By: Dr. W. J. Whistance-Smith p. 1 OTHER KEY DEFINITIONS... n Means. Philosophers often contrast...

By: Dr. W. J. Whistance-Smith p. 1

OTHER KEY DEFINITIONS . . .

Means. Philosophers often contrast means and ends. The ends we seek are the goals we try to achieve, while the means are the actions or things which we use in order to accomplish those ends. A hammer provides the means for pounding a nail in a piece of wood. Some philosophers, (Kant), have argued that we should never treat human beings merely as means to an end.



Morality. "Morality" refers to the first-order beliefs and practices about good and evil by means of which we guide our behavior. Contrast with Ethics, which is the second-order, reflective consideration of our moral beliefs and practices.



Consequentialism. Any position in ethics which claims that the rightness or wrongness of actions depends on their consequences.

Deontology. Any position in ethics which claims that the rightness or Wrongness of actions depends on whether they correspond to our duty or not.



Natural Law. In ethics, believers in natural law hold (a) that there is a natural order to the human world, (b) that this natural order is good, and (c) that people therefore ought not to violate that order.



Rights are entitlements to do something without interference from other people (negative rights) or entitlements that obligate others to do something positive to assist you (positive rights). Some rights (natural rights, human rights) belong to everyone by nature or simply by virtue of being human; some rights (legal rights) belong to people by virtue of their membership in a particular political state; other rights (moral rights) are based in acceptance of a particular moral theory.



Utilitarianism. A moral theory that says that what is moral right is whatever produces the greatest overall amount of pleasure. Some utilitarians (act utilitarians) claim that we should weigh the consequences of each individual action, while others (rule utilitarians) maintain that we should look at the consequences of adopting particular rules of conduct


UNIVERSAL VS. RELATIVE ETHICS

Universal ethics suggests that there are certain ethical principles that remain constant over time.

Relative ethics suggests that ethics are relative to a particular culture and time.


THE ROADMAP FOR SUCCESS IN ETHICS CASES!

Identify the ethical problem in the case study. Finding and identifying a problem is the first and most important step in inquiry. After you have read the material (case study), several times write a very short description of the problem. Identify the specific subject of the material and try to identify the thesis (if appropriate). This is to say, what do you see to be the primary ethical dilemma or issue involved.


SUCCESS IN ETHICS CASES (2)

Brainstorming. Now that you have decided on what the dilemma or issue is begin thinking about what values might be involved in this dilemma. .



List Values. Which of the issues or values are ethical ones? If there are some which are not ethical issues or values, explain what basis they have (economic, political, etc.). Most values create some form of rights, obligations, ideals, etc., be sure you give some thought to the implications of these ethical values.



Prioritize the ethical issues or values. Which are the most important ones? What reasons did you use to decide on the priority list?



State the Ethical dilemma as a question. Based on the above guides, identify the major ethical issue. State the ethical dilemma in the form of a question and this question should be posted very early in your essay. Questions may take the form of either "What policy should the school district take in regard to the alleged beliefs of the teacher?" (a generalized question) or "Should the school district dismiss Mr. Didwrong?" (a specified question).



Research. Your research should focus on the problem of dilemma identified as a question (previous slide). Your question to some extent become your hypothesis and thus your research should focus only on this. Remember, the ethical dilemma involved is what is important, economic, political, religious, etc. issues, although important, are only secondary.


SUCCESS IN ETHICS CASES (con’t)

The Judgment. Clearly state what you think the morally best solution or judgment concerning the question you formulated is.



Final Decision Criteria. Apply a normative ethical theory that we have used in this course by arguing that your moral judgment or solution is the best one. You should plan to use at least three of the normative principles we discussed this semester to defend your judgment. This step will occupy the majority of your presentation. Basically, you are being asked to convince me of the moral validity of your judgment and your corresponding reasoning.



Criticism. What criticisms (moral, political, cultural, economic, etc.) could be raised against your position and the normative theory/principle you used to support your judgment? How would you respond to these criticisms?


No Fear . . . Bad Apples eh?

Toronto - Near Rye High, July 24 -- In his home in the heart of Silicon Valley, Enrique, a software developer, has a remarkably complete collection of commercial programs for his Apple Macintosh (not a) computer. Like millions of other people, Enrique has not bought all of them; he has copied his friends' software instead.

Canadian Federal law is clear that in almost all cases it is illegal tomake duplicate copies of software. But that does not seem to faze manycomputer users: people who would not steal a book or cheat on a testseem to have no qualms about obtaining software illegally.


No Fear Con’t (1)

"If I feel good about a product I'll buy it," Enrique said. "But first I want to decide whether a program is really worth 500 bucks."

Enrique offers two justifications: most software is too expensive for anyone but a corporate buyer, and there is nothing ethically wrong with sampling a program before spending $500 or more.


