CS 585 Section 002, Spring 2013:
Science Fiction and Computer Ethics

Professor: Dr. J. Goldsmith
Office: 311 Marksbury Building, Phone: 257-4245
Office Hours: TBA and by appointment. Email questions strongly encouraged and answered.

Course Description:

The topics covered in this course will be:

• Privacy and surveillance;
• workplace and employment issues;
• ownership;
• warbots;
• carebots;
• professional ethics.

Prereqs: Ability to read and write English, and to think and write analytically.

Textbook: Computer Ethics, fourth edition Deborah Johnson. Prentice Hall, 2009.

Grading:

There will be:

• Blogs: You are expected to write at least once/week, and comment on someone else's blog at least once/week (30 points);
• class participation (10 points);
• occasional short response essays (25 points);
• longer papers/presentations/creative writing (your choices!) for midterm and final (15 and 20 points, respectively).

The midterm project will be completed by March 5th; a project proposal is due on February 5th. The final project is due by DATE, although any in-class presentations must be scheduled during a class period. The final project proposal is due DATE.

Those taking CS 585 002 for graduate credit will not have the lowest essay grade dropped.

READ THIS:

Attendance in class and section is very strongly encouraged.

Copying of homework from other students or from other sources is strictly prohibited. Obtaining a solution from another source without citing the source is plagiarism, AND WILL BE PUNISHED. You are encouraged to visit Dr. Goldsmith in her office hours or to send her email if you are stuck on homework problems. You do not need an appointment for regularly scheduled hours.

Outcomes and assessments

Students will learn basic concepts in computer ethics. In particular, the student will be able to:

37. THIS WILL BE FILLED IN,
38. AND THIS.

NOTE THAT THIS IS A HACK-IN-PROGRESS FROM A DIFFERENT SYLLABUS. WORKIN' ON IT.

Week by Week Course Outline:
Consider this syllabus a first approximation.

Date	Readings and Viewings	Assignment
	Introduction
Jan. 10	CE Chap. 1
Jan. 15--17	Chap. 2; Skilled Work, Without the Worker from The NY Times, By John Markoff. Published: August 18, 2012; movie: Charlie Chaplin's Modern Times
	Privacy and surveillance
Jan. 22--24	Chap. 4, Scenarios; movie: Final Cut (Robin Williams, 2004)
Jan. 29--31	Chap. 4, Why Care? story: The Dead Past, Isaac Asimov
Feb. 5	MIDTERM PROJECT PROPOSAL DUE
Feb. 5--7	Chap. 4, Is Privacy Over? movie: 1984
	Digital property
Feb. 12--14	Chap. 5, 109--118; novel: Diamond Age, Neal Stephenson
Feb. 19--21	Chap. 5, 119--127; Diamond Age
	Human-robot relations
Feb. 26--28	Robot Caregivers, by Jason Borenstein and Yvette Pearson, Journal of Ethics and Information Technology,Volume 12 Issue 3, September 2010, Pages 277 - 288, and story: Mama's Care.
Mar. 5	MIDTERM PROJECT DUE
Mar. 5--7	"Itsy Bitsy Spider" by James Patrick Kelly Chap. 3, 55--59; movie: Robot and Frank
Mar. 11--16	SPRING BREAK
Mar. 19--21	"Dolly" by Elizabeth Bear, (Asimov's, January 2011).
Mar. 26	FINAL PROJECT PROPOSAL DUE
	Warbots
Mar. 26--28	CNN on war drones and Wired on war drones and Sanjeev and Robotwallah (Ian McDonald, 2007).
	Social media
April 2--4	The Machine Stops, by E.M. Forster The "Machine Stops," first published in the Oxford and Cambridge Review in 1909 Copyright 1947 E.M. Forster; novel: The Jazz, Melissa Scott; movie: Catfish; Chap. 3, 66--71.
	Computer Games
April 9--11	TV: Boston Legal episode, Word Salad Days (Season 2, Disc 6); READING.
	Robot and Cyborg Rights
April 16--18	Bicentennial Man, and Star Trek, Next Generation: Measure of a Man (Season 2, Episode 9)
	Professional ethics
April 24--26	Semester Retrospective
April 30th	FINAL PROJECT DUE: 9:45 AM

---

webmaster@cs.uky.edu

This page last modified: Tuesday, January 29, 2013.