ethics | Plaid Line + PRIZM + Scottie News

By: Calvin Westin

The story about Prometheus, where fire stolen by a mythical figure from the gods became a symbol of the destructive and bad side of progress. While giving humankind a tool for making civilization and ruling the world, the fire itself remained uncontrollable. Mary Shelley used this same idea while creating the book of Victor Frankenstein, whose creation had made something too powerful to stay under its creator’s control, similar to fire in ancient times. And now, as the development of artificial intelligence technology progresses at a fast speed, it seems humans are once again following this pattern. By publishing these powerful artificial intelligence algorithms, companies like OpenAI are committing theft of fire, therefore risking disruption of domains of human intelligence.

People are also worried that our current safety rules aren’t enough to keep up. In Chapter 5 of Shelley’s book, Victor Frankenstein’s sadness creates an unsettling relationship. Having brought the monster into being, Frankenstein goes on, “This was then the reward of my curiosity; and I became myself capable of bestowing existence on whom I had created. Perhaps a corpse would be reanimated; galvanism had give tokens of such a wonder.”

This story is a major warning for us today. Scientists like Geoffrey Hinton believe that computers will soon beat humans in terms of dealing with data analysis and handling data. Once developers lose control over the results produced by the machines, there will be serious consequences following after that.

Consequently, it appears to be time that IT professionals start actually managing and executing their responsibilities more effectively. New tech isn’t an excuse to do sketchy stuff in this field, so experts working on AI really need to follow some strict safety rules while they’re doing their research.

In the end, the people who create anything have full moral responsibility for it.

By: Baarika Suresh

Note: This is the second article in a series that looks at ethics.

Regarding the United States upcoming election, two major newspapers, The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times decided to make the choice to not publish editorials endorsing a presidential political candidate. Newspapers choosing not to endorse a candidate has become more popular now. USA Today and the Wall Street Journal haven’t backed a candidate for awhile. That leaves just the New York Times still endorsing a candidate, out of all the major national newspapers, and they are backing Kamala Harris and the Democrats. Shifting away from the practice of endorsing candidates has also been a popular trend with more regional newspapers as well.

This has sparked a decline in subscriptions and many mixed reviews online. Some of these were a criticism of the move, claiming that this is the downfall of American democracy. The Washington Post and Los Angeles Times are owned by two billionaire American businessmen, Jeff Bezos and Patrick Soon-Shiong respectively, and were bought from families that had traditionally passed the papers down from generation to generation. Both the newspapers have historically leaned left but have recently decided not to endorse the democratic presidential nomination this election. People online think this is because if the republican candidate does get elected then the billionaires will lose money, as Trump might try to target their newspapers for not backing him.

The question is: Is this a method of self preservation or could it be the idea of good media ethics?

Newspapers that lean a certain way can show only one point of view clearly and show the other side more blurrily. For example, editorials in The Washington Post kept a count of Trump’s lies but did not bother to track Harris’s as well. Would it be fair if a newspaper only published Harris’s lies and not Trumps? Is it really fair if only one side is shown?

Good ethics is to get both sides of the story, to give the public all the facts to let them make their own decisions. I believe this is the true meaning of democracy; to not be influenced by the beliefs of others but to be provided with facts and make our own minds up. Elections can be decided by citizens influenced by the thoughts of others, without getting all the facts. Many readers of newspapers fail to see the difference, or don’t think there is one, regardless of how often it is explained that an editorial board and the newsroom function independently.

I believe it is good that newspapers are choosing to stay neutral.