CLASS 1

Is Computer Science, Science?

  • What is science?
  • Formulation of a hypothesis about the world, and then perform reproducible tests on that hypothesis. If the expected result occurs, you have a scientific fact.
  • What is Computer Science?
  • It is the manipulation of information.
  • Yes, but why?
  • Francis Bacon’s Definition of Science
  • Algorithms can be viewed as the hypothesis about the world.
  • Metaphysical status of information
  • Computer science is dealing with information, and if information has a metaphysical status, then computer science deals with the real world. And thus, is a science.
  • No, but why?
  • It’s a mixture of various fields
  • Arts / Engineering
  • Math
  • It’s a tool that can be used in science – an applied science
  • A microscope is a tool used in science, but the person who made the microscope is not a scientist.
  • Computer Science is more engineering than it is science.

Definition of Technology as Narrative: Consists of three parts -> Intentions, Artifact, Desired Outcomes
Desired outcomes and intentions are normative, making technology normative as well.

  • Technology
  • Normativity in technology
  • Artifact vs Technology
  • How using the concept of narrative, technology must be understood as more as mere artifact. It’s normative because of intentions and desired outcomes
  • Use an example to make the point that technologies are normative
  • Technology and Progress
  • Enlightenment Notion of Progress
  • Historical Context
  • Happens around the 18th century during the American, French revolutions. Trying to liberate themselves from three sources of oppression: The Church, the Monarchy, and Socioeconomic inequality.
  • Birth of the scientific method, allowing people to make claims to knowledge, and thus, empowering them. Disempowered the negative parts of the Church.
  • Ben Franklin denying refusing patents because the idea is that technology is going to help everyone out. Everyone would be able to have things do things that servants would typically do before. This was alleviation from socioeconomic class.
  • Primary Conceptual Component
  • In all three contexts, they valued technology instrumentally - as a tool to liberate themselves from the sources of oppression. There is no automatic connection between technology and progress.
  • Technocratic Notion of Progress
  • Historical Context
  • The industrial revolution brought mass production which allowed a lot of people to have stuff they couldn’t have before. Introduced the working-class. More technology and better technology meant more goods, which meant more people had access to more goods, and thus, technology and progress were seen as synonymous.
  • Primary Conceptual Component
  • They valued technology inherently. Technology IS progress. We don’t value technology because can lead to progress, but technology is progress - full stop.
  • Counter-Enlightenment Notion of Progress
  • Historical Context
  • 1970’s
  • March against the Vietnam war
  • March against nuclear power
  • The ‘quiet’ revolution
  • Right after WW2, old military complexes were unused. Decisions were made on how to change those buildings for peace and for people. Make fridges, cars, radios etc. But then the environmental movement realised that it was affecting the world. So, turns out, not all technology is good. Chemicals, nuclear meltdowns, 3 mile island, Chernobyl, and the Cold War. So pervasive that Duck-and-cover drills werenecessary.[MC1]
  • Not all science and technology is good.
  • Primary Conceptual Component
  • Technology doesn’t necessarily mean progress.
  • Big-Picture
  • Does improved technology mean progress?Well, progress towards what? First you need to decide what kind of society you want to live in. Then, you can judge your technology and determine whether it will lead to progress.

