Digital ethics focuses on ethical issues related to data, AI, and the internet, necessitating collaboration with computer scientists to tackle unique challenges.
Privacy is a critical topic in digital ethics, requiring collective solutions for protecting personal data and enforcing stronger regulations.
Deep dives
Digital Ethics: Understanding the Unique Challenges
Digital ethics is a relatively new field that focuses on ethical issues related to data, AI, and the internet. While it shares similarities with other branches of ethics, such as medical ethics, it also has its own complexities. For instance, data collection in the digital world is invisible, intricate, and can lead to unpredictable inferences. This necessitates collaboration with computer scientists and specialized knowledge to tackle these unique challenges.
Keeping Pace with Technology and the Need for Specialization
The rapid advancements in technology pose a challenge for scholars in digital ethics. Staying up to date with technological changes can be daunting, especially with algorithms evolving every week. Specialization becomes vital, as it's impossible for individuals to keep pace with every facet of AI development. While ancient philosophical principles still hold relevance, new ethical theories may be required as AI becomes more autonomous and potentially attains moral agency.
Privacy Concerns and the Trade in Personal Data
Privacy is a critical topic in digital ethics, particularly due to the extensive data collection in machine learning algorithms. Personal data, even seemingly innocuous details like music preferences, can be used to infer sensitive information and potentially lead to discrimination. The trade in personal data raises ethical issues, including the risk of abuse and exploitation. Protecting privacy requires collective solutions, such as banning the trade in personal data, robust cybersecurity standards, and enforcing stronger regulations.
Digital ethics is a new field. But what is it, what is its scope? In this episode of the Philosophy Bites podcast Carissa Véliz, author of Privacy is Power and editor of The Oxford Handbook of Digital Ethics, discusses these topics with Nigel Warburton.
Philosophy Bites is brought to you by the team of David Edmonds and Nigel Warburton. We've been running since 2007.
Get the Snipd podcast app
Unlock the knowledge in podcasts with the podcast player of the future.
AI-powered podcast player
Listen to all your favourite podcasts with AI-powered features
Discover highlights
Listen to the best highlights from the podcasts you love and dive into the full episode
Save any moment
Hear something you like? Tap your headphones to save it with AI-generated key takeaways
Share & Export
Send highlights to Twitter, WhatsApp or export them to Notion, Readwise & more
AI-powered podcast player
Listen to all your favourite podcasts with AI-powered features
Discover highlights
Listen to the best highlights from the podcasts you love and dive into the full episode