ETHICOMP

III ETHICOMP LATINOAMÉRICA - ETH -

XIX Congreso Argentino de Ciencias de la Computación - CACIC 2013 : Octubre 2013, Mar del Plata, Argentina : organizadores : Red de Universidades con Carreras en Informática RedUNCI, Universidad CAECE / Armando De Giusti ... [et.al.] ; compilado por Jorge Finochietto ; ilustrado por María Florencia Scolari. - 1a ed. - Mar del Plata : Fundación de Altos Estudios en Ciencias Exactas, 2013.

E-Book.

ISBN 978-987-23963-1-2 1. Ciencias de la Computación. I. De Giusti, Armando II. Finochietto, Jorge, comp. III. Scolari, María Florencia, ilus.

CDD 005.3 Fecha de catalogación: 03/10/2013

AUTORIDADES DE LA REDUNCI Coordinador Titular De Giusti Armando (UNLP) 2012-2014 Coordinador Alterno Simari Guillermo (UNS) 2012-2014 Junta Directiva Feierherd Guillermo (UNTF) 2012-2014 Padovani Hugo (UM) 2012-2014 Estayno Marcelo (UNLZ) 2012-2014 Esquivel Susana (UNSL) 2012-2014 Alfonso Hugo (UNLaPampa) 2012-2013 Acosta Nelson (UNCPBA) 2012-2013 Finochietto, Jorge (UCAECE) 2012-2013 Kuna Horacio (UNMisiones) 2012-2013 Secretarias Secretaría Administrativa: Ardenghi Jorge (UNS) Secretaría Académica: Spositto Osvaldo (UNLaMatanza) Secretaría de Congresos, Publicaciones y Difusión: Pesado Patricia (UNLP) Secretaría de Asuntos Reglamentarios: Bursztyn Andrés (UTN)

AUTORIDADES DE LA UNIVERSIDAD CAECE Rector Dr. Edgardo Bosch Vicerrector Académico Dr. Carlos A. Lac Prugent Vicerrector de Gestión y Desarrollo Educativo Dr. Leonardo Gargiulo Vicerrector de Gestión Administrativa Mg. Fernando del Campo Vicerrectora de la Subsede Mar del Plata: Mg. Lic. María Alejandra Cormons Secretaria Académica: Lic. Mariana A. Ortega Secretario Académico de la Subsede Mar del Plata Esp. Lic. Jorge Finochietto Director de Gestión Institucional de la Subsede Mar del Plata Esp. Lic. Gustavo Bacigalupo Coordinador de Carreras de Lic. e Ing. en Sistemas Esp. Lic. Jorge Finochietto

COMITÉ ORGANIZADOR LOCAL Presidente Esp. Lic. Jorge Finochietto Miembros Esp. Lic. Gustavo Bacigalupo Mg. Lic. Lucia Malbernat Lic. Analía Varela Lic. Florencia Scolari C.C. María Isabel Meijome CP Mayra Fullana Lic. Cecilia Pellerini Lic. Juan Pablo Vives Lic. Luciano Wehrli

Escuela Internacional de Informática (EII) Directora Dra. Alicia Mon Coordinación CC. María Isabel Meijome

comité académico Universidad

Representante

Universidad de Buenos Aires

Echeverria, Adriana (Ingeniería) – Fernández

Universidad Nacional de La Plata

Slezak, Diego (Cs. Exactas)

Universidad Nacional del Sur

De Giusti, Armando

Universidad Nacional de San Luis

Simari, Guillermo

Universidad Nacional del Centro de la

Esquivel, Susana

Provincia de Buenos Aires

Acosta, Nelson

Universidad Nacional del Comahue

Vaucheret, Claudio

Universidad Nacional de La Matanza

Spositto, Osvaldo

Universidad Nacional de La Pampa

Alfonso, Hugo

Universidad Nacional Lomas de Zamora

Estayno, Marcelo

Universidad Nacional de Tierra del Fuego

Feierherd, Guillermo

Universidad Nacional de Salta

Gil, Gustavo

Universidad Nacional Patagonia Austral

Márquez, María Eugenia

Universidad Tecnológica Nacional

Leone, Horacio

Universidad Nacional de San Juan

Otazú, Alejandra

Universidad Autónoma de Entre Ríos

Aranguren, Silvia

Universidad Nacional Patagonia San Juan

Buckle, Carlos

Bosco Universidad Nacional de Entre Ríos

Tugnarelli, Mónica

Universidad Nacional del Nordeste

Dapozo, Gladys

Universidad Nacional de Rosario

Kantor, Raúl

Universidad Nacional de Misiones

Kuna, Horacio

Universidad Nacional del Noroeste de la

Russo, Claudia

Provincia de Buenos Aires Universidad Nacional de Chilecito

Carmona, Fernanda

Universidad Nacional de Lanús

García Martínez, Ramón

comité académico Universidad

Representante

Universidad Nacional de Santiago del Estero

Durán, Elena

Escuela Superior del Ejército

Castro Lechstaler Antonio

Universidad Nacional del Litoral

Loyarte, Horacio

Universidad Nacional de Rio Cuarto

Arroyo, Marcelo

Universidad Nacional de Córdoba

Brandán Briones, Laura

Universidad Nacional de Jujuy

Paganini, José

Universidad Nacional de Río Negro

Vivas, Luis

Universidad Nacional de Villa María

Prato, Laura

Universidad Nacional de Luján

Scucimarri, Jorge

Universidad Nacional de Catamarca

Barrera, María Alejandra

Universidad Nacional de La Rioja

Nadal, Claudio

Universidad Nacional de Tres de Febrero

Cataldi, Zulma

Universidad Nacional de Tucumán

Luccioni, Griselda

Universidad Nacional Arturo Jauretche

Morales, Martín

Universidad Nacional del Chaco Austral

Zachman, Patricia

Universidad de Morón

Padovani, Hugo René

Universidad Abierta Interamericana

De Vincenzi, Marcelo

Universidad de Belgrano

Guerci, Alberto

Universidad Kennedy

Foti, Antonio

Universidad Adventista del Plata

Bournissen, Juan

Universidad CAECE

Finochietto, Jorge

Universidad de Palermo

Ditada, Esteban

Universidad Católica Argentina - Rosario

Grieco, Sebastián

Universidad del Salvador

Zanitti, Marcelo

Universidad del Aconcagua

Gimenez, Rosana

Universidad Gastón Dachary

Belloni, Edgardo

Universidad del CEMA

Guglianone, Ariadna

Universidad Austral

Robiolo, Gabriela

comité científico Coordinación Armando De Giusti (UNLP) - Guillermo Simari (UNS) Abásolo, María José (Argentina) Acosta, Nelson (Argentina) Aguirre Jorge Ramió (España) Alfonso, Hugo (Argentina) Ardenghi, Jorge (Argentina) Baldasarri Sandra (España) Balladini, Javier (Argentina) Bertone, Rodolfo (Argentina) Bría, Oscar (Argentina) Brisaboa, Nieves (España) Bursztyn, Andrés (Argentina) Cañas, Alberto (EE.UU) Casali, Ana (Argentina) Castro Lechtaller, Antonio (Argentina) Castro, Silvia (Argentina) Cechich, Alejandra (Argentina) Coello Coello, Carlos (México) Constantini, Roberto (Argentina) Dapozo, Gladys (Argentina) De Vicenzi, Marcelo (Argentina) Deco, Claudia (Argentina) Depetris, Beatriz (Argentina) Diaz, Javier (Argentina) Dix, Juerguen (Alemania) Doallo, Ramón (España) Docampo, Domingo Echaiz, Javier (Argentina) Esquivel, Susana (Argentina) Estayno, Marcelo (Argentina) Estevez, Elsa (Naciones Unidas) Falappa, Marcelo (Argentina) Feierherd, Guillermo (Argentina) Ferreti, Edgardo (Argentina) Fillottrani, Pablo (Argentina) Fleischman, William (EEUU) García Garino, Carlos (Argentina) García Villalba, Javier (España) Género, Marcela (España) Giacomantone, Javier (Argentina) Gómez, Sergio (Argentina) Guerrero, Roberto (Argentina) Henning Gabriela (Argentina)

Janowski, Tomasz (Naciones Unidas) Kantor, Raul (Argentina) Kuna, Horacio (Argentina) Lanzarini, Laura (Argentina) Leguizamón, Guillermo (Argentina) Loui, Ronald Prescott (EEUU) Luque, Emilio (España) Madoz, Cristina (Argentina) Malbran, Maria (Argentina) Malverti, Alejandra (Argentina) Manresa-Yee, Cristina (España) Marín, Mauricio (Chile) Motz, Regina (Uruguay) Naiouf, Marcelo (Argentina) Navarro Martín, Antonio (España) Olivas Varela, José Ángel (España) Orozco Javier (Argentina) Padovani, Hugo (Argentina) Pardo, Álvaro (Uruguay) Pesado, Patricia (Argentina) Piattini, Mario (España) Piccoli, María Fabiana (Argentina) Printista, Marcela (Argentina) Ramón, Hugo (Argentina) Reyes, Nora (Argentina) Riesco, Daniel (Argentina) Rodríguez, Ricardo (Argentina) Roig Vila, Rosabel (España) Rossi, Gustavo (Argentina) Rosso, Paolo (España) Rueda, Sonia (Argentina) Sanz, Cecilia (Argentina) Spositto, Osvaldo (Argentina) Steinmetz, Ralf (Alemania) Suppi, Remo (España) Tarouco, Liane (Brasil) Tirado, Francisco (España) Vendrell, Eduardo (España) Vénere, Marcelo (Argentina) Villagarcia Wanza, Horacio (Arg.) Zamarro, José Miguel (España)

III ETHICOMP Latinoamérica - ETH -

ID

Trabajo

Autores

5711

Una conversación con Matthew Sher sobre privacidad y la amistad

Maria Beatriz García (UNLP), William M. Fleischman, (Villanova University, USA), Joaquin Bogado (UNLP)

5705

Complexity is Free, but at What Cost? A Survey of the Current Uses of 3D Printers and the Ethical Concerns that Will Arise from Their Continued Use

Kelly Gremban (Villanova University, USA)

5853

Greedy for Green: The Motivations and Hindrances of Maintaining Environmental Sustainability in the Commercial Industry of Cloud Computing

Bradley S. Cantor (Villanova University, USA)

5685

Why We Should Not Build Autonomous Robotic Weapons

William M. Fleischman (Villanova University, USA)

Una conversación con Matthew Sher sobre privacidad y la amistad María Beatriz García Psicoanalista mariabeatriz.garcia @ gmail.com William M. Fleischman Departments of Computing Sciences and Mathematical Sciences Villanova University Villanova, Pennsylvania 19085, U. S. A. william.fleischman@villanova.edu Joaquín Bogado LINTI – UNLP jbogado@linti.unlp.edu.ar

Abstract: El siguiente trabajo indaga en la importancia de la privacidad para la dignidad humana desde dos miradas esenciales al tema: ética y psicológica, teniendo cuenta la privacidad en las redes sociales y el comportamiento de la generación del milenio según el artículo de Matthew Sher al respecto.