CLASS 2

  • Relationship between society and technology
  • Technological Determinism
  • Technology completely determines the social structure of our society
  • Hard Technological Determinism
  • Technology fully shapes society and not the other way around
    (T -> S)
  • Ex: Assembly line
  • Broke work up into different components
  • Demanded unskilled labor
  • Created the working class
  • Hard TD because: social structure came out of the industrial revolution.
  • Society cannot influence technology at all
  • Soft Technological Determinism
  • Technology MOSTLY shapes society (T -> S)
    but there’s a concept of technological momentum where when new technology is introduced, it is malleable – mouldable. But the more and more it’s adapted and expanded upon, the harder it is to change. Society can impact technology, but only in the early stages.
  • Ex: Fossil Fuels
  • Henry Ford first introduced the internal-combustion engine because he had investments in oil.
  • Even though steam powered engines were better, Henry Ford had the assembly line which allowed him to mass produce it and make it more accessible.
  • The morethe internal-combustion engine was adopted, the harder it is to use other technologies like steam or electricity. Even though we know we probably shouldn’t.
  • Social Constructivism
  • Society shapes technology “All the way down” (S -> T)
    Technology is a reflection of social values
  • Ex: America
  • Because America there already existed values that valued [42:00] individuals over collective goods, the technology of automated and mechanized manufacturing processes arose. Treating humans like cogs in a machine.
  • Co-Constructivism
  • Soft TD without the concept of momentum
  • Best theory of the relationship between society and technology.
  • Society and technology shape each other (S <-> T)
  • Apply each theory to a case study
  • Do Artifacts have Politics?
  • Artifacts that shape social order
  • Overpasses in Long-Island Beach
  • Purposefully made so low that busses wouldn’t be able to use the roads that the overpasses went over. As a result, low-income people didn’t have access to the Jones’s Beach.
  • Moulding
  • Trying to disempower the workers
  • Handicap Accessibility
  • Stairs segregate handicapped people.
  • Tomato Harvester
  • Highly Compatible with Politics
  • Solar Energy
  • Highly compatible with democratic politics
  • Empowers individuals to consume and produce their own energy
  • Empowerment of the individual, of autonomy
  • Allows for de-centralization of power production
  • Doesn’t necessitate de-centralization
  • E.g. solar powered fields owned by companies.
  • Centralization power production
  • Necessarily Political
  • Nuclear Power – fascist
  • Requires centralized hierarchical authoritarian control of production
  • Requires militaristic protection of nuclear waste and material in plants and transportation
  • Ship at sea
  • Needs a captain
  • Railroad
  • Manufacturing plant
  • We need to ask ourselves what politics artifacts have, and whether or not we agree with those politics
  • It gives people legitimate critiques about technology. No technical know-how is needed to find faults with the artifacts.
  • Explain the differences between the two, and how each artifact is in that group
  • Technologies as Forms of Life
  • De-Facto state of Technological Determinism
  • Our forms of life are deeply shaped by technologies in a super deep way.
  • Most of us remain oblivious to this fact.
  • We just accept life as it is.
  • Why don’t more people ask about this?
  • Progress and misunderstanding it
  • Most people live in the technocratic notion of progress
  • Unreflectively believe in the technocratic notion of progress
  • Because of this, it doesn’t occur to people that they need to analyze how technology shapes our lives. If all technology is good, then there’s no need to analyze it.
  • Making / UsingDistinction
  • Making
  • Engineers care about how things work.
  • Engineers believe that technologies are value neutral, and their only responsibilities is to make it.
  • They don’t use the technology, so it’s up to the consumers.
  • Because they only make technology, they don’t have to care about normativity. [1:31:00] QUIZ QUESTION HERE
  • Using
  • I’m only using technology temporarily, so I don’t care.
  • Why should we care?
  • Guy walking on the sidewalk trying to have a conversation with his neighbor in the car.
  • Difference of situations between technologies. Guy in the car has different possibilities vs guy walking on the sidewalk
  • Technologies shape our world
  • How can we wake up from technocratic somnambulism?
  • Impact studies – Technological assessment
  • Suggest that people who are affected should accept their fate.
  • Are reactionary. Only done AFTER the impact.
  • Instead, check the politics of the artifacts

