Tentative Schedule
Note
This schedule is incomplete and tentative. Its purpose is to give you a general idea of the course structure and topics. Consult Canvas and Perusall for assignment due dates.
Weeks 1–2 (Aug 20, 22, 27)
- Introduction to the course
- Historical overview
- Professional ethics
- ACM Code of Ethics
Week 3 (Sep 3, 5)
- Disruption, social practices, and cyberpractices
- Computing technology and affordances (Is technology value-neutral or value-laden?)
- Virtue-centered approaches
- Human flourishing and well-being
Week 4 (Sep 10, 12)
- Utilitarianism/consequentialism
- Security/privacy trade-offs
- Predictive policing
- Encryption
Week 6 (Sep 17, 19)
- Deontology
- Human dignity
- Autonomy
- Justice
- Power and manipulation
Week 6 (Sep 17, 19)
- Value conflicts
- Contractualism
- Introduction to Rehg’s method for cyberethical evaluation
Week 7 (Oct 1, 3)
- Rehg’s method continued
- Public merits
Week 8 (Oct 8, 10)
Midterm prep
Week 9 (Oct 15, 17)
Midterm work week. No class. MIDTERM DUE BEFORE MIDNIGHT OCT 17.
Week 10 (Oct 15)
Topic TBD.
FALL BREAK (Oct 17)
Weeks 11–13 (Oct 29, 31, Nov 5, 7, 12, 14)
Topics TBD. Potential topics include
- Epistemic problems on the internet
- Privacy
- Intellectual property
- Generative AI
- Algorithmic fairness
- Algorithmic explainability
- Algorithmic equity
- Strong AI and general AI
- The future of automation
- Self-driving vehicles
- Automated weapons
- Care bots
Weeks 14–15 (Nov 19, 21, 26)
Group presentations
THANKSGIVING BREAK (Nov 28)
Week 16 (Dec 3, 5)
Group presentations
FINALS WEEK
No class. FINAL PAPER DUE BEFORE MIDNIGHT DEC 12.