Partiendo de la necesidad y la valoración de la de privacidad se va desarrollando su conceptualización a la luz de la Etica Nicomaquea, su lugar en la estructuración del psiquismo y su impronta en la actualidad, donde parece estar amenazada por las nuevas tecnologías y el uso de las redes sociales por los jóvenes de la hipermodernidad.

Keywords: Privacidad, Amistad, Redes sociales, la Ética Nicomaquéa, la Ética en relación con la informática

1 Introducción En un perspicaz artículo presentado al workshop II ETHICOMP Latinoamérica en 2012, Matthew Sher se examinó la facilidad con la que la generación del milenio ha adoptado los medios sociales y la tecnología de la internet. [1] Habló de la comodidad que sienten los jóvenes en la negociación de las políticas de privacidad de Facebook, Google y otros medios de comunicación social, la conciencia de las

1643

vulnerabilidades asociadas con la pérdida de la privacidad y su decisión en gran parte consciente de compartir información personal a cambio de los beneficios percibidos de la autoexpresión y la actividad comercial. Sher se refirió a las afirmaciones del CEO de Facebook Mark Zuckerberg en el sentido de que “la edad de privacidad ha terminado” y que “las personas realmente han logrado sentirse cómodas no sólo con compartir más información de diferentes clases, sino también mas abiertamente y con más gente. Esa norma social es algo que ha evolucionado con el tiempo.”

Una de las consecuencias inquietantes de esta tendencia es que reduce el concepto de privacidad a una mercancía que puede canjearse por acceso comercial y estima personal. De hecho, en un artículo recién publicado sobre la privacidad y la ley, Benjamin Wittes explora “la posibilidad que el avance de la tecnología y la proliferación de datos personales en manos de terceros nos ha dejado con un debate conceptualmente anticuado, cuya dependencia del concepto la privacidad no resulta en una guía útil en las cuestiones de política pública que enfrentamos”. [2].

En este trabajo, queremos rehabilitar la importancia del valor de la privacidad y, dibujando las conexiones al concepto de la amistad, señalar ciertos daños asociados con el comercio libre y no reflexivo de la información privada y personal.

2 ¿Por qué necesitamos y valoramos la intimidad?

Según el análisis cuidadoso de Ruth Gavison [3], privacidad tiene un papel importante en la promoción de valores como la libertad, autonomía, autenticidad y salud mental que consideramos esenciales para llevar una vida productiva y satisfactoria. Podemos enumerar algunas de estas funciones: • Es un espacio libre de distracción para que nos podamos concentrarnos en nuestros propios pensamientos • Es un espacio en el cual podemos explorar, de manera provisional, ideas y posibilidades sensibles • Es un espacio para el desarrollo de las relaciones íntimas • Es un espacio libre de la presión y la influencia de los demás, por ejemplo o Gobiernos que deseen dirigir o inhibir nuestra capacidad de organizarse políticamente o Aquellos en una posición de autoridad en cuanto a nuestro trabajo y actividades profesionales o Los padres y otros miembros de la familia para que seamos capaces de desarrollar nuestra propia identidad auténtica Edward Bloustein afirma que en el caso extremo de la pérdida de privacidad, “El hombre que se ve obligado a vivir cada minuto de su vida, entre otros, y que cada una de las necesidades, el pensamiento, el deseo, la fantasía o la gratificación está sometida al escrutinio público, ha sido privado de su individualidad y dignidad humana. Tal individuo se fusiona con la masa. Sus opiniones, siendo públicas, nunca tienden a ser diferentes; sus aspiraciones, siendo conocidas, siempre tienden a ser convencionalmente aceptables; sus sentimientos, siendo exhibidos abiertamente, tienden a perder su calidad de ardor personal único y convertirse en los sentimientos de cada uno. Tal ser, aunque inteligente, es fungible; no es un individuo.” [4].

1644

¿Cuáles son los impedimentos para el ejercicio saludable de privacidad? En primer lugar, podemos destacar el constante canto de sirena del correo electrónico y los medios de comunicación social. Además podemos subrayar el impulso a usar estos medios para exponer incluso los más íntimos pensamientos y actos.

La felicidad es la respuesta a la cuestión de la finalidad de la vida humana. Los avances científicos y tecnológicos actuales no siempre se nos presentan como progreso pero sin duda apuntan conscientemente al “bien-estar”, avatar de la felicidad reducida a los bienes que cada uno posee. En la sociedad actual tenemos, por un lado, la profusión de los objetos de las tecno-ciencias incidiendo sobre los modos de goce de la familia, aunque más no sea por la influencia que tiene el reparto para el uso de los “gadgets” que se ponen en juego en su vida cotidiana. Por otro, encontramos el ámbito de lo público donde, entre otros fenómenos, se observa un empuje a decirlo todo, a contar todo en todas partes, a ver y ser visto, y especialmente en los medios de comunicación que vuelven todo mercancía. A traves de ellos, hoy la vida privada con sus modos de goce, intenta hacerse pública.Se trata de la promoción de un espectáculo donde la relación social entre personas queda mediatizada por la imagen, pero también del ejercicio de una violencia que implica el asesinato de la singularidad del sujeto, puesto que, capturado por un espectáculo al estilo de los reality shows, en apariencia participa de algo que parece muy subjetivo, pero en verdad queda reducido a una simple imagen.La mirada promovida es una mirada sin vergüenza, una mirada que no se erige en una instancia que juzga, sino que se reduce a otro que también goza. Es la época de la transparencia donde no existe lo invisible. La “era de la privacidad” ha terminado, según declara el fundador de Facebook. Por otro lado también parecen desfallecer los secretos: Julian Assange dijo que también había terminado el tiempo de los secretos de Estado.

3 Sobre la vida privada Comenzamos por valernos del equívoco que introduce este título, poniendo en consideración sus dos acepciones posibles. Nuestro término “privado” procede del latín. Y en esta lengua “privatus” es el simple ciudadano particular en su calidad de tal: mientras que la “privatio” tiene el sentido, que resuena a veces en algunos usos de nuestra palabra, de la carencia.

Si queremos plantear soluciones a los problemas a los que nos enfretamos hoy día, deberíamos volver a los puntos centrales de las teorías éticas clásicas, que han quedado olvidados en las teorias políticas y morales actuales. La concepción como esferas separadas de lo público y lo privado no siempre ha existido, sino que ha evolucionado a lo largo de la historia, en la mente de los teóricos, así como en la conciencia de los ciudadanos. Separar tajantemente lo público y lo privado como en la actualidad parece inevitable, supone un error de base.

Entonces cabría preguntarse: ¿Hay algo en la filosofía aristotélica equiparable a nuestra comprensión de la privacidad?

1645

4 Un retorno a Aristóteles En la Etica Nicomaquea y en la Política de Aristóteles [5], las relaciones humanas y la eticidad del Estado son cuestiones relevantes. En nuestra sociedad individualista y fragmentaria parece haberse olvidado lo que ya Aristóteles afirmaba: que el hombre es un animal que sólo puede vivir relacionándose con los demás.

En la Grecia Clásica se entendía por “público” a todo lo relacionado con la polis: tanto el individuo en su condición de ciudadano, de extranjero, de exiliado; como todo lo que tiene que ver con el gobierno común y la preocupación por los asuntos políticos;el sistema de las instituciones,así como las leyes y las normas relativas al ciudadano. Es este ámbito así entendido un reino de la igualdad.

Por privado, en cambio, entendían todo lo concerniente al individuo en el terreno doméstico: el ser humano en sus relaciones con otros individuos; en sus roles de esposo, esposa, padre, madre, hijo; pero también todo lo que tiene que ver con las posesiones privadas, los intereses, necesidades, aspiraciones, deseos y derechos de los individuos en el oikos. Ambito este, entonces, de la desigualdad y la diversidad.

También era éste el ámbito de lo íntimo.

La comprensión de la relación que hay entre la filosofía práctica y teórica en el conjunto del cuerpo filosofal aristotélico es lo que nos permitirá entender el sentido de la relación entre lo público y lo privado, entre la ética y la política.

Siendo la naturaleza humana la materia prima sobre la que deben fundarse las reglas éticas y políticas, será necesario visualizar la teoría del hombre que tiene el Estagirita; concepción que marcará las teorías ético-politicas.

Como es bien sabido, es precisamente el logos el rasgo definitorio del hombre aristotélico, lo que hace aparecer la posibilidad de la comunicación entre los hombres y la posibilidad de no conformarnos con el simple vivir y ,por tanto, la necesidad de la política.

La razón de ser del mundo y del hombre aristotélico atiende a un telos que está definido de modo natural, fin al que debemos acercarnos para perfeccionarnos y cumplir así nuestra función específica de hombres. Esta función, que Aristóteles llamará Bien, es una función o trabajo que se presenta en tanto el hombre no es sólo logos, sino un compuesto de logos y deseos. Pero, lo que realmente condiciona la ética y la política es que lo determinante en el hombre es su logos que hace de él un ser relacional que no puede vivir en soledad. Esto lleva inevitablemente a atender la convivencia, la comunicación y hacer de la ética y la política un cuerpo unido, soldado.