CLASS 3

  • Theories of Ethics
  • Utilitarianism (Micro point of view)
  • Three components
  • Consequentialism: Only the consequences of the act that determine the rightness or wrongness of the action. The ends justify the means.
  • Hedonism: Happiness is the only thing that matters.
  • Aggregative:“Egalitarianism”, in the sense that, everyone’s happiness is equally important.
  • If the resulting total happiness is equal or more than the total happiness before the act, the act is good. Otherwise it’s bad.
  • Ex:Burning a baby
  • The baby suffers, makes the baby’s family unhappy, and might make you happy, but unless you’re happier than the sum of the baby and family suffering, it’s wrong by utilitarianism.
  • Ex: Five people in a room needing various transplants, and one healthy person
  • Utilitarianism comes to the conclusion that it would be morally right to chop up the healthy person to save the five other people.
  • Generally pretty good, but it can come up with some pretty counter-intuitive results.
  • Deontology (Micro point of view)
  • Tries to explain human rights by explaining that people are generally pretty important because we have the ability to reason. As such, we should be treated in a certain way and treat others in a certain way. Our ability to reason is our categorical imperative.
  • Formulation of Imperatives
  • Formula of the Universal Law (FUL): Act always in such a way that the maximum implicit in your action be fit to be a universal law.If the act is no longer possible if everyone does it, then it is morally bad.
  • Ex:Taking out a loan that we can’t pay back, and use the money to donate to a kid’s cancer fund.
  • Implicit Maxim: It’s okay to lie when taking out a loan at a bank that you can’t pay back, when it’s to other people’s benefit.
  • Result: Since people need to pay back loans in order for banks to give out loans, the banks would eventually never be able to give out loans. So, it’s wrong.
  • Ex: A crazy axe murderer asks where you wife is.
  • Implicit Maxim: It’s okay to lie.
  • Result: ??? Not clearly explained in class on why it’s wrong.
  • Formula of the End of Itself (FEI):Act always in such a way that you respect other people in ends themselves and never as a mere means. People would agree to be treated to the way they’re being treated, if asked.
  • Ex: You notice a baby drowning in a lake
  • The baby would not like you to walk away and would consent to you trying to save it. So the right thing to do would be to save it.
  • Ex: Cutting up one person to save five others (like in utilitarianism)
  • Wrong because the one person would not consent to being cut up.
  • Ex: Bombing of Hiroshima – land invasion vs bomb
  • 2 million of America’s troops dying and 12-15 million of Japan’s troops dying through a land invasion vs 600k Japanese people dying on the bomb, a large chunk of them civilians.
  • These civilians would not have consented to being bombed, so the land invasion would have been better. The soldiers contractually consented.
  • But utilitarianism would suggest that the bomb is the better option.
  • Does not treat non-rational creatures as though they’re important.
  • Burning babies would be okay, severely mentally handicapped people are not important, and neither are other animals.
  • Theory of justice as fairness (Macro point of view)
  • Justice as fairness: the idea here is that, we want to arrange a civil society. Natural society is creation of human beings. Because we don’t want to live in a state of nature, all of us are willing to put some constraints to avoid living in the state of nature, thereby we sign a contract to society, because society is protecting us from the state of nature even at the cost of some rights.
  • Original Position
  • Imagine yourself in a state of nature outside of any society.
  • Veil of Ignorance
  • Make rules and laws such that no matter where you end up, you’ll be okay with it.

