Chapter Title: No, PAPA: Why Incomplete Codes of Ethics are Worse than none at All

Chapter Title: No, PAPA: Why Incomplete Codes of Ethics are Worse than none at All

Name of the Book: Cyber Ethics

Library Reference: N/A

Amazon Link:

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=cyber+ethics&x=0&y=0

Quote:

“The possible danger to life of weapons systems and whether it might be increased or reduced by a new system being developed is no addressed in any meaningful way by the PAPA issues.”
Learning Expectations:

1. To know what is PAPA
2. To know why incomplete code of ethics are worse than none at all.
3. To know its environmental impact.
4. To know the difference between teleworking and telecommunicating.
5. To know the incomplete moral codes.

Review:

Condemnation of moral act may be so highly distorted as to be absurd, or highly immoral act may not be condemned at all, because the impacts that cause it to be considered immoral do not fit within the PAPA formulation. Not all important moral issues in information technology can be put under the PAPA headings.

The information age puts new emphasis on some parts of many older moral questions. The moral issues surrounding the development of weaponry are thus a few of the very many possible examples of how an older moral question can take on a new light as technology changes.

Privacy and Accuracy of computer data and information issues essentially unrelated to the environmental impacts of computing. Property issues in computing will have two tangential relationships to the environment: the cost of software that respects legal intellectual property rights, being a significant portion of the cost of computing tends to inhibit the increasing use of computers. But the possibility of a return on development costs induces software developers to produce software’s that requires computers with ever greater computing power, causing users to upgrade hardware far more frequently than wear and tear would require.

Invasion of privacy could enable criminals to build up a profile of where certain people live and work. Matching data sets in this way could enable the criminals to tell which houses will remain unoccupied during the working day and thus could be burgled with little chance of detection. Inaccurate data can lead to denials of credit that prevent participation in mainstream society in the developed world, or worse to false arrest on very serious changes.
Learning’s/Insights:

• Definition of PAPA
• Weapons or the question of whether the technology for use in weapons systems ought to be developed
• Environmental impact of these systems
• Teleworking
• Telecommuting
• Protecting the weak against the strong
• Importance of the PAPA issues
• The pressures to look for loopholes on codes
• Incomplete moral codes
• Complete moral codes
• Avoiding accidental incomplete moral codes

Integrative Questions:

1. Why is there a need to complete the moral codes?
2. What is PAPA?
3. What is Teleworking and Telecommunicating?
4. What is the importance of PAPA issues?
5. Why is that moral codes are incomplete?