Vincent Mackenna's Philosophy Blog

While I have not done specific research on the politics of technology, I have a strong notion to disagree with Winner in the introduction of this article. Artificial intelligence is something that has had a lot of political/ethical debate surrounding it, and rightfully so. Even if the true impact of "super-intelligent" (a broad term used to describe A.I. systems that surpass or simulate human level intelligence—which are, at the very least, not in the foreseeable future). A.I. is not known currently, the varying hypothesis around such impact is infinitely fascinating. I stand on the side of, what I like to call, "singularity skepticism." Which, in short, is a skeptical view of the hypothesized impact on singularity and occurrence. Most qualified computer scientist are found on this side, but the general population are overwhelmingly afraid of A.I. systems, both super-intelligent and simple. If I were to give a simple statement on my views of ethical consideration ...

This analysis seems to take on a very utilitarian point of view in defining the "balance of benefits and burdens" of the environmental justice.  "It is the boomerang effect of a harmful practice on its supposed beneficiaries that often leads them to halt the practice." This is such a fantastic line. This seems to be the case with a lot of ethical injustice regarding politics, or, more aptly, money. No significant change will ever occur until the ones promote the behavior face backlash or personal loss from the behavior. The EJP is quite depressing, really. There is simply nothing the less affluent people can do but be at the will of the people have the money or influence to change such injustices that are in-congruently affecting them negatively.   Even in such events where a "movement" is formed, that movement still needs the backing of affluent people, and in the case that no affluent person can be personally and positively affected by the issue ...

I have not done a lot of research into the ethics of technology in general, but by interest I have written a few papers on the ethics and threat of the technological singularity—the supposed moment in time where artificial intelligence will reach a point in which there will be an instant, irreversible change. Given that, most of my ethical consideration surrounding non-medical sciences, ignorantly so, is based of what I have researched about singularity. As Jonas addressed at the end of the chapter, there is very much a possibility that there is too much emphasis on the threat of technology and underplayed its promise. I am a dissenter for Joans' view; however, I have no doubt that the promise of technology is overplayed—in fact, I think it may be under played. When thinking about hypothetical threats of technology, I believe that artificial intelligence poses the most threat. The very idea of creating a super-human mind is something that we cannot fathom, and there are studies t...

When I read about Ethical Egoism, I didn't dismiss it as fast as others would. Ethical Egoism is a necessarily horrible thing, and I would argue people already act in a manner that can be described as Ethical Egoism which doesn't devolve society to utter chaos as many philosophers seem to think it would. That said, there are extremes to Ethical Egoism that can't be accounted for (when applied to myself). Hobbes' idea of the Social Contract seems to plug many holes in Ethical Egoism while operating under the same assumption that , I believe to be true, all people are ultimately self-interested. The idea works in theory and operates in a system of practicality.  When I was defending Ethical Egoism, I stated that a lot of the time the "obvious" self-interested act is not self-interested. In a lot of cases, it is, in the long run, better to do something that would inconvenience you because it will pay off later. So by nature of that, the "self-interested...

In every reading thus far, I have had a near instant objection to every philosophical idea that was posed—whether I agreed with it or not; however, I find it very difficult to find immediate and solid objection to Kant's idea of moral objectivism. The only issue that I have with Kant's proposal is that he assign expectation of a person in his example. In Kant's charity example, the person who doesn't give to charity has the expectation that someone should help him if he were in need, but what if that weren't the case? If my moral system outlines that I have no obligation to donate to charity, I should have the assumption that everyone else also has no obligation to give to charity. Kant's example criticizing a seemingly silly moral system. Most people, which should be all people, ought not put moral obligations on other that they would no put onto themselves. This idea is relatively unassertive, and if were taken into account, all of Kant's examples become...

The idea of morality being "just the attempt to bring about as much happiness as possible in this world" rather than a faithfulness of abstract rules is, in a way, an abstract rule. I would argue that happiness isn't something that can be objectively measured, so there is no way to defined what will and won't increase the overall happiness of the world. Happiness has to be see as an abstract idea, so, by nature of that, morality is still a faithfulness to an abstract.  When I read philosophical ideas and theory, I always have a really hard time understanding the practicable use of such things. While Bentham's theory seems great in thought, I find it hard to see this ever being truly adopted in real life. I understand that Utilitarianism is defining how humans ought  act rather than do, but  a total disregard of practical application makes any conversation not worth having/ I can't fathom a world where Utilitarianism could be applied—I don't think a Util...