La búsqueda del Bien conllevan dos caminos distintos pero complementarios: por un lado el hombre busca su eudaimonia desde su automovimiento, siendo él mismo quien le da intencionalidad a dicho movimiento. Este camino será estudiado por la ética. Por otro lado, el hombre puede y debe buscar su felicidad en conjunción con los otros hombres, aunando principios comunes voluntarios. Movimiento común que será estudiado por la política.

Desde el comienzo de la historia, los hombres han luchado, empírica o intelectualmente, frente a la coacción para mantener o ganar su libertad. En la política actual éste sigue siendo un problema recurrente. Lo público y lo privado tienen así una relación estrecha con la libertad y dependiendo de cual sea nuestra

1646

concepción del par público-privado y de la valoración que de uno u otro hagamos, así daremos lugar de una u otra manera a la libertad y así la defenderemos. Y viceversa: nuestra concepción de la libertad dará valor a uno u a otro aspecto de nuestra vida, al público o al privado.

Podemos entender estos conceptos de modos diversos, así como referirnos a ellos con distintos nombres, pero no hay duda de que son nociones que guían y han guiado las reflexiones políticas y éticas de todos los tiempos. Pueden aparecer con el nombre de poder frente a la conciencia, de lo oficial frente a la resistencia individual o como la ley frente a la voluntad individual, como el Estado frente a la persona, la casa frente a la ciudad, el poder público frente a los derechos individuales, la solidaridad frente al individualismo o como se nos presenta en el mundo moderno: el hombre público frente al sujeto privado.

Tampoco hay dudas que los conceptos de público y privado son categorías que aparecieron en la cultura griega clásica, polaridad que está presente ya en la literatura griega antigua, explícitamente en la Odisea, pero que fue más elaborada en el período democrático de la Atenas clásica.

Es importante recalcar que esta polaridad no significaba en el mundo griego una separación de esferas. En la vida de la polis la realidad es una estrecha relación entre lo público y lo privado, y si bien es cierto que podían entrar en conflicto, es, precisamente, la reciprocidad de ambas lo que permitía que la vida privada del hombre y la vida pública o de la polis, fueran ambas civilizadas y humanas; pues, los actos y las decisiones de uno y otro ámbito no estaban aisladas de sus consecuencias en el ámbito contrario.

Es la polis con sus leyes la condición de posibilidad de la vida privada del individuo, siendo el hombre comúnmente aceptado en la cultura griega como un ser que tiende a la comunidad, no sólo por interés propio, sino también por naturaleza o necesidad. Y aún más, porque ambos, polis e individuo, comparten unos fines comunes.

Hoy dia hemos convertido en necesaria y evidente una separación que no tenía cabida en el mundo aristotélico.

En las sociedades actuales, modernas,hemos pasado a una forma de democracia representativa en la que esperamos participar lo menos posible en los asuntos públicos para tener más tiempo libre para nuestros asuntos privados. Nos hemos olvidado de la concepción del hombre aristotélico donde sólo es tal en tanto se vive en comunidad, en una comunidad bien organizada, una comunidad bajo la ley, expresión de la justa razón. Para un griego del siglo IV, obrar según la ley era obrar según la razón. El ciudadano griego se identifica con esas leyes porque sabe perfectamente que sin leyes no hay libertad posible: volvería a la tiranía o a la oligarquía. Las leyes son entonces el garante de su autonomía, no un obstáculo a su vida privada. La libertad individual se afirmaba en el tomar parte en el poder colectivo.

Tras la aceptación general de que la libertad pública y la libertad privada no son sólo diferentes sino opuestas y excluyentes una de otra, ha queda eclipsada la concepción misma de la democracia ateniense. Es notable que nosotros ya no podamos disfrutar de la libertad de los antiguos, las razones son sobre todo nuestra concepción de lo público y lo privado.

1647

Para nosotros lo público ha dejado de ser garante de nuestra vida privada; la política está divorciada de la ética y sin duda, las leyes han dejado de ser expresión de la pura razón. No es el bien común, sino el interés privado, lo que prima y ambos son entendidos como incompatibles. La tan mentada globalización nos ha hecho perder la conciencia de pertenecer a una comunidad, como vivenciaba el hombre de la Grecia Clásica.

Esas son las verdaderas razones de que no seamos capaces de disfrutar de la libertad antigua.

5 Esencial-mente privados Se denomina razón a la introducción de un orden de determinaciones en la existencia humana, en el orden del sentido. El descubrimiento de Freud es el re-descubrimiento, en un terreno virgen, de la razón.

Ese terreno virgen que, ya está presente en la Etica aristotélica y que corresponde a la parte “irracional” del alma humana, Freud la denomina y sistematiza como Lo Inconsciente. Es lo más íntimo, lo más privado y a la vez lo más ajeno a nosotros mismos. Es esa intimidad que nos es éxtima, desconocida al yo de la conciencia.

El término “mente” se ha equiparado al término “psique” y desde Aristóteles a nuestros días son inumerables las corrientes que han tratado de explicar el funcionamiento psíquico.

Pasar del campo de la Filosofía al campo de la Psicología implica dar un salto cualitativo. Si como pudimos ver es la ética y la política en el mundo clásico lo que nos permite, localizando al ciudadano, articular en un sentido los conceptos de lo privado y lo público; será, lo privado como acepción en el sentido de “carencia”, de “falta”, lo que nos permitirá articular lo que del psiquismo está en juego en el fenómeno que nos interpela: la aparente despreocupación de los sujetos modernos por el cuidado de su privacidad. Despreocupación que parecería reflejarse en su máxima expresión en las denominadas redes sociales. Pasamos así de la consideración de lo público y lo privado en una esfera que podríamos decir de una realidad general a una realidad particular, subjetiva…

No hay “realidad”, para el ser humano, en el sentido de una experiencia inmediata o no mediada. Esta mediación el hombre la lleva a cabo a través de su psiquis. Hay una realidad externa y una realidad interna. Mundo interno,yoico,que le permitirá captar, interpretar y relacionarse con la realidad externa. La noción de realidad está articulada mediante la significación, el mundo simbólico del sujeto y la esquematización característica de las imágenes que constituyen su mundo imaginario.

Mundo interno, acaso, máxima expresión de lo privado. Privatio, privado, carente… falta, constitutiva y constituyente del sujeto. Falta que en el psiquismo se da en tres registros: imaginario, simbólico y real, estructura triádica borromea del ser.

El sujeto del Inconsciente no es un sujeto dado sino que es un sujeto que se estructura. La función que para el hombre desempeña la imagen de su propio cuerpo es fundamental en la estructuración psíquica. La imagen especular, imagen virtual, es constitutiva del Yo, es su reflejo, su imagen anticipada, lo que constituirá su ser (registro imaginario). Relación muy estrecha con la superficie del cuerpo en tanto

1648

reflejada en una forma. No se trata de la superficie sensible, sensorial, sino de esa superficie en tanto está reflejada en una forma. La imagen de la forma del otro es asumida por el sujeto.

La imagen estará siempre presente en las diferentes etapas del sujeto. La veremos aparecer ya sea como velo, como pantalla que muestra, que vela la falta, ya sea como espectáculo que llama a ver, o como producción artística, provocando la mirada….la imagen como respuesta al vacío, a la falta. Ser de semblante, “identificación imaginaria”: lo que estaba afuera se convierte en el adentro.

El hombre se aprehende como cuerpo, como forma vacía del cuerpo, en un movimiento de báscula, de intercambio con el otro. Aprenderá a reconocer invertido en el otro todo lo que en él está entonces en estado de puro deseo, deseo originario, inconstituído y confuso, deseo que se expresa en el gemido o llanto del recién nacido.

Aprenderá cuando se ponga en juego la comunicación. Esta anterioridad no es cronológica sino lógica. Antes que el deseo aprenda a reconocerse por el símbolo, sólo es visto en el otro. En el origen, antes del lenguaje, el deseo sólo existe proyectado, alienado en el otro. La tensión que produce no tiene salida….más que la destrucción del otro.

Ahora bien, ¿qué significa decir “yo”?. ¿Significa acaso lo mismo que capturarse siendo en una imagen especular?

Hay en francés pero no en castellano dos modos del pronombre de primera personal del singular, que dan cuenta de la incidencia del lenguaje en la estructuración psíquica: “moi” y “je.”

Yo (Je) es un término verbal cuyo empleo es aprehendido en una cierta referencia al otro, referencia que es una referencia hablada. El Yo (Je) nace en referencia al Tú, en una relación donde el otro le manifiesta órdenes, deseos, que él debe reconocer. El sujeto está entonces en el mundo del símbolo, es decir en un mundo de otros que hablan. Su deseo puede ser dicho, puede pasar entonces por la mediación del reconocimiento. El grito se convierte en llamada, estructura de discurso que precipita el lazo social. La inscripción del sujeto en el orden simbólico es la posibilidad misma de la pacificación de la agresividad emanada de lo imaginario.

Mundo simbólico que garantiza un ordenamiento en la relación al otro.

Esta es la vía por donde el niño aprende el orden simbólico y accede a su fundamento: la ley. Ley que impone un límite a través de una prohibición que inscribe una falta estructural en el psiquismo. “Falta en ser” que instituye un lugar para el sujeto.

Dijimos que en el ser humano la realidad no es aprehendida de manera inmediata y debemos agregar que tampoco es posible un dominio pleno de la realidad, algo se escapa, volviendo siempre al mismo lugar. Hay algo de “imposible” en la realidad para el ser humano. Ese imposible es lo Real, lo que no puede ser simbolizado.

Siempre hay algo de impensable…avance de la ciencia tapando el agujero de lo Real, falla imposible de tapar. Impotencia del conocimiento que hoy muestra más que nunca, a pesar de los logros de la ciencia y la tecnología, ese Real, la felicidad, imposible de atrapar.

