This semester has been an interesting one and I have learned a lot in this class that I was not expecting to. Ethics is something that I always felt I had a strong grasp on and could not possibly learn something new. In this class I learned that ethics is something that people hold in high regards and they try to live their life’s in a way to not interfere with their fundamental believes. This is a great way to live your life and it always work in theory although problems do arise when we are put in situations where we must choose between a positive outcome or something that conflicts with our personal code of ethics. Through the course we have discussed several situations where this happens and the choices that some people made when they were confronted with said issue. Some people stood there grown and felt great to act accordingly, some people did the opposite and regretted that choice in their life. The issue that I noticed is that all the people who regret doing the unethical choice usually write in a way to make themselves seem like the victims. I find this offensive because the real victims are the people who had to live with the consequences of the actions they did. Its cruel to be punished for something that is not your fault and have someone who had a positive outcome to complain how bad they feel about the situation. They are essentially acting like the aggressor and the victim in all of the situations that we discussed in class. It would be like if someone broke into your home to steal your belongings and then when to the cops and complained that the gun factory made a product that was tailor made for him to commit crimes. The worst part of this scenario would be that the major gun company would get in trouble with the law and the robber would keep all of the stolen merchandise. I feel that you can not have it both ways, either you are a criminal and walk around with a heavy hart or don’t commit any crimes and live at peace with your conscious and other people. Know that I have taken this course it will reflect in all of my future decisions and I will apply my personal ethics to not only my career but also my life in general so I can live a life that I am proud off.
Category: Jose Aguirre
Driving towards the future Blog 15
An issue that I must deal with daily is the act of transportation, it’s something that has become vital to everyone because its needed to get to work or school. It’s also a dangerous and costly issue that is costing all of us a fortune. The problem is that companies find cheap real-estate to set up their business and we are forced to commute to that destination at least five times a week. I have feel victim to this because I live in King City, work in Salinas and go to School in CSUMB. I have to pass 4 towns to get to school and it’s also difficult because I always feel like an outsider because I am not from any of these towns. When technology was emerging, I thought that would decrease my commute and people seem to get this technology and use it in the worst possible way. Every semester I always must drive 1 and ½ hours to take an online test that I could have taken anywhere in the world. Why is it that people are smart enough to make complicated devices that you can communicate with anyone in the world and yet we are less in touch with each other? I think that people are just basically animas and only react to basic instinctual queues that we have developed to keep us safe. Technology has done a great deal with our ability to produce a great amount of work in a small-time frame and yet it also made life people seem like video games. Something that I have noticed in my everyday life is that people always ignore my emails and yet they snap into action when I meet them face to face. Is it because emails are more like white noise to people or is it because I am 6’2 and do MMA on my spare time. The problem is that I am a nice guy and when I email people or talk to them on the phone they can sense that and associate it with someone they can ignore. When I am face to face a part of their brain lights up like a charismas tree and that part is there to keep them alive and it’s something that technology can’t help with. I do hope that we can find a way to coexist and I won’t have to drive an hour and a half to get a 20-minute question answer. Has technology is growing we also need to grow along with it so we won’t miss something that’s right in front of us that can be easily avoided. I do hope that in the future we develop a way to make the world a smaller place by being able to be in a place and not just our voice or image. It would be great to be able to travel in a more efficient way that would allow us to safely be at work and school without the time wasted in traffic.
The 14th Rule of Conduct
A topic that seems to be on my mind that has lots of ethical dilemmas is the unspoken rules of conduct that people use to have. It was understood that everyone has a buzzy life and we all have lots of things we need to get done in a short amount of time. So, when you when to the store or hairline and you saw a line you would just get in the back of the line because that was the right thing to do. People would just naturally understand that the people in the line had families that needed them so we just followed the rules. It seems that today we have forgotten that rule and just jump to the front of the line when people are faced with line for goods and services.
This is ethically wrong due to lots of factors that contribute to the decay of modern society. The people who were in front of the line had a right to be there because they knew that there was going to be a line so they planned to get there early to be in front of the line. The people who just jump to the front of the line usually get there late and when we give them access to the front of the line we are rewarding their behavior of not planning and getting what they want at little to no effort. This is a horrible thing to be teaching people because they are going to be disappointed when they dont get the job they want because they did not work hard to earn that job position. It also promotes for the people who do plan to not try to get there early because someone will just cut them off and all that hard work of getting up early wont be rewarded. In the job market being prepared and always knowing what to do is something that employers are looking for in employees. They will miss out on some great employs when they get everyone that just takes shortcuts to get there work done.