CLASS 4

  • Gender and Technology
  • Relationship between technology and gender
  • Gendered Notion of Progress
  • Historically, technology has been associated with masculinity, and nature has been associated with femininity.
  • Man-Made / Non-Natural vs Mother-Nature / Natural
  • If technology is viewed as progress, as a by-product, masculinity is seen as progress and femininity is viewed as a threat to progress.
  • Technologies that reinforce gender systems / stereotypes [45:00]
  • Many technologies reproduce and re-create gendered relationships. Relationships that have different gendered components.
  • Process of Reification: through artifactuality, ideas can be made real.
    ( Pre-Existing Values ) ( Technology ) ( New Social Context )
  • Example: Barbies and GI Joe Dolls
  • GI Joe teaches you that war is fun, Barbies teach you that math is hard.
  • Technologies that subvert gender systems / stereotypes
  • Example: Military technology
  • Brute force used to be necessary, and thus more masculinity, but not so much anymore with technology like drones where the gender doesn’t make too much of a difference. There is more equality.
  • Example: Pilots
  • Planes used to need a lot of upper body strength to fly planes. But now that the plane steering are less mechanical and more electrical, it allows more women in flying.
  • Technologies that alter the very nature of gender and sex
  • Gender vs Sex
  • Gender [1:03:00]
  • Femininity and Masculinity.
  • Men and women have varying levels of masculinity and femininity.
  • Gender is socially constructed because from society to society, the notion of masculinity and femininity differs. Even through history.
  • Sex
  • Sex is traditionally thought of as ‘natural’. Turns out things are complicated.
  • At statistically regular rates, people are born without clear male/female genitalia (hermaphrodites). This isn’t seen because their sex are assigned right after birth. Doctors use technology to determine whether or not someone is going to become a boy or a girl.
  • Thus, if the sex can be, not reassigned, but assigned, sex becomes a social construct.
  • Essentialism vs Constructivism
  • Essentialists argue that the connection between sex and gender is very, very close. If you are born a man, you will essentially behave in a masculine way.
  • Constructivists argue that there is a big disconnect between sex and gender. Gender is largely socially constructed. The natural category to which you belong, male, female, doesn’t have a lot to do with how you end up identifying in terms of gender.
  • Nature vs Nurture [1:11:00]
  • A History of Feminism
  • First Wave
  • Historical Context: Suffragette movement in the western world in the 1920’s. Fighting for the right to vote.
  • Women’s constitution didn’t offer them the same ability to reason and use logic to make an informed decision, needed for voting.
  • Women demonstrate that they have the same qualities as men.
  • Flappers
  • Flappers were women who wore pants, had short hair, drank, smoke cigarettes, and engaged in sexual intercourse outside of the marital bedroom.
  • Primary Conceptual Component: Arguing for equality through sameness by demonstration.
  • Second Wave
  • Historical Context: Women’s liberation movement in the 1960-1970’s. The idea was that it was a reaction to the first wave. The argument was that women should not have to demonstrate their sameness to have equality under the law. Women are people, different from men, but still fundamentally people and thus are entitled to equality under the law. Another term for second wave feminism is ‘Difference feminism’. ‘Difference feminists’ were essentialists. The recognition of those differences is politically important.
  • Primary Conceptual Component: Equality by nature, and not by sameness.
  • Invention of the birth control pill, letting them have sex like men without consequences.
  • Some second wave feminists went further
  • Feminine characteristics were empathy, caring, and kindness.
  • Masculine characteristics were the lack of empathy, cold-hearted logic, and hyper-rationality.
  • Democrats take the side of pro-feminism, republicans take the opposing side. Republicans said the nuclear family requires a specific type of femininity that the feminists are against.
  • Becomes heavily heated.
  • A crazy feminist killed Andy Warhol and she wrote the SCUM manifesto. Republicans pointed to this and said “Look how crazy feminists are”.
  • Third Wave
  • Historical Context:Third wave feminists were social constructivists and were anti-essentialists. They found the essentialism of the second wave feminism to be a big problem, and took issue that second wave was largely focused on white women.
  • Primary Conceptual Component: Locate inequality through reification and argue for equality by pointing out the socially constructed notion of gender.
  • Leaky Pipeline
  • The idea is that there’s a pipeline. The input are girls, and the resulting end is ‘success’ in STEM. The pipeline is the process of getting to that resulting end.Not as many girls get in the pipeline, and there are ‘leaks’. Women leak out at far greater rates than men.
  • Efforts were made to help increase the amount of input into the pipeline. Suggesting the problem lies on the supply side. It ignores the domain itself.
  • Where the leaky pipeline metaphor comes from
  • Why it’s there at all
  • And what framework it employs[MC2]
  • Critiques of the Leaky Pipeline
  • Suggests that the problem lies on the supply side. Ignores the domain itself. Maybe there’s something wrong with computing?
  • Look at the leaky pipeline through the non-western landscape and the historical landscape.
  • Historical Context
  • In world war two, women did computation. Were called ‘computers’. They understood computers better than men did, because men just came back from fighting.
  • The fact that there are nowhere near as many women in computer science today is not a statement about computer science itself. There is nothing inherently hostile to women in computer science because it used to be the exact opposite.
  • Non-Western Landscape
  • In Malesia, India, women make up majority of computer scientists.It’s a culturally contingent thing.
  • If you broaden the definition of computer science, to include things like graphic arts, there’d be more women in computer science.
  • There are successful women in computer science, and we should try and make them stand out. Or, try and ‘redo’ history by including women like they did for black people. See Washington Carver.

CLASS 5 (unfinished)