1649

6 De la Philía Aristotélica a los amigos del Face…

El preámbulo de la Declaración Universal de los Derechos Humanos, proclamada por las Naciones Unidas, considera que “la libertad, la justicia y la paz en el mundo tienen por base el reconocimiento de la dignidad intrínseca y de los derechos iguales e inalienables de todos los miembros de la familia humana”; y en su artículo 12 deja expresamente plasmada la privacidad como uno de los derechos inalienables relacionados con la dignidad humana: “Nadie será objeto de injerencias arbitrarias en su vida privada, su familia, su domicilio o su correspondencia, ni de ataques a su honra o a su reputación. Toda persona tiene derecho a la protección de la ley contra tales injerencias o ataques.”

En el artículo de Sher [1], se puntualiza que “The decision to share information online is a conscious choice, and most Millennials understand the tradeoff that comes with connectivity. In an April 2010 Harris poll , 85% of the surveyed Millennials acknowledged that, by participating in social media, they are giving up part of their privacy.” Más adelante agrega, “…In spite of their awareness, Millennials apparently hold that the benefits of social media greatly outweigh the privacy risks that come with it.”

En el estudio “Los adolescentes y las redes sociales”[7], se consigna que lo que más valoran los jóvenes de sí mismos es su grado de popularidad... y qué necesita un adolescente para ser popular?... “amigos, humor y espontaneidad” es lo que respondieron a esta encuesta 3500 alumnos de escuelas secundarias de Argentina.

Este mismo estudio en referencia a los riesgos en las redes sociales reflejó datos interesantes: 95% no cree en los riesgos de internet, 90% se siente inmune frente a lo que puedan encontrar, 75% cree en todo lo que dice la Red, 60% cree que sólo amigos ven su página personal y el 90% dice que en su casa no hay reglas de uso de la Internet. En sus propias palabras, dicen: “los riesgos son manejables”, “me tengo confianza, soy hábil con la tecnología”, “es más importante conocer gente, que pensar en los riesgos”, “me gusta abrir mi página para que la vean todos”, “no me imagino qué riesgos pueda tener estar en una red social”, “la red social es la responsable de los riesgos y los tiene controlados. Tanto lo que consigna Sher en su artículo como lo reflejado por este estudio, marcan que los jóvenes sostienen que los beneficios de estar conectados a las redes sociales son mayores que sus posibles riesgos.

Virtualidad no es un término que pertenezca al campo conceptual del psicoanálisis ni tampoco al de la ética clásica, sin embargo, tanto un enfoque como el otro, nos pueden ayudar a comprender el por qué aquello de lo que se trata, está cada vez más omnipresente en el mundo, cambiando, perforando, subvertiendo?...conceptos como el de la privacidad, tan insoslayable cuando de la dignidad humana se trata.

Si en Etica Nicomaquéa, Aristóteles se ve llevado a dedicarle dos libros enteros al tema de la amistad, hemos de pensar que tamaño tratamiento, por sobre reflexiones éticas como la felicidad, la virtud, el placer, la justicia, no es algo azaroso.

Responde a la convicción aristotélica de que la amistad es algo especialmente valioso, diríamos que algo único, en la vida de los seres humanos. La amistad, en efecto, no es un aliciente más, entre otros, para una vida feliz: es --en palabras del propio Aristóteles-- “lo más necesario para la vida”, lo más necesario para una vida

1650

feliz. Por eso, dice Aristóteles, “nadie querría vivir sin amigos, aun estando en posesión de todos los otros bienes.”

En definitiva, puesto que el ser humano es un animal social, que naturalmente tiende a la convivencia con otros seres humanos, la amistad constituye la realización más plena de la sociabilidad y la forma más satisfactoria de convivencia.

Amistad se dice en griego philía, palabra de la misma raíz que el verbo phileîn, que significa “querer”. En griego, philía abarca todo tipo de relación o de comunidad basado en lazos de afecto, de cariño o amor, y de ahí que Aristóteles incluya, bajo esta denominación, relaciones tan dispares como el cariño entre padres e hijos, la relación apasionada entre amantes, la concordia civil entre conciudadanos, y la relación que nosotros consideramos más estrictamente como amistad.

Dos perspectivas sigue Aristóteles en el tratamiento del tema de la amistad : los distintos tipo de amistad y la amistad perfecta. En la primera línea de pensamiento, Aristóteles convencido de que la diversidad de opiniones es siempre una muestra de la complejidad del tema a tratar, desarrolla el hecho incuestionable de que existen opiniones muy diversas y contrapuestas acerca de la amistad.

No obstante las distintas opiniones Aristóteles encuentra que hay un núcleo común significativo en las distintas nociones de amistad. En primer lugar, la amistad se define por el querer, por el afecto. Ahora bien, no toda forma de querer es propiamente amistad. En efecto, la amistad exige un querer mutuo, recíproco y, además, que sea conocido y reconocido por ambos, por ambas partes. Si el querer no es recíproco, o si una o las dos partes desconocen la reciprocidad de su querer, no cabe hablar de amistad en sentido estricto.

Teniendo en cuenta las diversidades del querer , Aristóteles reconoce tres formas o tipos de amistad: la amistad basada en la utilidad, la amistad basada en el placer y la amistad basada en el bien, es decir, en la virtud o excelencia de la persona a la cual se quiere. En las dos primeras formas de amistad no se quiere al amigo por sí mismo, sino accidentalmente, no se quiere al amigo por lo que es o por el que es, sino porque coincide que tal individuo nos resulta útil o placentero.

Ahora bien, Aristóteles reflexiona sobre la amistad desde una perspectiva ética, desde la perspectiva concerniente a la felicidad, a la vida buena, digna y satisfactoria.

Desde esta perspectiva, Aristóteles considera que las amistades basadas en la utilidad y en el placer son formas deficientes de amistad comparadas con la amistad basada en el bien, en la virtud, a la cual denomina amistad perfecta. En efecto, solamente en esta forma de amistad se da la benevolencia en sentido estricto, es decir, el querer al amigo y el querer el bien del amigo por él mismo, que es lo que define la auténtica amistad.

La amistad perfecta — por tanto, la amistad auténtica, la que merece tal nombre — es aquella que se basa en la excelencia, en la virtud, y en la cual el amigo es querido por sí mismo. Ahora bien, cabe preguntarse cuando Aristóteles dice que el amigo es querido por sí mismo, ¿qué entiende por “sí mismo”? ¿qué ha de entenderse que es el sí mismo del ser humano?

En un sentido el “sí mismo” de cada cual se manifiesta en el modo en que uno vive, en el modo en que uno realiza su propia existencia, en definitiva, en las acciones que uno lleva a cabo. Pero no en cualquier tipo de acciones, sino en las acciones o actos elegidos. Aristóteles distingue, en su ética, entre actos voluntarios y actos elegidos Actos voluntarios son aquellos que se realizan con conocimiento de lo

1651

que se está haciendo y sin coacción alguna externa que fuerce al individuo a su realización.

No toda acción voluntaria es, sin embargo, una acción elegida. La elección comporta conocimiento racional, comporta deliberación, y Aristóteles la caracteriza como “inteligencia deseosa, o bien, deseo inteligente”. La elección es el principio propiamente humano de la acción, es aquel principio de donde surgen las acciones verdaderamente humanas.

Lo cual significa que, en último término, cada cual es responsable de su propio carácter ya que éste resulta, en último término, de nuestras propias elecciones.

Como toda disposición ética, la amistad se refiere primariamente a la elección, en este caso a la elección adecuada de los amigos. Y la elección adecuada del amigo es la elección del amigo que es bueno, que es excelente. De este modo puede decir Aristóteles que “al querer al amigo quieren su propio bien, puesto que cuando alguien bueno se convierte en amigo querido, se convierte en un bien para aquél que lo quiere. De modo que uno y otro quieren su propio bien, y se recompensan recíprocamente por igual.” La tesis de Aristóteles es que el amor al amigo constituye una extensión del amor a sí mismo. Entonces el amigo “tiene para con el amigo la misma disposición que para consigo mismo.”

Llegado a este punto de la reflexión se impone una pregunta: ¿qué causará que, después de más de 2500 años, siga siendo la amistad algo tan imprescindible para el ser humano? Una respuesta posible llega del lado de lo ya dicho sobre la estructuración psíquica. Existe en el ser humano, más allá de las épocas, el deseo primordial de ser reconocido, porque sobre la base del reconocimiento es que se edifica toda nuestra subjetividad.

Una suma de identificaciones diversas servirá como base para la estructuración en el sujeto de la instancia psíquica llamada “Yo”, identificaciones basadas en imágenes virtuales creadas por cada sujeto. Es su reflejo, su imagen anticipada, lo que constituirá su ser…. Identificación que permitirá a un sujeto reconocerse siendo él mismo en la imagen especular . La investidura en la imagen virtual es el tiempo fundamental de la relación imaginaria, identificación narcisista que se plasma en registro simbólico en la cuestión que el sujeto dirige al Otro en término de pregunta: ¿ cómo quieres que sea?...¿Qué objeto debo ser para el Otro?....El deseo de un sujeto se instituye como deseo del Otro. El deseo se constituye entonces como el resto que queda de la tramitación de la necesidad por la demanda.

Es entonces en base a este proceso psíquico profundo, inconsciente, que cada quién asume su propia identidad. Proceso psíquico que se solidifica en la temprana juventud acompañando los cambios biológicos que metamorfosean la propia imagen infantil.

Se deduce entonces la importancia de la imagen en la estructuración psíquica de un sujeto. En la contemporaneidad, la imagen parece que viene a colmar un vacío existencial… ¿Será la época de la pérdida de sentido que provoca un vacío que se intenta llenar con imágenes?

Dos consecuencias parecen esenciales en relación a la existencia de la virtualidad.

