatic relations, according to a recently declassified State Department report of the conversation, and that Washington would regard "any major reversal of Iraq's fortunes as a strategic defeat for the West." Iraqi leaders later describe themselves as "extremely pleased" with the visit.
The envoy was Donald H. Rumsfeld, then the CEO of pharmaceutical giant Searle.
The meeting is widely considered to be the trigger that ushered in a new warming of U.S.-Iraq relations, which allowed the shipment of dual-use munitions, chemical and biological agents and other dubious technology transfers. But for years what exactly was said between Rumsfeld and Hussein in that now infamous meeting has been shrouded in secrecy.
No one knew, until last week.
In a new investigative report from the Institute for Policy Studies entitled Crude Vision: How Oil Interests Obscured U.S. Government Focus On Chemical Weapons Use by Saddam Hussein released last week, researchers Jim Vallette, Steve Kretzmann, and Daphne Wysham expose the real reason Donald Rumsfeld was sent to Baghdad: Hewas sent by Reagan himself to pressure Saddam Hussein to approve a highly lucrative oil pipeline project from Iraq to Jordan.
Examining recently released government and corporate sources, the researchers document for the first time how a close-knit group of high-ranking U.S. officials (including Sec. of State Shultz and Attorney General Edwin Meese) worked in secrecy for two years attempting to secure a billion dollar pipeline scheme for the Bechtel corporation. The Bush/Cheney administration now eyes Bechtel as a primary contractor for the rebuilding of Iraq's infrastructure.
Bechtel's pipeline would have carried a million barrels of Iraqi crude oil a day through Jordan to the Red Sea port of Aqaba.
"The men who courted Saddam while he gassed Iranians are now waging war against him, ostensibly because he holds these same weapons of mass destruction" said Jim Vallette, lead author of the report. "They now deny that oil has anything to do with the conflict. Yet during the Reagan Administration, and in the years leading up to the present conflict, these men shaped and implemented a strategy that has everything to do with securing Iraqi oil exports. All of this documentation suggests that Reagan Administration officials bent many rules to convince Saddam Hussein to open up a pipeline of central interest to the U.S., from Iraq to Jordan."
I find the timing particularily convenient. Saddam nixed the pipeline deal in late 1985 and the first "official" arms shipment to Iran (Iran/Contra) went through in January 1986. (According to Reagan's own statements on the matter.)
I asked this question last fall when the military buildup in the Gulf became public. Why now?
Fascism should more properly be called corporatism, since it is the merger of state and corporate power.
Because that would just show how little you know of what is going on in Iraq.
Then maybe you, since you're obviously privy to all the information the pentagon has so far, as well as a perfect view of every square inch of Iraq, can enlighten us?
I want Saddam dead, like most people; but after hearing how the US has *already* formed a government (of US politicians/military personel) I kind of get the feeling they're not going to come out of this with fewer enemies. Quite the reverse...
Code, Hardware, stuff like that.
Hmmm???
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.