When people are children their parents would say to them that god is watching or that people will get what they derive. The fact is that someone is always watching and since information of people seems to be currency in most friendships, supervisors always will know who does the work and who just passes off the work to someone else. Companies are establishments set up to make money and saving money is a great way to reallocate resources to produce more money. If you are always taking the easy way out supervisors will know that you are not essential to the company and are most likely to terminate that employee. The simples act of working hard always translate into life in a positive way, the only drawback is that people will try clime the ranks on the hard works of others. For this reason, we must also work smart and work hard in all aspects of our lives to get the best of job opportunities, friendships, and life in general.
When making one AI do we make 13 hearts?
We truly do live in the golden age of television; I am sure these stories will have a strong correlation with current events. The new series on Hulu is no exception to the brilliant and ethical issues that are discussed and presented in a 43min window. The show I am talking about is Dimension 404, the episode that was interesting because it showed an issue that this class has done many presentation on. The episode is called “Bob” and it’s an Artificial Intelligence that the government built to keep us safe. The premise is that a brain has more computing time that a computer so they bioengineer a brain to carry out military intelligence. The conflict is that it can’t find a man that has malicious intent to hurt a mass quantity of people and this bio machine is not broken so they bring in a military phycologist to alleviate this problem. This is the first ethical issue that I found interesting, if a machine is made to mimic a human brain can we use human brain doctors to fix it or heal it. This device was built for national security and it mostly studies people. At what point, should this machine be treated like a machine and how can we treat this machine ethically when it was made to so a certain task. If the machine can no longer perform its primary task are we going to turn off a machine or kill a certain being. Should be also grant it vacation day? The problem is that we have not point of reference and at what point does this machine no longer belong to us. I think people tend to humanize machines all the time and it’s a great way to keep our belongings in great working order. I also am guilty of this behavior like when I ask my cell phone a question and when it answers it I say thank you. We tend to correlate pain to negative acts and it’s an evolutionary trait that has served us to be top of the evolutionary chain. Has the plot thickens in the story the phycologist brings attention to how the machine would process the outcome of the information he collects. The example they use is that his intel is used to perform a drone strike that he must pilot and its apparent that he is not just a cold machine. All the intel he collects has made him identify with us and his making it not want to be the instrument of deadly force. It’s hard for people in the security filed to be decertifies to the violence and have their profession warp there way of thinking and it’s even harder when you are always working. The resolution to this story was when Bob embraced that he is not a military brain but a human hart and took it among itself to bring some salvation to itself by using drones to deliver presents to everyone. This episode has lots of ethical issues that we will need to consider when working in emerging technologies and these kinds of shows will prepare us or at least get people talking about issues that will affect our everyday life’s.
12 Angry Millennial Men
According to recent PBS News fewer and fewer students are making the decision to not go to college. This report is troubling to hear due to my current enrollment to college and their reasons make a lot of scenes. They are not seeing the benefits of going to college for 4 years to learn something that they feel they don’t even need in today’s work force. They don’t feel that making long essays and learning a lot in biology would help their carrier in today’s work force in the digital age. High school students also know are exposed to entertaining concepts that can make them a lot money, like social media or video games. I have found it extremely frustrating going to college and having professors that never taught before and having them attempt to pass information to their students. They usually don’t have the patients for questions and when we don’t understand the answer they usually just repeat it in the same way.
Another issue is the high cost of tuition associated with a college degree. People don’t want to get in debt because of past experiences with credit cards. They learn the hard way that credit card charge for lending you that money and those interests can and will grow in an alarming rate. They know that if they go to college they will have get student loans and will fall back into debt, this is especially frustrating when they just payed off their credit cards. Parents and high school teachers will encourage us to attend college because the education you will be imparted is worth the money you will be in debt over. This is no longer true, with a mass majority of teachers not being up to par with their teaching instruct their students to go on YouTube for lectures over the material they are covering. I find this infuriating because, I spend thousands of dollars over something I could have gotten for free! To make things worse the information is more clear and precise and the professors don’t even study those videos to learn how to make there lecture better for students.
Multiple reports have also stated that the people that do decide to attend college usually just want to check that box in their life’s so they can say they did. They are not concern with learning or even education, all they want is that degree so they only focused on passing test and not learning. This is not a great skill to develop in the work force because they will expect you to implement topics to your work and not just reside facts on the topic. Young adults know have develop skills that most companies would like their employees to possess. They can go in social media and find out the current method of a profession and learn those skills has soon has the company realizes they need them. Going to a job interview and having projects to show with the software that the company just got is a powerful way to make a good impression. Not going to college was a sign of laziness and lack of ambition in past generations and this generation blinding implementing out of date courses and expenses is the new low.
Murder Was the Case that they gave me 11
An ethically sensitive situation that has been in the news lately was the current trial of former NFL player Aaron Hernandez. I personally don’t like watching football and even I found this case to be compelling, ethically wrong, and sad. This football player was blessed with great physical abilities that he worked hard to apply to the sport of football becoming a professional player. All his hard work had finally payed off by getting a high paying job and he in turn wasted this one in a lifetime opportunity by being arrested for the murder of a semipro football player. These situations have lots of ethical dilemmas due to the love of football that this country has and how we tend to turn a blind eye to some of their shortcomings due to their ability to play this game professionally.