Para delimitarlas podemos utilizar la topología del nudo borromeo, es decir, del anudamiento de los tres registros: imaginario, simbólico y real, donde lo real en tanto indecible es el lugar del sujeto, lo imaginario el lugar del cuerpo y lo simbólico el lugar del discurso. Pero la existencia de la virtualidad nos remiten sobre todo al

1652

desanudamiento del nudo. Prevalencia de lo imaginario sobre lo simbólico con apartamiento de lo real: aún cuando sabemos que la imagen es la representación de un objeto real, hoy podemos constatar que esa relación se ha invertido y que es el objeto el que se convierte en la representación de la imagen, que ordena y hasta instaura la realidad. Más aún la constituye a tal punto que la imagen puede trasformarse en la única realidad. Así la existencia de un sujeto puede quedar supeditada a las imágenes que de sí mismo suba al Facebook….”si no estás en Facebook, no existís.”

Sher [1] afirma que “A certain amount of public approval confers a boost in selfesteem and personal validation. 'Millennials are more visible on the Web,' reports Douglas MacMillan of Businessweek. 'Respondents aged 18 to 29 were the most likely to say they’d posted photos of themselves and other personal data for others to see on such Web sites as Facebook and MySpace'. Many Millennials live a significant part of their lives online, and to ask them to relinquish that way of life out of concern for their privacy would not only be unthinkable, but also detrimental to their concept of identity.”

Por otra parte, la prevalencia del registro real sobre el registro imaginario, quedando apartado el registro simbólico, produce cierta imposibilidad de cuestionamiento y dialectización. Ninguna pregunta puede plantearse, sólo gobierna la vida pulsional: mirar y ser mirado, ver y ser visto.

El desvanecimiento de la ley simbólica deja a los jóvenes sin brújula, viviendo como si no tuvieran que acomodarse a un Otro, como si este no existier. Lo simbólico está en crisis debilitando la ley…consecuencia de ello los excesos propios de la época, borramiento de un orden simbólico que lleva como marca también cierta indiferencia hacia la privacidad…

En este contexto, las múltiples,abigarradas e “imaginarias amistades” del Face se convierten, intentando colmar un vacío, en un nuevo e insospechado sentido que fuerza las fronteras poniendo en riesgo, acaso, valores inherentes a la dignidad humana como lo es la privacidad.

Aún suponiendo que estas amistades conservan lo esencial que marca Aristóteles de núcleo significativo: el querer, el lazo afectivo, eso se colorea de la modalidad de la época en que las nuevas tecnologías han modificado sustancialmente las nociones de espacio y tiempo: las demandas de amor y atención a los “amigos” se tienen con el imperativo de la inmediatez. Podemos decir que el chat, el mensajito, el facebook, reproducen en la época la condición de la carta de amor. Por supuesto que con la liquidez del amor contemporáneo, rasgo del amor contemporáneo que consuena con la liquidez, es la rapidez con la que se va.

Lazos sociales que privilegian la cantidad, como bien lo explicita Sher -“ They do not wish to restrict their social interactions to people in close proximity”.- , muchas veces en desmedro de la profundidad del vínculo; provocando conductas exhibicionistas y adictivas. “ As one Millennial blogger remarks, “getting a reaction from the masses – instead of from your couch buddy – can be more addictive than settling down for a real conversation with only one person” . In this respect, Millennials could be considered a socially exhibitionistic generation.”

Atentos a la importancia que encierra el reconocimiento del otro en la dinámica subjetiva y pretendiendo hacer de este trabajo un diálogo fructífero entre, posiblemente, dos generaciones, apelamos a la conciencia generacional como

1653

herramienta potente para convertir las diferencias entre generaciones en la base misma del propio reconocimiento.

7 Conclusiones En su artículo, Sher plantea un desafío a las generaciones mayores afirmando, “Millennials are involved with modern internet technology in a profound way. Their behaviors are, in a sense, the first significant result of the internet’s social effects.

Consequently, older generations fear that Millennials’ acceptance of online connectivity might lead to the end of online privacy, or more generally, a redefinition of privacy itself.” Más adelante agrega, “While their mentality may seem reckless from an outside perspective, Millennials have a different way of seeing the privacy issue. … It is precisely because Millennials rely so heavily on social media that many are so self-conscious regarding the information displayed about themselves. To preserve the integrity of their online identities, Millennials take advantage of built-in privacy controls regulate the visibility of their information.” [1] Si bien reconocemos la precisión de sus observaciones, sin embargo estamos preocupados por la tendencia de reducir las cuestiones relativas a la privacidad a un simple asunto de la regulación de comercio. En la medida en que las actitudes caracterizadas por Sher consiguen amplia aceptación, tememos que la hipótesis operativa será que son actitudes compartidos por todos, algo que puede tener consecuencias profundamente serias si se conduce a la revelación irreflexiva de información sensible acerca de un amigo o conocido. Estamos igualmente preocupados por la tendencia a devaluar el concepto de amistad ideal o perfecta en términos aristotélicos. Aunque reconocemos el gran valor de la posibilidad de conectar a las personas con una relación real que viven distantes uno del otro, aquí, también, la dinámica de las redes sociales parece presentar el peligro de reducir esta profunda relación a algo más parecido al comercio de información.

Bibliografía 1. Sher, Matthew, Millennial Dissonance: An Analysis of the Privacy Generational Gap. Proceeding de II ETHICOMP Latinoamérica, CACIC.2012, Bahía Blanca, Argentina 2. Wittes, Benjamin, Databuse: Digital Privacy and the Mosaic, accesible en línea en http://www.brookings.edu/research/papers/2011/04/01-databuse-wittes/ (2011) 3. Gavison, Ruth, Privacy and the Limits of the Law, “ Yale Law Journal, vol. 89 (19791980), pp. 421-471.

4. Bloustein, Edward J., “Privacy as an Aspect of Human Dignity,” in Philosophical Dimensions of Privacy: An Anthology, edited by Ferdinand Schoeman, Cambridge University Press, (1984), pp. 156-202 5. Aristóteles: Etica Nicomaquea. Ed. Porrúa. México, (1999) 6. Lacan, Jacques: Escritos I, Siglo XXI Ed. México, (1992) 7. Ministerio de Educación de la Nación Argentina. Los adolescentes y las redes sociales.

Septiembre 2010

1654

Complexity is Free, but at What Cost?

A Survey of the Current Uses of 3D Printers and the Ethical Concerns that Will Arise from Their Continued Use Kelly Gremban Department of Computing Sciences Villanova University Villanova, Pennsylvania 19085, U. S. A. kgremb01@villanova.edu

Abstract. As 3D printing becomes more widespread, ethical decisions must be made in regards to how the technology should be used. I discuss various ways 3D printers are currently being used, and how they may be used in the future.

Three ethical concerns are addressed: 1) intellectual property rights, 2) the printing of plastic firearms, and 3) the printing of living body parts.

Keywords: 3D printing, additive manufacturing, bioprinting, printable guns

1 Introduction 3D printers have been around for nearly three decades, but they are mostly used for commercial manufacturing and were made available to consumers only in recent years. As the technology becomes more versatile and affordable, it is increasingly apparent that 3D printing will be the next invention to revolutionize societies and economies worldwide. 3D printers can create everything from customizable prosthetic limbs that fit better than generic models for a fraction of the cost, to lifelike action figures, to replacement parts for out of production items. Theorists predict that they could “revamp the economics of manufacturing and revive ‌ industry as creativity and ingenuity replace labor costs as the main concern around a variety of goodsâ€? [1].

But with technology that promises more uses than can even be comprehended at this point, there are a lot of questions to be answered, such as whether 3D printers will positively or negatively affect society, and what limitations will or should be placed on their use.

This paper will first examine the promises of 3D printing technology to revolutionize the manufacturing industry and economy, and then address two ethical concerns that will come up as this technology advances: intellectual property infringement and the use of 3D printers to create ethically debatable items, such as body parts and firearms.

1655

2 A Brief Background 3D printing is revolutionary because it combines computer-generated ideas with effective and easy manufacturing to create products previously thought impossible.

To create with a 3D printer, the user starts with a Computer Aided Design (CAD) which is a digital model of the object. These can be made by creating the design through a CAD program or by using a 3D scanner to create a model of a real-life object [2]. The CAD software then slices the model into minute cross-sections that are fractions of a millimeter thick. The printer takes these cross-sections and applies them through a process called Additive Manufacturing (AM) in which each layer of material is deposited and fused with the layer below it [3]. Printers currently on the market are mostly restricted to printing with plastics, although larger industrial printers can work with metals. According to Hod Lipson of Cornell University, “any material you can squeeze, melt or generate into a powder, you can print” [4]. There are numerous unique variations on the typical plastic or metal printers:  The “candyfab” uses granulated sugar to print candy [5].  The “Burritob0t” can print customized burritos in less than five minutes [6].  The “D-Shape” prints sandstone to create houses [7].  Researchers have printers that use living cells to print “cartilage, meniscus of the knee … spinal disks and heart valves” [4].

One benefit to 3D printing is that it is more eco-friendly than traditional methods of manufacturing. AM is revolutionarily efficient, both in terms of environmental impact and production cost. First, AM requires as little as one-tenth the amount of material as conventional approaches. Whereas traditional manufacturing must remove excess, AM builds up materials until it forms a whole [8]. Second, taking the manufacturing out of the factory also means that objects can be created anywhere, thereby cutting down on shipping requirements. Third, producing only when required removes the need for an economic system based in mass production that leads to thousands of surplus products being wasted [4]. 3D printing is beneficial because it allows for manufacturing physical objects on-site with minimal waste.

The second benefit of 3D printing is cost-efficiency for individual businesses because it streamlines the production process. Wohlers Associates, a consulting company that pays special attention to 3D printers, estimates that businesses using these devices can reduce costs by 50% and time requirements by nearly 70% [9]. The driving factor behind the cost reduction is that “complexity is free” [4]. It used to be that fabricating businesses spent most of their time creating and re-creating prototypes, and the more complex an object the more time, personnel, and money it required. With 3D printing, the major expense for companies is now just the amount of material needed to build the object [10]. 3D printing also cuts out assembly lines because a 3D printer can print moving parts at the same time, already assembled [2].

Daniel O’Conners demonstrated this by printing “a spinning gyroscopic thingumabob complete with moving ball bearings” in one session which moved freely after being removed from the machine [11].