No Fear Con’t (2) NO FEAR OF BEING CAUGHT

Some people acknowledge that using unlicensed software is wrongbut say they have no fear of being caught; some say the software isoften flawed and they want to test it before they buy it. Mostfrequently people who illegally use software say the industry makessuch huge profits from its corporate customers that individuals shouldbe free to help themselves.

Taken together, these rationalizations and excuses reflect a widespread attitude that electronic information is, in effect, in the public domain and should not be protected as private property.


No Fear Con’t (3)The software industry estimates that $2.4 billion worth of their products in North America -- almost half the total of $9.7 billion in sales -- was stolen in 1999. Last year's figures are not yet available (but mega considerable!).

Although the industry remains hugely profitable and competitive, some experts say the amount of theft reduces the incentives that developers have to create programs. But software creators are trying to fight back.

Last year, the Software Publishers Association, a trade group, conducted 75 raids, sent 561 warning letters and filed 33 lawsuits against organizations and individuals it suspected of software piracy.


No Fear Con’t (4)

But the laws are rarely enforced against individuals. In June,the RCMP raided a computer bulletin boardknown as Edwin’s Place after a complaint by the association. The website was, run out of a house in Mississauga, offeredmore than 200 commercial programs that subscribers could copy. Noarrests have been made in the case.

Far more common than such organized activities is the simple exchange of floppy disks among friends.


No Fear Con’t (5) "A person's feelings of closeness to a friend take priority over some abstract ethical principle," said Nancy Gould, a philosophy professor (Edwin’s wife) at the U. of T., who has written on the subject of ethics and computers. "This is especially true when the principle is abstract and you're dealing with corporations who are abstract and seem to be making so much money anyway."

REVOLUTION IN SOFTWARE When software for a wide variety of business and personal usesbecame easy to buy, it ignited the personal computer revolution in theearly 1980s. But now that revolution is being shaken by the ease withwhich programs and data can be copied from one machine to another.


No Fear Con’t (6)At first, many software companies protected their programs by building in codes that made them impossible to copy. But customers complained loudly, and as it became common for personal computers to have hard disks, the sale of protected software ended, in part because buyers needed to be able to copy their programs, which are sold on floppy disks, onto their hard disks.

"There was a battle over copy protection between the software industry and the users, and the users won," said Elio Rea, executive director of the Software Publishers Association.


No Fear Con’t (7)Illegal copying is also a concern in other media. But copying computer data is far easier than duplicating video or audiotapes, or photocopying an entire book. A computer disk can be copied simply by putting a blank diskette into the computer and hitting a few keys. Total time involved: Less than 10 seconds. Because it is so easy -- and so little stigma seems to be attached to it -- more and more people are making illegal copies.

"In this new digital universe, there is no cop on the corner," said L’ll Dave, a Rye High Student. "Not only is there no cop on the corner, there is no corner."


No Fear Con’t (8)BIG COMPANIES ARE STRICT Most large corporations, government agencies and schools have strict rules that prohibit copying software -- even when employees are trying only to make their work easier. Yet illegal sharing of software is a rapidly growing phenomenon and a widely accepted practice by the millions of people who use personal computers at work, at school, or in their homes. Not long ago, for example, at the Mentor School, a private school in Mississauga, a student brought a copy of a popular personalcomputer game called MarioKart to a computer laboratory. Soon there were dozens of copies of the game on floppy disks being taken home in students' backpacks.


No Fear Con’t (9)"They know it's stealing but they think that no one will ever catch them," said a 12-year-old sixth grader. Officials at the school said that despite educational efforts, it was difficult to enforce laws that have so little apparent impact. "We've been struggling with this and there's no simple solution to it," said Lee Green, the Mentor School's VP. "It takes the whole problem of xerography and raises it a power higher."SITUATION OVERSEAS IS WORSE And the situation is far worse in other countries where there is no tradition of protecting intellectual property, software industry executives say. A recent survey in Germany, for example, determined that there are fewer software programs purchased than computers -- a certain indication that piracy is widespread.


No Fear Con’t (10) The Business Software Alliance, an international trade group, estimates that $12 billion worth of software is stolen each year, an amount equal to total worldwide software sales.

"The concept of copyright is not that deeply embedded in the hearts and minds of very many people in this world," said Jack Valenti, president of the Motion Picture Association of America, a trade group in the United States.

In the view of many computer experts, the situation is only going to get worse, as more information -- like films or books -- is available in digital form, stored inside computers.


No Fear Con’t (11)"We are the only industry in the world that empowers every customer to become a manufacturing subsidiary," said an official of the software association.

ROLE FOR SCHOOLS IS URGED Last month the Ministry of Education jointly issued a report calling on the Canadian schools to expand their teaching of ethical use of computers and other information technology. And many large corporations, concerned about potentially bad publicity should they illegally use software, conduct regular audits of their employees' personal computers. But small companies frequently have a more casual approach.


No Fear Con’t (12)At a management training company in Toronto that employs about 40 people and has dozens of personal computers, an unusual compromise was reached not long ago, said one employee who agreed to be interviewed only if she and the company were not named.

