Onlife

The Wikileaks phenomenon is intricate, but suppose we reduce its ethical evaluation to two questions: is whistleblowing ethical, even when motivated by resentment and the desire to harm its target? And is Wikileaks’ facilitation of whistleblowing ethical, even if it might put at risk innocent people? A deontologist, convinced that telling the truth and never lying is an absolute must, is likely to appreciate whistleblowing as the right thing to do, independently of the reasons behind it. And a consequentialist may support Wikileaks as a means to maximise the welfare of the largest number of people, especially if risks are minimized by censuring sensitive information. So current answers in the mass media seem to converge: Wikileaks is a good thing. I am not entirely convinced. Confidential communication is a three-player game – sender, receiver and referent – in which sender and receiver trust each other. The receiver, not the referent, trusts and holds responsible the sender f...

SPECIAL SECTION ON GREEN COMPUTING: Call for Papers IEEE Technology and Society (T&S) is planning a special section on the topic of “green computing”. The magazine has a long history with the theme of “green technology,” going back to at least 1995, when it published the article “Going Green Makes Business Sense” by Jim Lippke (T&S, Vol. 14, No. 3, 24-25). It recently published “Greening IEEE” by Patrick Meyer (T&S, Vol. 28, No. 3, 64-72). The focus of this special section will be on environmentally sustainable computing and IT. Dr. Luciano Floridi (University of Hertfordshire and University of Oxford, UNESCO Chair in Information and Computer Ethics) will coordinate the special section. Submissions should be emailed to T&S’s editor-in-chief, Keith Miller ( miller.keith@uis.edu ), and should conform to the usual suggestions for authors (please see http://www.ieeessit.org/technology_and_society/authors.asp ). Please indicate in your email that the submission ...

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Questions and answers about the philosophy of information.

I recently met a very bright and lively graduate, who registered with Facebook during the academic year 2003-04, when she was a student at Harvard. Her ID number is 246. Impressive. A bit like being the 246th person to land on a new continent. In the past six years, that continent has become rather crowded, as she has been joined by 500 million active users worldwide. The round number has been reached last July. It is a good reminder of how more and more people spend an increasing amount of time “onlife”, interacting with and within an infosphere that is neither entirely virtual nor only physical. It is also a good reminder of how influential Information and Communication Technologies are becoming in shaping our personal identities. In the philosophy of mind, there is a well-honed distinction between personal identity and self-conception, or more simply between who we are (call it our ontological self), and who we think we are (call it our epistemological self). Like many other han...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/mobile/technology-10786874 Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Received the Vice Chancellor Award 2010 "Highly commended for research supporting engagement  with business, the profession and partner organisations".