The ability to handle complexity leads to the third benefit: innovation. With 3D printers, manufacturers and even at-home amateurs can create structures that would be impossible with any other approach. For example, a 3D printer can create a complete

1656

bike chain, printed with the links already connected. And with reduced barriers to participate in 3D manufacturing anyone with access to a printer can contribute [8].

This change has begun to bring about the democratization of manufacturing, which, as it continues, will “allow local entrepreneurs to solve all kinds of problems, both big and small” [12]. People will not have to rely on off-the-shelf products but will be able to customize existing items or create entirely new products to find more efficient solutions. The most important function of 3D printers is the fact that they allow an entirely fresh generation of ideas to come into being. In Lipson’s words, “it’s not about how you duplicate things that you make today with other techniques, but it’s how you explore, as we said, the new frontiers of design, making things you can’t imagine today” [4]. 3D printers are not simply going to change how products are made, but will widen the definition of what it is possible to make.

As with the arrival of any revolutionary technology, the changes that come about may be difficult to embrace at first. 3D printers will change the way we think about modern manufacturing practices, and as a result could render many of them obsolete.

Businesses that rely on the current way of doing things – like assembly lines and mass production – may have a hard time keeping up, but eventually this revolution will bring about new opportunities. “As businesses, industries, and jobs go away, new ones appear, and historically the new ones more than make up for the old ones that have vanished” [5]. One possible outcome is the strengthening of small businesses.

Currently, it is difficult for locally-owned shops to compete with mega-store corporations. Small businesses cannot stock the same variety of products or rely on a national or global infrastructure to get cheaply produced goods. But with 3D printing, creativity will quickly surpass mass productivity in economic importance. In terms of the effects 3D printers will have on businesses and the economy, the outlook is positive.

3 Intellectual Property Concerns Because 3D printers are so efficient at production and reproduction, there are several ethical concerns that must be addressed in the upcoming years. The first is that of intellectual property. Like the printing press, photocopier, VCR, and DVR before it, the 3D printer will be the center of a debate between individuals protecting fair use and open sources, and companies protecting copyright and patents.

The 3D printer of today is comparable to the computer in its formative years: this technology has the potential to revolutionize the creation and distribution of physical objects just as computers revolutionized the creation and communication of ideas.

However, the same pitfalls that the computer industry went through have the potential to affect the 3D printing industry before it really gets started. Michael Weinberg, an attorney for Public Knowledge, refers to laws like the Digital Millennium Copyright Act that restricted the rights of the general public on the internet before the general public even knew they had those rights. He says that unless people actively learn about and defend their rights to fair use and open source materials in regards to 3D printing, they may lose them as corporations and industries that feel threatened by innovative technology try to protect themselves by restricting usage. [2]

1657

Just as with the computer industry, the rise of the 3D printer will most likely expand the manufacturing industry but there will be strife before this can happen because it goes against most of the prevalent business models. Entrepreneurs and hobbyists looking to make use of 3D printers will have to compete with established industries protecting their interests. Patent holders will try to put restrictions on CAD files to prevent users from either scanning and reproducing copyrighted products, or creating products that infringe upon established patents. Currently, there are multiple sites where users can freely share CAD files in peer-to-peer communities. If the files become legally restricted then these open source communities may be destroyed by those who assume that any CADs shared are pirated, in the same way that Napster and other peer-to-peer sites were taken down.

In his essay, “It Will Be Awesome If They Don’t Screw It Up”, Weinberg advises 3D manufacturers on how to practice their rights without infringing on copyrights, patents, or trademarks. The best way to keep 3D printing technology from being restricted is by knowing how to use it without violating intellectual property rights in the first place. However, it is still going to be difficult to maintain the right to freely create and share in the face of large industries that feel threatened. The fact that there is no way to prove the benefits 3D printing will have does not make this problem any easier, because “policymakers and judges will be asked to weigh current concrete losses against future benefits that will be hard to quantify and imagine” [2]. It is likely that this case will go the way of its predecessors, photocopiers and VCRs, and be settled in favor of the new technology, but given the counter-examples of the computer industry’s heightened restrictions it would be prudent to be vigilant about the public’s rights to fair use of products and open source sharing of creative material.

4 Issues Arising from Printed Weapons?

While the right to creation via 3D printing should be preserved, there are some scenarios in which advanced home manufacturing could cause a real danger to the public. One benefit to the current system of centralized manufacturing is that it can be regulated. Dangerous objects like firearms are supposed to be made and distributed only by certain people and only in accordance with specific guidelines. Decentralized 3D manufacturing can avoid these regulations entirely by allowing individuals to print their own weapons, or at least enough of the component parts to avoid regulation.

In the United States, there are currently several layers of law enforcement surrounding the creation, distribution, and purchase of firearms at both the state and federal level. Specifically, “anyone ‘engaged in the business’ of manufacturing, importing or dealing in firearms is required to become a federal firearm licensee” and when any gun is sold, the distributor must run a background check on the buyer and record the serial number of the gun which must be included by the manufacturer.

However, once you go beyond that the regulations become more complicated. For example, since the component parts of guns can be sold separately, the piece that is legally considered the “firearm” is the central frame, also known as the lower receiver, because it allows for the combination of the other pieces. Additionally, there are restrictions about how a gun may be made or what materials must be used. For

1658

example: “the Undetectable Firearm Act of 1988 requires that all major gun components generate accurate depictions in x-ray machines and also requires assembled firearms to trigger metal detectors”. In this way, the distribution of firearms is restricted by limiting who can buy or sell guns as well as by specifying how gun parts must be made and ways to track them. [3] The current system of regulating gun access and use is not perfect, but 3D printing is poised to upset any efficacy of the regulations. This is in part because of two current trends: 3D printing is becoming more advanced and widely available, and the firearm industry is beginning to use more polymer materials in weapons design, specifically in the design of the frame – the one regulated component. While there are still metal components that would have to be purchased from an arms manufacturer, the frame could be printed at home without having to adhere to any regulations.

Additionally, 3D printers soon will have the capability of printing the highlyregulated parts that can alter a semi-automatic rifle into a fully automatic one. These abilities to make alterations at home circumvent laws restricting the use of highly dangerous weapons by the public. [3] Americans have never been explicitly prohibited from creating their own firearms, but historically being able to make these weapons required the dedication to learn metalworking first. Now 3D printers are making it so that “a person with little to no understanding of firearms will nonetheless be capable of wielding a weapon in [a] short matter of time” [13]. This year, the Texas-based group Defense Distributed, headed by Cody Wilson, successfully fired their 3D printed handgun, “The Liberator,” and put the CAD files online for others who have 3D printers to use. The gun is entirely plastic except for a firing pin and the ammunition – the plans do include a piece of steel that would set off metal detectors, but it is an enhancement that can be omitted without affecting the functionality [14].

This 3D printing innovation has set authorities scrambling to counteract the effect of do-it-yourself, undetectable firearms. New York Congressman Steve Israel called for the renewal of the Undetectable Firearms Act after hearing the news, while New York Senator Charles Schumer suggested banning 3D-printed guns entirely. The Australian police force released a statement warning people that using the Liberator would put their personal safety at risk, explaining that they had tested it and the gun exploded on the second round. Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione attributes the “catastrophic failure” to a lack of standards for homemade weapons that endanger the gun owners as much as their targets [15]. The general political tone seems to be leaning towards restriction, but in America at least, forbidding the personal production of weapons may be constitutionally impossible.

Although there is a legitimate threat to the public involved with this system of printing, any legal action in America restricting access to or use of 3D printers may go against the Constitutional right to bear arms. In fact, there is an argument that allowing 3D printed guns would actually enrich Second Amendment protections.

Currently, the right to bear arms does not apply to those who are handicapped and cannot use generically-produced weapons to defend themselves. With infinitely customizable design options, 3D printers could extend this right by creating unique guns that compensate for the user’s limited abilities [3]. Additionally, the recent Supreme Court case of the District of Columbus v. Heller upheld firearm rights, and explained that the continued right to be able to resist tyranny is one of the key reasons

1659

for upholding the Second Amendment even in the modern age. It is arguable that the “ability to make one’s own weapons, spare parts and ammunition would be essential to sustain protracted resistance against tyranny or to obtain meaningful protection in times of anarchy” [3]. If this issue goes to court in the United States, it is reasonable to expect that this argument will be made and supported by those who view their right to bear arms as inalienable.

As with all technology, there are ways to use it for dangerous purposes, but that must be weighed against the improvements and greater rights that it provides as well.

That being said, protecting lives should be held above protecting rights. Until firearm regulations and police enforcement are prepared to handle the possibility of homemade weaponry, these uses for 3D printers should be pursued carefully.

5 Printing the Biological World Printed weapons are a concern that is being addressed currently, but there are benefits to looking ahead and giving consideration to applications of 3D printing technology that are not yet affecting mainstream culture. Researchers in the medical field are using printers in ways that will revolutionize health and wellness. So far, results are still experimental, but intentions and predictions for where this technology will go next range from improving the quality of life to altering the construction of the human body.

The 3D printing of biological material, or bioprinting, uses live cells and specially designed cultures as the “ink” in their printers. This field of study shares many of the same principles as AM, but has several differences and difficulties that come about from using living material. The first is that the cells settle and readjust after being printed. For this reason, a CAD made from a scanned organ cannot be printed as-is; “the organ blueprint must be larger and probably have a slightly different shape” due to “postprinting remodeling associated with tissue fusion, tissue compaction and tissue maturation processes” [16]. The second major difference is having to prevent damage from happening to the cells during and after the printing process. Vladimir Mironov, the director of the Advanced Tissue Biofabrication Center at the Medical University of South Carolina, explains, “[f]rom an engineering point of view, high temperature and toxicity (typical for rapid prototyping technologies and processes) are not acceptable for the bioprinting process” [17]. Every step of the process of printing puts strain on the cells, from being stored in cartridges, to being ejected, to surviving in lab conditions afterwards.

