Writing Assignment 350 words

Ethics and Professionalism in CS ETHICAL THEORIES

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Ethical Theories Form the baseline or framework by which people weigh their actions

Ethics mathematical definition ◦ Let 𝐴𝐴 = {𝑎𝑎1,𝑎𝑎2, … ,𝑎𝑎𝑛𝑛} be the set of possible actions in a situation ◦ Let 𝐵𝐵 = {𝑏𝑏1,𝑏𝑏2, … , 𝑏𝑏𝑚𝑚} be the set of ethical theories ◦ Let R = {“Good”, “Bad”, “Right”, “Wrong”} ◦ Then define a function 𝑓𝑓: 𝑎𝑎, 𝑏𝑏 → ∶ 𝑟𝑟 𝑎𝑎 ∈ 𝐴𝐴, 𝑏𝑏 ∈ 𝐵𝐵, 𝑟𝑟 ∈ 𝑅𝑅

The function f is called the ethics decision function ◦ Human minds evaluates a similar function in making ethical and moral judgements.

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Consequentialism (Teleological) Human actions are judged based on the outcome or the consequence.

Egoism ◦ Individual’s happiness and interests above anything else ◦ Refraining from helping someone if you are tired

Utilitarianism ◦ Group’s happiness and interests above anything else ◦ An action is good if it makes the maximum number of people happy ◦ Minimize the number of losses in the Trolley problem

Altruism ◦ Action is right if it favors all except the actor himself ◦ Trying to save someone from drowning while you don’t know how to swim

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Deontology (Kantian) The action is good or bad depending on the will of the actor. ◦ A consular officer rejecting or delaying a visa ◦ Killing an intruder

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Deontological vs. Teleological

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Absolutism There are universal set of rules that determine right from wrong ◦ Common ◦ Don’t change over time ◦ Lies versus white lies ◦ Killing an intruder

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Relativism

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Universal Ethical norms don’t exist

What’s right or wrong differ based on ◦ Culture (wearing short pants in some countries) ◦ Society (Not all Muslim women wear Hijab in Muslim countries) ◦ Time (Racism was legal in the past) ◦ Context (The 1$ versus 1000$ found) ◦ Or even Individual!!!!! ◦ This is interesting ◦ Our mathematical model is missing something?

Absolutism vs. Relativism

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Kohlberg's Cognitive moral development theory.

Three levels of ethical development ◦ Like cognitive development

Pre-conventional ◦ Avoid punishment ◦ Maximize reward

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Lawrence Kohlberg

Kohlberg's (2) Conventional (conformity) ◦ Do what others do (cascades like sheep) ◦ Social accord for the good of society (traffic laws)

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A Herding Experiment Let’s see an experiment created by Anderson and Holt in 1997.

Bayes’ Rule in the Herding Experiment Each participant wants to maximize his chance of winning. Each participant should guess a majority-blue if:

A participant should guess majority-red otherwise. If the two probabilities are the same, then the participant is indifferent in his choice. At the beginning of the experiment, each participant has the following prior probabilities:

Bayes’ Rule in the Herding Experiment (2) In addition, based on the composition of each urn, we have:

Suppose now that the experiment started and the first participant draws a blue marble. He wants to evaluate the following posterior probability:

What will happen for subsequent students?!!

Kohlberg’s (3) Post-conventional ◦ Challenge the law. Not all laws are right ◦ Free from all influences.

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Kohlberg’s

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