Social & Ethical Issues in Computing
As computers pervade ever more aspects of our lives, and possibly even our bodies, some serious questions are being raised concerning the ethical wellbeing of our future.
Read on as we cover everything from Big Brother to the world’s first bionacle man.
1. Introduction
What is ethics? Answer – the study of customs or values of a person or group. At least that’s the textbook answer, yet how it relates to you and me more or less depends on a variety of factors. Each of our own customs or values depends on the way we have been brought up by our parents, our education, religious factors and how we are influenced by the society in which we live. Just think about popular culture and how it affects you today!
Imagine a situation where you were unable to get a job due to the fact that you had undesirable DNA.
So how does this fit into computing? Well, there is a branch of computing that deals with ethics and all modern computer scientists have to be aware of this and integrate it into their everyday decisions. This deals with the multitude of questions that may arise when building hardware and software such as, should we do this? Will it hurt anybody? Will it invade people’s privacy? You get the idea. There are many prominent examples out there in the real world of where the computing scientists involved had to take the social and ethical issues into consideration. What follows is a look at various high profile cases of where this was a major factor; we will discuss the social and ethical implications of several different projects in terms of the computing scientist’s involvement. In summary, we say we can build something but the question is, should we?
2. The Human Genome Project
The Human Genome Project was started in 1990 by the U.S. Department of Energy and the National Institutes of Health. It was intended to map the 20 to 25 thousand genes in human DNA and sequence the 3 billion base pairs that make up these genes. The resulting knowledge would be invaluable to medical science. However, it was recognised at the start of the project that the social and ethical implications would have to addressed and in fact, it was the first large scientific undertaking to dedicate a significant proportion of its resources to these issues. What kind of ethical concerns do you think would arise from this project?
Imagine a situation where you were unable to get a job due to the fact that you had undesirable DNA. This wouldn’t be the first time in history that some portion of human society had been discriminated against, only this time it would be based on scientific fact. Whether this would happen is debatable however, who has access to this information and for what purpose is one of the many things that as a computer scientist, you would have to take into account. Can you think of any other ethical concerns that might arise?
There are many controversial issues surrounding the Human Genome Project and arguments for and against the development of this knowledge database. Could the recent advances in cloning have happened without this? Advances in medical science such as the search for a cure for Cancer and finding a cure for Parkinson’s are prime examples of where research into medicine helping our society.
Essentially it would be up to you as an individual to justify your involvement and think carefully about whether it is ethical to continue. There are always benefits and dangers. As a society we create rules to prevent some of the more negative aspects from happening. Would you think it was ethical to construct a database of the human genome?
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