Despite these complications, scientists have already had success with their bioprinting experiments:  Laurence Bonasar of Cornell University used a modified Fab@Home printer to print cartilage directly onto a bone [17].  A team of researchers, also using a Fab@Home 3D printer, used cartilage from calves and silver wire to print a pair of functioning bionic ears which continued to perform for more than ten weeks [18].  The University of Bordeaux was the first to work on printing bone tissue [17].

1660



A group from the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine successfully printed skin onto live animals and showed that the procedure cut the healing time of wounds by more than half [17].  The research company Organovo printed a functioning, miniature human liver using a proprietary 3D printer, NovoGen [19].

Much of this bioprinting is focused on one of two goals: printing entire organs for transplant or printing functional tissue for medical research. Achieving the goal of printed organs will be very difficult, but steps are already being made. For example, Mironov and his co-authors state that the most challenging step is managing to print the system of arteries necessary for maintaining cell life [16], but Mironov himself goes on to claim in a later paper that several universities, including his own, have data to show that this is feasible [17]. Eventually scientists want to reach the point where they can collect a patient’s cells and print a new organ directly into the body, which would have numerous benefits. Most notably, it would “once and forever eliminate patient waiting lists for organ transplantation,” thus saving countless lives which would otherwise be lost simply due to lack of resources [16]. Additionally, being able to collect and print with the patient’s own cells would eliminate the dangers of the body rejecting the new organ or developing tumors [17]. This achievement will allow for a higher quality of life for a greater number of people, without requiring sacrifice or endangering the patient unnecessarily.

Bioprinting tissue for medical research is likely to be happening sooner than madeto-order organs. It may not be as accurate as in-depth clinical trials with real patients, but it is expected to be “more predictable than small or even large animal testing” and simultaneously “reduce the costs of drug development and improve drug safety” [16, 17]. Overall, this will be a benefit to the medical community. Researchers will be able to have similarly if not more useful information from testing with human tissue, all without the ethical conundrum of weighing benefits against testing on sentient animals.

Since bioprinting is still in its formative years, there is a great deal of thought being put towards how it will be used in the future, and how it may even have an influential role in the shaping of the future. Mironov speculates that being able to make body parts to order with your own cells will lead to two outcomes: on one hand it can extend the length of human life as each part that wears out is replaced, and on the other hand it may create a culture of what he terms “body fashion” as people with the means to do so design and print custom body enhancements for themselves [17]. This one example demonstrates how a single piece of technology can have such farreaching effects as to influence both the quality of life and changes in culture.

Along with expanding the length of our lives, bioprinting and 3D printing can help to expand the physical capabilities of humans. This invention could be what makes long-term space exploration possible: the ability to travel with a full hospital and manufacturing facility. If that does not sound enough like science fiction, there are some people who are interested in bioprinting for even more futuristic reasons. The group that created the bionic ears out of cartilage has explained that their goal is to develop “a unique way of attaining a seamless integration of electronics with tissues to generate ‘off-the-shelf’ cyborg organs” [18]. These possibilities are even spreading into the art world. Heather Dewey-Hagbog has created a work called “Stranger Visions” in which she collects discarded DNA from public places, analyzes the

1661

samples, and then uses the genetic information to 3D print a face [20]. While these are not totally accurate resemblances – no one has recognized themselves in her work yet, at least – and she only prints in plastic, she believes that this is just a precursor to being able to clone a person from a bit of hair or skin. These predictions may seem like something from a strange tale, but researchers are working every day on turning them into reality.

6 Conclusion 3D printing is the next pivotal step in advancing technology, and will disrupt the established systems as thoroughly as the computer and the invention of the Internet did mere decades ago. 3D printing has the potential to greatly improve our quality of life and expand our ability to practice our inalienable rights. But, at the same time, there are dangers and new methods of misuse that must be anticipated and prevented.

Despite the pitfalls that arise with any new piece of technology, 3D printers will benefit the quality of life. While precautions must be made to prevent dangerous and illegal use, they should not include restricting the distribution and creative freedom that will bring about innovative advancement. As enthusiasts start experimenting with strange and exciting new uses “the best improvements will spread fastest, in a process akin to Darwinian natural selection” [5]. For that reason, it is important to encourage a “diversity of approaches and strong competition among different approaches” in order to ensure superior results going forward [16]. The next several years will be crucial in the formation of 3D printing rights and restrictions, and hopefully lawmakers, industry leaders, and everyday users will work to create the most creatively supportive community possible and allow the new possibilities it opens up to develop.

Acknowledgments Many thanks to Dr. William Fleischman, who encouraged me to submit this paper and offered support and advice for its development.

References 1.

2.

3.

Vance, Ashlee. "3-D Printing Spurs a Manufacturing Revolution." The New York Times 13 Sept. 2010: n. pag. Web. 10 Apr. 2013.

Weinberg, Michael. It Will Be Awesome If They Don't Screw It Up. Www.publicknowledge.org. Public Knowledge, Nov. 2010. Web. 12 Apr. 2013.

Jensen-Haxel, Peter. "3D Printers, Obsolete Firearm Supply Controls, and the Right to Build Self-Defense Weapons under Heller." Golden Gate University Law Review (2012): n. pag. LexisNexis. Web. 10 Apr. 2013.

1662

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

11.

12.

13.

14.

15.

16.

17.

18.

19.

20.

Wohlers, Terry, Bre Pettis, and Hod Lipson. "Can 3D Printers Reshape the World?"

Interview by Ira Flatow. Science Friday. NPR. 22 June 2012. Radio. Transcript.

Easton, Thomas A. “The 3D Trainwreck: How 3D Printing Will Shake Up Manufacturing.” Analog Science Fiction & Fact.Nov. 2008. Web. 20 Jun. 2013.

Cheshire, Tom. “BurritoB0t: the 3D printer that creates Mexican snacks in five minutes.” Wired.co.uk. 16 Aug. 2012. Web. 18 Jun. 2013.

Steadman, Ian. “The race to build the first 3D-printed building.” Wired.co.uk. 4 Jun. 2013. Web. 21 Jun. 2013.

"Print Me a Stradivarius." The Economist 10 Feb. 2011: n. pag. The Economist. Web. 15 Apr. 2013.

Quittner, Jeremy. "How 3D Printing Is Saving This Jewelry Design Business."

Crain's New York Business. N.p., 20 Oct. 2010. Web. 15 Apr. 2013.

Graham-Rowe, Duncan. "3-D Printing for the Masses." MIT Technology Review (n.d.): n. pag. 31 July 2008. Web. 12 Apr. 2013.

O’Connor, Daniel. “Thingi Thursday: Spinning Gyroscope.” Weblog post.

N.p., 13 Jun. 2013.

Web. 16 Jun. 2013.

Www.prsnlz.me. http://www.prsnlz.me/blogs/daniel-oconnors-blog/thingi-thursday-spinninggyroscope/.

MacDonald, Chris. "3D Printing and the Ethics of Value Creation." Web log post.

The Business Ethics Blog. N.p., 1 Dec. 2012. Web. 10 Apr. 2013.

O'Neill, Kevin J. Is Technology Outmoding Traditional Firearms Regulation? 3-D Printing, State Security, and the Need for Regulatory Foresight in Gun Policy. Social Science Research Network. N.p., 3 May 2012. Web. 16 Apr. 2013. <http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2186936>.

Greenberg, Andy. "Meet The 'Liberator': Test-Firing The World's First Fully 3DPrinted Gun." Forbes. N.p., 5 May 2013. Web. 28 June 2013.

Clark, Liat. "Australian Police: Exploding 3D Printed Gun Will Kill You and Your Victim." Wired.co.uk. Wired, 24 May 2013. Web. 25 June 2013.

Mironov, Vladimir, Vladimir Kasyanov, Christopher Drake, and Roger R. Markwald.

"Organ Printing: Promises and Challenges." Regenerative Medicine 3.1 (2008): 93103. Web. 25 Jun 2013.

Mironov, Vladimir. "The Future of Medicine: Are Custom-Printed Organs on the Horizon?" The Futurist 45.1 (2011): 21-24. Proquest. Web. 25 June 2013.

Mannoor, Manu S., Ziwen Jiang, Teena James, Yong Lin Kong, Karen A. Malatesta, Winston O. Soboveio, Naveen Verma, David H. Gracias, and Michael C. McAlpine.

"3D Printed Bionic Ears." Nano Letters (2013): 2634-639. Pubs.acs.org. 1 May 2013.

Web. 27 June 2013.

Organovo. Organovo Describes First Fully Cellular 3D Bioprinted Liver Tissue.

Ir.organovo.com. N.p., 22 Apr. 2013. Web. 27 June 2013.

Dewey-Hagborg, Heather. Stranger Vision. N.p., 7 Mar. 2013. Web. 24 June 2013. <http://deweyhagborg.com/strangervisions>.

1663

Greedy for Green: The Motivations and Hindrances of Maintaining Environmental Sustainability in the Commericial Industry of Cloud Computing

Bradley S. Cantor Enrolled in the Master of Software Engineering Program Department of Computer Science

Villanova University Villanova, Pennsylvania 19085, U. S. A. bcanto01@villanova.edu

Abstract. This articleexploresthe potential for environmental sustainability in the rapidly growing industry of Could Computing. By understanding the Cloud as a commercially driven endeavor, we unearth the motivations that drive the growth of the burgeoning industry. We go on to explain the impetus behind many of the Data Center innovations that Cloud Computing has brought about.

We show that these innovations are why the Cloud has been heralded as a form of Sustainable Computing.After exploring the technologies endorsed and innovated by Cloud Computing, the article proceeds todiscuss some of the potential downfalls inherent to propagating a commercially driven, yet environmentally sustainable industry. Lastly, the paper discusses the role that we, the consumer, play in shaping the environmental sustainability of the digital storage industry.