Executives wanted to buy only a single copy of each program because of its high cost. But the company's computer-support manager -- concerned about unethical practices -- persuaded them to buy a separate copy for each department. Now the company, which uses software both in the administration of its business and as part of the services it provides, shares one copy for every three or four machines.


No Fear Con’t (13)DISAGREEMENT ON ETHICS "I have an ethical model in my mind, but my company disagrees with me," said the employee. "They told me: 'Why can't we just buy one copy? What difference will it make?'"

The problem will only get worse, industry executives say, as each new technology makes it easier to copy digital information.

Apple Computer Inc. has found itself struggling with copyright questions since the introduction last year of its Macintosh Quicktime software, which is intended to make it easy for personal computer users to add snippets of digital video to their programs.


No Fear Con’t (14)Many in the industry feel that finding a way to protect copyrights is essential for the industry to avoid a crisis.

"Our current intellectual property laws are in danger of breaking down completely in the face of this digital revolution," said Mitchell D. Kapor, the founder and former chairman of the Lotus Development Corporation. "And big publishers are hesitant to move forward without more of a feeling of comfort that they have copyright protection in the new digital world."


No Fear Con’t (15)QUESTIONS: 1. Do you think it is ethical to copy software without paying for itin order to test it out and see if it is something you would want tobuy?2. Do you think it is ethical to copy software without paying for iton the basis of "occult compensation" (i.e., you have paid exorbitantprices for software in the past and this is a way of getting even forthat kind of over-pricing)?3. This case mentions that people who would not steal a book orcheat on a test have no qualms about illegally obtaining software. Howdoes the ease of copying and the fact that so many people feel thatcopying software is not the same as stealing or cheating affect yourviews on this situation?


No Fear Con’t (16)4. What do you think about the compromise that one company isreported as using: buying a copy of software for each of theirdepartments (about four or five computers to a department) rather thanbuying either one copy for the whole company (and then copying it asmany times as needed) or buying one copy for each computer in thecompany?


E-mail WoesI work with many computer programs which are related to moving data from one place to another. We'll call this program UUCP for the purposes of this example. I take care of the UUCP program, but I have no control over what the other people in the company put into the UUCP program for transmission to other computers. I got a call from someone at another company saying that they had not received their file from our computer. I checked and indeed we had transmitted the file, and our side said it was successful. Therefore, we assume that the file was "lost" once it got to the other company.


E-mail Woes (1)Our policy would say that the person within my company who originated the file should resend the file to the other company. However, since I work with the UUCP program, I can mark files as being "transmitted" or "not transmitted" in order to cause them to be sent again. Now, since it is after hours, and it may be hard to locate the person who created the file in the first place, should I 1. mark the file as unsent and resend it again? 2. tell the other company that we sent the file okay and that it is "their problem"? 3. send an e-mail note to the person creating the file telling them that we sent okay, but that they didn't receive it, and they'll have to do something about it? 4. A variation of 1, 2 and/or 3?


THREE PHILOSOPHIC BASES FOR ETHICAL REASONING:

Rights analysis - rules based Utilitarianism - outcomes based Rawls' theory - justice based


USE OF RIGHTS ANALYSIS

Identify the rights claimed and investigate the claims for their moral standing.

Determine which claimed rights satisfy moral standards; for example, Kantian standards, which may justify their respect.



Identify the actions consistent with the protection or the promotion of the right.

Identify conflicts among rights. If there are none, those claimed rights with moral standing are to be respected.



If there are conflicts among rights with moral standing, investigate the importance of the interests those rights are intended to protect or to promote.

Prioritize the rights based on the importance of those interests and determine the extent to which each is constrained by the others.



Choose the action that does best in terms of priorities established.


USE OF UTILITARIANISM

Identify the alternatives -- actions or rules of behavior.

For each alternative or rule under consideration, identify the set of consequences.

Determine which of the consequences are social costs and which are social benefits.


USE OF UTILITARIANISM

Evaluate and estimate the social costs and benefits.

Choose the action or rule that yields the greatest social benefits.


USE OF RAWL’S THEORY

Identify the liberties and rights involved.



Evaluate policies in terms of how extensive are the corresponding liberties and rights of individuals consistent with equal liberties and rights for all. Prioritize rights and liberties when there are conflicts. Eliminate policy alternatives that limit liberties for reasons other than assuring other liberties and rights.



Identify the opportunities associated with each remaining policy and evaluate the policies in terms of how extensive the corresponding opportunities are. Eliminate alternatives that limit opportunities.



For the remaining policies, evaluate their fairness implications for those affected, with a focus on the least advantaged individuals.

Choose among the remaining policies based on the difference principle by favoring policies that benefit the least advantaged even if they reduce aggregate well-being.

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By: Dr. W. J. Whistance-Smith p. 1 OTHER KEY DEFINITIONS... n Means. Philosophers often contrast...

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