Unless a Special Consideration request has been submitted and approved, a 5% penalty (of the total possible mark) will be applied each day a written assessment is not submitted, up until the 7th day (including weekends). After the 7th day, a mark of ‘0’ (zero) will be awarded even if the assessment is submitted. Submission time for all written assessments is set at 11.55pm. A 1-hour grace period is provided to students who experience a technical issue. This late penalty will apply to written reports and recordings only. Latesubmission of time sensitive tasks (such as tests/exams, performance assessments/presentations, scheduled practical assessments/labs will be addressed by the unit convenor in a Special consideration application.

Resources:

• Required readings  can be downloaded from Leganto.
• You must read the required readings BEFORE class.

Delivery:

• A mix of live and recorded lectures 
• In person scheduled students: in-person tutorials.
• Online scheduled students: zoom tutorials.
• Online Flexible students: online forums.

W1 – Introduction: Philosophy and Technology (OD) - February 22

• No reading
• No tutorial

 

W2 – What is technology? Optimist and pessimist views of technology (OD) – February 29

• Reading 1: Mary Tiles and Hans Oberdiek, “Conflicting Visions of Technology,” in Living in a Technological Culture (London: Routledge, 1995), pp. 12–31.
• Reading 2: Andrew Feenberg, “What is the Philosophy of Technology?”, in Defining Technological Literacy. Towards An Epistemological Framework, J. Dakers (ed.), (Palgrave McMillan, 2006), 5-16.
• Tutorial 1

 

W3 - Co-evolution of mind and technology (MA) – March 7

• Reading 1: Sterelny K. (2011) "From hominins to humans: how sapiens became behaviourally modern". Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B. 366: 809-822. http://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2010.0301
• Reading 2: Clark, A. (2002). “Towrds a science of the bio-technological mind”, International Journal of Cognition and Technology, Vol. 1, No. 1, p . 21-33.
• Tutorial 2

 

W4 - Cognition and technology (MA) – March 14

• Reading 1: Hollan, J., Hutchins, E. & Kirsh, D. (2000). Distributed Cognition: Toward a new foundation for Human-Computer Interaction Research. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, 7 (2), 174–196
• Reading 2: Andrew Feenberg, “From Essentialism to Constructivism: Philosophy of Technology at the Crossroads,” from Technology and the Good Life?, ed. Eric Higgs, Andrew Light, and David Strong (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000), pp. 294–315.
• Tutorial 3

 

W5 –Artificial Intelligence and Philosophy (MA) – March 21

• Reading 1: Bringsjord, Selmer and Govindarajulu, Naveen Sundar, "Artificial Intelligence", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2018 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2018/entries/artificial-intelligence/>.]  (Section 1-5, 8-9 of the SEP entry ONLY).
• Reading 2: Robbins, Scott. “AI and the path to envelopment: knowledge as a first step towards the responsible regulation and use of AI-powered machines.” AI & Society. (2019)
• Tutorial 4

 

W6 – The Singularity and Mind-uploading: Will humanity survive? (OD) – March 28

• Reading 1: Chalmers, David J. “The Singularity.” Journal of Consciousness Studies 17, no. 9 (2010): 7–65.
• Tutorial 5

 

W7 – Artificial moral agents: Can robots be persons? (OD) – April 4

• Reading 1: Wynsberghe, Aimee van, and Scott Robbins. “Critiquing the Reasons for Making Artificial Moral Agents.” Science and Engineering Ethics, 2018, 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11948-018-0030-8.
• Reading 2: Formosa, Paul, and Malcolm Ryan. ‘Making Moral Machines: Why We Need Artificial Moral Agents’. AI & SOCIETY, 3 November 2020. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00146-020-01089-6.
• Tutorial 6
• Media Presentation due – Sunday 28/4/2024 @ 11:55p.m.

 

W8 – Autonomous Vehicles and Carebots: How to live with machines (OD) – April 11

• Reading 1: Gogoll, Jan, and Julian F. Müller. “Autonomous Cars: In Favor of a Mandatory Ethics Setting.” Science and Engineering Ethics 23, no. 3 (June 2017): 681–700.
• Reading 2: Vallor, Shannon. “Moral Deskilling and Upskilling in a New Machine Age: Reflections on the Ambiguous Future of Character.” Philosophy & Technology 28, no. 1 (March 2015): 107–24. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13347-014-0156-9.

 

MID-SEMESTER BREAK

 

W9 –Videogames and morality: Do virtual actions matter? (PF) – May 2

• Reading 1: Luck, M. (2009). The gamer’s dilemma: An analysis of the arguments for the moral distinction between virtual murder and virtual paedophilia. Ethics and Information Technology, 11(1), 31–36.
• Reading 2: Ryan, M., Staines, D., & Formosa, P. (2017). Focus, Sensitivity, Judgement, Action: Four Lenses for Designing Morally Engaging Games. Transactions of the Digital Games Research Association, 3(2), 143–173.
• Tutorial 7
• Quiz 7

 

W10 – Platform and Surveillance capitalism (OD) – May 9

• Reading 1: Nick Srnicek, extracts from Platform Capitalism (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2017), pp. 36-50, 126-129.
• Reading 2: Zuboff, Shoshana. “Big Other: Surveillance Capitalism and the Prospects of an Information Civilization.” Journal of Information Technology 30, no. 1 (March 1, 2015): 75–89. https://doi.org/10.1057/jit.2015.5.
• Tutorial 8
• Quiz 8

 

W11 – Privacy on the Internet: Do we have any and should we care? (OD) – May 16

• Reading 1: Reiman, Jeffrey H. “Driving to the Panopticon: A Philosophical Exploration of the Risks to Privacy Posed by the Highway Technology of the Future.” Santa Clara High Technology Law Journal 11 (1995).
• Reading 2: Joinson, Adam N., and Carina B. Paine. “Self-Disclosure, Privacy and the Internet.” In Oxford Handbook of Internet Psychology, edited by Adam N. Joinson, Katelyn Y. A. McKenna, Tom Postmes, and Ulf-Dietrich Reips, Vol. 1. Oxford University Press, 2012.
• Tutorial 9
• Quiz 9

 

W12 – AI, Automation and Work (PF) – May 23

• Reading 1: Tubaro, Paola, Antonio A Casilli, and Marion Coville. ‘The Trainer, the Verifier, the Imitator: Three Ways in Which Human Platform Workers Support Artificial Intelligence’. Big Data & Society 7, no. 1 (January 2020): 205395172091977.
• Reading 2: Jarrahi, Mohammad Hossein. “In the Age of the Smart Artificial Intelligence: AI’s Dual Capacities for Automating and Informating Work.” Business Information Review 36, no. 4 (December 2019): 178–87. https://doi.org/10.1177/0266382119883999. 
• Tutorial 10
• Quiz 10

 

W13 – No New Content – May 30

• Writing week.
• No lecture
• No tutorial
• No new quiz
• Research Essay Due: Sunday 2/6/2024 @ 11:55p.m.