It’s always refreshing to know that we are just a little morally warped and not broken due to the justice that the family of the victims have endured. Losing a love one at the prime of their life’s is not something their family can just get over although knowing that their son’s killer is behind bars will bring some comfort that he won’t strike more misery to another family’s life’s. This issue is all too real since before his arrest he was also indicted for a separate case of double Homicide. These kinds of horrendous acts of violence with little to no ethical consideration is the byproduct of years of getting his way. I do believe that you must fight for what you want and the setbacks are just has important has the triumphs because they teach you about humility. When you constantly win, you do get a sense of pride knowing that your hard work has played off and when you get a setback you learn that you are human. That you have flaws that you should work on and you also learn that other people are just has good. These kinds of lessons in my opinion were deprived from athletes because they keep wining trophies with their superior athletic ability and the school system also helps them pass their classes so they can keep bringing in wins for their school.
These kind of ethically bankrupt behavior is a big reason why we see these athletes squander one in a life time opportunities. When you are always getting your way and total strangers go out of their way to facilitate this behavior it’s common for athletes to feel all powerful. The unfortunate outcome is that they are only being treated like royalty because of their superior athletic ability and once that goes away people treat them like everyone else. These creates a real crisis of self-worth because the constant praise and admiration is removed and if they lived like it was never going away they will find themselves in a dark place. These kinds of sudden change will bring pity and it’s just too much for a lot of these athletes to bare since there hole identity is based on this. I am the opposite of these people that wining comes easy to them, in fact I am the opposite and I must work hard to get something I want and even harder to keep it. These kinds of struggle have taught me to be respectful to other people because they are probably going through a similar struggle and to cherish what I have because it can all go away at a moment’s notice and I must work even harder to get it back.
It’s not Fun to be Funny (blog 10)
Something that has gotten a lot of controversy is people being offended by jokes that comedian make on stage. The layout of a comedy show is a stage were a comedian would entertain an audience by jokes threw a setup and a punchline. This was just a way to entertain people and was not taken seriously because people wanted to be entertained and hear jokes they could relate to. In the times of kings, they had a court gesture that would entertain the king and its guest in important functions. He was considered a fool and was the only person in the court that would make fun to the king and the king would laugh. This would humanize the king by pointing out his flaws in a fun way and by him laughing at the joke. The thing that I don’t understand is if in medieval times people in power would recognize the benefits of comedy, why is it that when people today hear a joke they get offended and put a lot of time and effort into punishing the comedian. This line of thinking seam irrational due to the status of the comedians has entertainers and should not be taken seriously.
I do understand that people can insight riots with just their speech and we should always be on the lookout for extremist that corrupt the youth with their hateful propaganda. What I don’t understand is why are we treating every stage has a political stage where people can push their own agenda. Comedy stages are a place to go when you need a break from all of that and bringing it on to the comedy stages seems like a place where all of that is not applicable due to the outrages subject matter. The first joke should negate all the political agenda due to how people process information that is presented to them. When the outreaches material is presented it should poison the well for all other political agendas because we need clear and precise plan to implement and not jokes or funny anecdotes.
It’s a major factor is that politics also don’t give clear answers so we must search for the answer to our question and people know just analyze every one’s speech in search for answers. The problem is that not everyone has hidden meaning in their speeches and comedy shows don’t have calls to action it’s just entertainment. A lot of comedy clubs have taken to social media and explained that they are getting countless encounters with patrons that feel they were insulted and demand a refund. They must place disclaimers and notices that they won’t refund their money after they watch there shows. Comedy was a form of expression where you find comedy in our everyday life and not having to filter yourself. I also believe that people are seeing these comics working all the time and making money so they want a reason to find a problem with them.
Don’t forget to remember how to remember People (blog 9)
This past week in class, we discussed a sensitive subject that I had never even though about, the content and the ethical responsibility of social media in the case of a death. Social media is a great tool when it comes to staying in touch with friends and family due to the ability to reach millions of people. When someone makes a social profile on most cites they have clear terms of use with indicates that the content posted on the cite know belongs to them and it’s up to their discretion when it comes to what to do with the data.
The subject of death is a serious one that can not be taken lightly and just by informing people of the matter is something that’s not easy to deal with. People most often will join social media cites to get information from people they know and a death is something they would like to know and its unethical for a social media cite to take that upon themselves. A major problem is that it’s a morbid subject and it would be difficult for a cite to ask their users what their wishes would be in the case of a death. When someone passes, they have no idea the strain and heartache they cause on friends and love ones, so having them decide on an event that’s not for them is unrealistic. I had family members wanting to cheer up people and have their funeral be a party and it was just right down disrespectful.
