April 21st to 28th 2023 : Design Ethics¶
Reflection
Ariel was a fantastic educator. Passionate, engaging and understandable. He talked to us about Designing as way of doing ethics, and the Iceberg Model: the idea that everything we see in the world has underlying layers. Eg Colonialism.
Some more notes from the class:
“We don’t always see the technologicla nature of tech. Yet the technological context in unavoidable.
“A mirror only makes sense in a world wee see and where appearances matter”
“Values are also important in the rejection of technology - eg rejecting UBER because of the labour conditions”.
“Technological Texture to life”
“In we interpret a technological artefact we can see what a group values. It gives us clues about purpose. What is a good thing to pursue of avoid. It may be a moralizing instrument”.
“Technologies have been described as a “practical implementation of intelligence” - a limiting definition.
Very few scholars defend technological neutrality; Technology co-defines what is possible within a situation.
Neutral is not a net result between good and bad - it means having an effect on the world.
I learned finally what technological determinism actually meant. I had heard the term before but not had it defined for me.
It’s the designer’s fallacy to think your intervention will be used only as you intended. Because of their active role in the co-definiton of contexts. technologies have a moral dimension.
“Multistability. The idea that a technology is never just one thing. A phone is one thing to me and entirely another to bacteria.
“Normative Dimension of Design. - prescribing norms or standards explicitly or implicitly”.
Design involves Tacit ideas of how things should be.
We also talked about Ethics/ Deontology , Utilitarinism and Care ethics but also non western views like Sumak KAwsay.