IT and Nanotechnology: Ethics of Emergent Technology
Program Manager – Professor John Weckert
The aim of this program is to make a major research contribution to the ethical understanding of two related fields of emergent technology, Information Technology and Nanotechnology, from a distinctly philosophical standpoint. While the approach is primarily philosophical, members of the program realise that technical, scientific, legal and social science expertise is vital, and consequently work closely with scientist, technologists and practitioners in the relevant professions. Our task is to illuminate practical experience with relevant theoretical argument, generated by using well-developed skills and techniques of contemporary analytical philosophy.
Core projects
- E-Government
- The Precautionary Principle in Nanotechnology
Program Members
- Dr Fritz Allhof
- Dr Steve Clarke
- Dr Richard Lucas
- Dr Steve Matthews
- Dr Jeremy Moss
- Dr Edward Spence
- Professor Jeroen van der Hoven
- Professor John Weckert
Recent program highlights
Core Project – E-Government
CAPPE is working with seven European universities and one from the USA on a research project called eGovRTD2020. The project’s aim is to identify future strategic research fields for the development of eGovernment and the public sector in 2020. One of CAPPE's main roles is to provide an Asia-Pacific perspective to the project, since whatever the findings and recommendations; they will have a global perspective. Bowern and Weckert are the CAPPE members involved in this project. Bowern has made several trips to Europe to participate in project meetings. He has also co-authored a paper on “Ethical Value Creation for e-Government”, in the proceedings of the prestigious South East Asia Regional Computer Confederation (SEARCC) Conference, Sri Lanka, September 2006, and has published on electronic voting and open source software in a publication of the Australian Computer Society.
Bowern is currently completing his PhD on e-government.
Core Project – The Precautionary Principle in Nanotechnology
There is still a considerable amount of discussion of the precautionary principle in nanotechnology, and no consensus concerning coherence or its applicability in that context has been reached. Clarke has continued to work on this project, reading a paper on the topic to the James Martin Advanced Research Seminar Series in Oxford. Weckert and Moor (a CAPPE visitor from Dartmouth College, USA) have co-authored a paper in an international journal, defending the coherence of the principle in the nanotechnology context. The argument of this paper is being further developed in the book under contract with MIT co-authored by Weckert and Moor.
Other Program Highlights
Under the Charles Sturt University Visiting Professor program Professor Simon Rogerson of the Centre for Computing and Social Responsibility, de Montfort University, visited CAPPE again in 2006. Professor Deborah Johnson, Olsson Professor of Applied Ethics, University of Virginia, also visited in 2006.
CAPPE members were part of two successful grant applications to the National Science Foundation in the USA. Weckert, Moor and Allhoff (a visitor in 2006 and joining CAPPE part-time in 2007) are principal investigators on a project on nanotechnology and human enhancement. Miller and Kleinig are investigators and Weckert a consultant on the second one, on security, privacy and ethical identity management.
Richard Lucas successfully completed his PhD thesis on ethics and intelligent agents.
There are a variety of other projects in the program.
1. Ethics and Regulation in the ICT Industry
This project is funded by an ARC Linkage Grant, with the Australian Computer Society as the industry partner, and work continued throughout 2006. Two 0.5 research fellows, Richard Lucas and Jeremy Moss, were appointed to work on this project with the Chief Investigators, Weckert and Al-Saggaf. The PhD student funded by this project, Catherine Flick, continued her research on informed consent and its role in ICT.
2. Generating Knowledge and Avoiding Plagiarism: Smart Information Use by Secondary Students.
This project is also funded by an ARC Linkage Grant, with the industry partners being Scotch College, Mater Christian College and Wesley College in Melbourne and in Kooringal High School Wagga Wagga.Weckert and Al-Saggaf are two of the Chief Investigators. It has a focus on plagiarism enabled by electronic media.
3. Standards Australia
Corporate governance is gaining more attention in Australia following recent corporate collapses. Bowern is a member of Standards Australia's ICT Governance and Management subcommittee IT-030-02, developing AS 8016 Governance of ICT Projects. This standard is now published.
Apart from these projects, other research was undertaken. Various topics in the ethics of nanotechnology are being investigated by van den Hoven, Clarke and Weckert; Weckert and Moor are continuing their work on a manuscript on ethics and nanotechnology for MIT Press, and together with Allhoff and Patrick Lim have an edited collection in press with Wiley; Van den Hoven and Weckert have an edited collection on moral philosophy and IT in press with Cambridge University Press; Al-Saggaf is continuing his research on the social effects of the Internet in Saudi Arabia; Mather is working on Luciano Floridi’s theory of information ethics and Oliver Burmeister on aspects of the Human-Computer interface. John Barlow’s research on ethics and design is proceeding, Ed Spence began working on digital photo manipulation and on robot ethics and Lucas has continued with his research on ethics and intelligent agents. Cocking and Matthews have furthered their work on online identity; Cocking and van den Hoven began research on evil online; Miller has applied his previous work on collective responsibility to aspects of ICT; van den Hoven has continued with research on privacy, ICT and nanotechnology; and Weckert has worked on online trust, online pornography, and giving offence online.
Collaboration
Close collaboration with Dartmouth College and the Technical University Delft has continued, and collaboration with the University of Twente has begun. Collaboration with these two universities has been aided by the establishment of the Centre for Ethics and Technology based at those two universities and at Eindhoven University. Clarke, Karen Mather and Weckert have become involved with various members.
CAPPE’s collaboration with the ACS has continued, both through the Linkage project and through regular articles in the ASC publication Information Age, organised by Bowern. Negotiations have begun with NICTA with the purpose of fostering collaboration.