Funerals are not for the dead they are for the living to grieve and say goodbye to the person they lost and a social media cite is not that different. Our teacher brought up an example for in class discussion and mentioned that Facebook policy was to turn their page into a “remember them” page to honor them and remember their life’s they lived. This is a great policy because people would like remember them and feel down when thinking of their death and making a trip to their grave would be difficult if they were buried out of state or if they were buried at all. In certain situations, the deaths could be under extremely sensitive circumstances and having social media divulge that information would be ethically wrong and not to mention the pain the family would receive from people. It’s also great that big companies are hiring ethics professors to help them make these though decisions and help them deal with these controversial topics.
I hope that social media companies keep doing the right thing and help these communities by not adding more problems to an already grieving family. At the end of the day it’s not just computers, its people communication with each other and making those bonds stronger is something we all strive for and berry little of use achieve.
The 8th wonder of the world
I find it wonderful when people come together to work on a common goal and put aside their differences. This is something that is hard wired into people to bond them with each other when under normal circumstances it would not happened. There are many examples of these phenomenon, one example is of soldiers who served with each other. When these solders work together to accomplish boot camp they feel these deep-rooted loyalties towards each other and become best of friends. This has some ethical issues because if you pair bad people with each other they will be a menace to society and this decision should not be taken lightly. It’s the responsibility of people making the groups to place people that will benefit the group and not just one person. It’s important to have a clear and define leadership to accomplish the goal their individuals set out to fulfill.
Another great example is in colleges, students with different personalities and backgrounds are put in this situation where they must do a lot of work in a short period. These students also bond with each other and set out in the work force in a soft spot for all their classmates. The interesting part in an ethical framework is that they will in many occasions make decisions that won’t benefit their employer. This is ethically wrong to overlook a great employee and give a position to someone who is underqualified. This canid of reasoning is way too common today and we should be forever vigilant to not fall for this unique way of thinking. Some would argue that since they work together at school they have a base they can make their decisions from and not just the information provided in a paper why the applicant. This is also a valid way of thinking and does have plenty of merit although I find this to be inefficient. People are hired to performed a task for their employer and if they fail to provide the best quality of work they promised they could deliver upon they are essentially stealing from the company that took a risk by giving them a job.
I always have been against working in groups due to the lack of leadership it provides and I usually end up doing most of the work load. This is frustrating because it takes me a little longer to learn information than other people and usually don’t get most of it before tests. My grades usually are based on the work I do on projects and homework and getting good grades in those usually correlate for me passing my classes. People also can’t seem to hear what I say most of the times, so when I try to communicate the information it usually gets poor outcome. Studies have made correlations with people working in groups can perform more and better than one person can by themselves. I am going to try to work in groups even if I do most of the work because at the end of the year it’s my grade and I also going to have to work with people when I enter the work force in the field I am studying.
Lucky Number 7
This blog entry I would like to discuss the concept of Luck and how we are reinforcing this message that is harmful and is ethically bios. I have noticed that people put a lot of emphasis on luck and use this concept has an umbrella excuse to classify every setback. This is not a productive outlook on our life’s because, you can change luck but you can change yourself. This concept took me years to learn and apply to my life and I am better off for it. Looking back on the way I was raised I noticed that a lot of emphasis was put on being lucky. I would see someone that had a great job and when I asked my parents they would say he got lucky by getting that job. When we expose children to this kind of mentality its can be decremented to their development because they will feel that they wont get what they want even if they work hard for it. The lottery is also a great example of this epidemic that is all so common in a lot of homes. The notion of not having to studying or working hard to achieve your dreams of become wealthy’s is a goal that is impossible to many of the people who play the lottery. The reason why its so appealing is that if you live in the know you don’t worry about learning new skills or saving money and spending a couple of dollars seems like nothing to become rich. The problem with this logic is that its only a couple of dollar today and if you spread that out over the year that adds up to be close to thousands spends with no payout. Most people that I talk to about this always mention that they have won small cash prizes from playing and they always say that they spend the money they won on more lottery tickets. In this case, even when they win they still lose, in this kind of environment luck would a commodity that would be sought after due to the low odds of winning. I have found out you need to be able to control the odds and investing in yourself is always a great way of accomplishing this goal. If you invest in yourself and you start to notice that the market is changing you can always adapt and stay current and if you bet on something else, you are at the mercy of the one who is in control of the situation. They will know what the best bet is and how to maximize their profits and you will be left out to take the financial hit. The only way you could make a profit in this situation is that you get Lucky and they inform you of the upcoming change. I think that a great blessing for any child would be to be born unlucky so they can work hard achieve their goals in life. Expecting a positive outcome when little to no work is like expecting to lose weight without going to the GYM.
Ethics with Group 5 