Keywords: Cloud Computing, Sustainable Computing, innovations, ethical consumerism, economic viability

Data

Center

1 Introduction We live in an era of incredible innovation. The speed of this innovation is almost overwhelming. There are few among us who have not felt the remorse brought about from buying a brand new smartphone or flat-screen TV only to learn days later that a sleeker, fancier model has been announced. This type of rampant technological

1664

growth defines the past few decades. Landlines have given way to cellphones. Dial-up modems are all but extinct. Wi-Fi flows wherever there is coffee (just be careful asking for ‘Java’). High-schoolers can become ‘friends’ with a single click and a series of hash-tags is currently creating the next big, yet brief, internet trend. The speed of change is hard to keep up with and impossible to ignore. #innovation Constantly evolving gadgets, software applications and websites have become an integral part of daily life. This has created a society in which technology is no longer optional. The mail cluttered kitchen counters of our parent’s generation have been replaced by our own poorly managed and often overflowing digital inboxes. Our computers act as our rolodexes, our file cabinets, our calendars, book shelves and CD collections. The stuff that used to be jumbled around our homes now fills our hard drives. The movement to the digital environment has altered the way that we think about storing information. Fifteen years ago, nobody would have concerned themselves with bringing two thousand CD’s and fifty seven books on a two hour train ride. The advent of smart phones and tablets has changed our perception of accessibility. We want everything we own to be everywhere we go, and we want to be able to access it instantly. The rigid upload/download format of yesteryears MP3 players has given way to a far more dynamic interface of personal data storage; the cloud.

Entire archives of data, artwork, and entertainment flow through a network of revolving doors that connect millions of computers, phones and handheld devices around the world. The sheer magnitude of data has turned ‘space’ into a digital commodity. It is sometimes easy to forget that this data does not just magically float around in the sky. The premium placed on space has created an entirely new storage industry. Data centers, or server farms, have begun to pop up all over the United States, Europe and Asia. These data centers power the cloud. Without them, there would be no Spotify, no Amazon Web Services, or Google App Engine. Every megabyte of information ‘floating’ in the Cloud is stored in one of these servers [1].

This means that as the Cloud continues to grow, more and more data centers will be designed, built, and utilized. This growth represents incredible commercial opportunity. We are already beginning to see a mad dash for tech companies to provide Cloud services. But the Cloud model embodies more than just economic potential. This new industry could very well help usher in a new age of corporate responsibility and environmental sustainability.

The way that data centers are designed, built, and utilized will determine both the economic and environmental potential of Cloud Computing. As the industry grows it has the capability to redefine standard best practices in the field of Sustainable Computing. Energy efficient data center design and innovative server technologies have seemed to evolve alongside the rapidly growing Cloud but these practices are in no way guaranteed. As with all commercial endeavors, profitability will inform practice. In the rampantly growing industry of digital storage, economic viability will supersede environmental ideology. The potential for the Cloud to usher in a new era of Sustainable Computing will rely not on ethical responsibility, but instead on dollars and cents. The question is not whether the ethicality of the Cloud can stand up to corporate consumerism but instead whether the two coincide.

1665

2Sustainable Computing The field of Sustainable or ‘Green’ computing is "the study and practice of designing, manufacturing, using, and disposing of computers, servers, and associated subsystems—such as monitors, printers, storage devices, and networking and communications systems — efficiently and effectively with minimal or no impact on the environment[3]”. While this definition sums up many of the goals of Sustainable Computing there is another side of the environmental endeavor that often gets overlooked. Sam Murugesan, the author that provided the aforementioned definition, writes that “Green IT also strives to achieve economic viability and improved system performance and use, while abiding by our social and ethical responsibilities [3]”.This aspect of Sustainable Computing perfectly depicts what it is that makes the Cloud so interesting.The future of Sustainable Computing depends on the potential of economic viability. The mere practice of designing, using and disposing of hardware in an environmentally friendly way will not, in itself, provide an incentive for large-scale change. The same can be said for Data centers. If the green option is more expensive or less effective it will be unable to compete in the market. Cut-throat corporations are not going to trade economic viability for environmental sustainability. While this may seem problematic for green computing and the future of the Cloud, economic viability and environmental sustainability are not mutually exclusive.

3Incentives for Cloud Computing A survey conducted by Sun Microsystems Australia involving 1,500 responses from 758 large and small organizations in Australia and New Zealand, found that reducing power consumption and lowering costs were the major reasons that companies chose to incorporate environmentally responsible practices. The environmental impact of these practices was something of an afterthought [4].

Businesses prioritize environmental sustainability if and when it is cost effective.

When corporate concerns (cost and profit) align with sustainable practices the motivation for these practices need not matter. Sustainable Computing on the corporate level does not need to be a morality contest. Corporations will choose ecofriendly practices when they are the most cost effective. That is the bottom line. The environmental benefits are merely a byproduct.

This is where the innovations of Cloud Computing come into play. The Cloud presents a potential for economic viability and Sustainable Computing to coincide. In the past, corporations, both large and small, relied on small on-site data centers. That meant that in some form or another, companies were forced to use office space to physically house their servers. The databases, websites, and software that allowed businesses to function were all stored in these localized servers. Any loss of server functionality was potentially devastating; an onsite crash could instantly debilitate a business. This meant that corporations had no choice but to heavily invest in the maintenance and upkeep of their onsite data centers. Every localized data center needed its own team of IT professionals to provide technical support for the servers.

In addition to these IT professionals, these small in-house data centers required

1666

housing specifications and environmental control systems that far exceeded the ordinary demands of generic office space [5]. Insulation and temperature control was vital to preserving optimal functionality. The introduction of Cloud Computing mitigates most, if not all, of these costs.Companies can spend less on IT professionals, optimize office space and, most of all, avoid incredibly inefficient energy expenditures.

By outsourcing digital storage, companies are able to streamline costs.According to a recent research report by Accenture, small businesses experienced a reduction in emissions of up to 90 percent while using Cloud resources.

Additionally, large corporations also saw improvements of 30-60 percent in carbon emissions while using Cloud applications[6]. But why is the Cloud environmentally beneficial? It would seem that it just moves energy expenditure from one place to another. The Cloud model simply replaces two million, small-business onsite data centers with a few massive server farms. Perhaps there are fewer data centers but the amount of information that has to be stored is still the same. This would seem to suggest that the same amount of servers, and therefore, the same amount of net energy would still be required. After all, the sum of the parts is always equal to the whole.

While it is hard to say that this line of thought is not highly logical, it is also flawed.

The truth is that Cloud Computing represents far more than just a geographical relocation of data centers. Technological innovations brought about by the Cloud are changing the way that servers are stored and utilized. It is these innovations that are minimizing energy expenditure and therefore aligning corporate incentive with environmental ethicality.

4Innovations in Cloud Based Data Centers Emerging standard best practices are enabling Cloud based data centers to become increasingly energy efficient. Pre-Cloud on-site data centers were designed to handle sporadic peak loads. The problem with this approach is that during non-peak hours there was no way to reduce operational functionality. This reduced resource utilization resulted in wasted energy. Data centers that use emerging cloud practices, on the other hand, can greatly increase resource allocation through server consolidation. Different companies can share the same server using a parallel processing and partitioning method called virtualization. This practice helps alleviate energy consumption that would have otherwise been spent on the electrical costs of running a local server during non-peak hours. As workloads are consolidated onto partitioned servers, unused servers can be switched off. Before virtualization, this approach was impossible. Each server in an onsite data center had its own data, its own files and therefore its own function. It is only the dynamic partitioning of virtualization that allows for the ebb and flow of server consolidation to conserve energy [7].

The innovations brought about by Computer Science are in themselves remarkable, but the Cloud also presents a potential for sustainability that is far more intuitive. Other than the power required to physically run the servers, the largest energy expenditure experienced by data centers is the cost of temperature control [8].

1667

Before the Cloud, data centers were generally a converted room or collection of rooms in an office building. The center was almost certainly retrofitted to house servers; it was not the original purpose of the structure. The state-of-the-art server farms that are now being utilized by companies that provide Cloud services are cut from a very different cloth. Buildings are being designed for the sole purpose of storing servers. The energy costs of cooling the servers can be alleviated by choosing sites that remain cold throughout the year. Harnessing wind, shade, water, and ground temperature can help lessen operational costs. Due to the energy demands inherent to data centers, infrastructure siting is becoming increasingly dictated by climate and resource allocation. Investing in these state-of-the-art centers is not cheap but companies that provide Cloud services seem to be increasingly willing to take this approach; spend now to save later [9].

5 Concerns for Future Sustainability Data-centers are the infrastructure of Cloud Computing. They play an integral and inevitable part in the business of digital storage. By taking climate and ecological factors into account, data centers are able to reach new levels of energy efficiency. This green infrastructure is not only cost effective, but it also provides a strong anchor for the future of Sustainable Computing. After all, these new data centers are the roots on which the Cloud must grow. But a recent Greenpeace report released in April of 2012 is far more skeptical about the inherent greenness of “the factories of the 21st century information age. [9]” Weary of the potential downfalls of massive data centers and the large corporations that own them, the Greenpeace report stresses the importance of energy transparency, infrastructure siting, and the use of clean/renewable energy. While the findings do suggest a trend towards corporate environmental advocacy, the report also argues that the Cloud phenomenon is not necessarily, in and of itself, eco-friendly.

It should come as no surprise that the issue is energy. The electrical cost of maintaining the aggregated digital information at present is already beginning to become astronomical. The expected growth of Cloud Computing over the coming years will dramatically increase this cost. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, “data centers now account for 1.5 percent of all electricity consumption in the U.S. and by 2020, carbon emissions will have quadrupled to 680 million tons per year, which will account for more than the aviation industry [10]”. Furthermore, a recent estimate of the IT sector’s footprint conducted as part of the 2008 SMART study concluded that data centers will be responsible for 2% of global GHG emissions by 2020 [11]. Incredibly, the Greenpeace report also estimates that the industry will experience “a 50-fold increase in the amount of digital information by 2020 and nearly half a trillion in investments in the coming year [11]”.

These numbers are staggering. They illustrate the profound technological and commercial role that Cloud computing will play in the coming years. In the face of such rapid expansion, Greenpeace, and many others, worry that Cloud providers will become increasingly fixated on lowering the operational energy costs of their data centers. There is no question that infrastructure siting and design innovations will help

1668

accomplish this but in business, profit informs growth. State-of-the-art data centers are expensive and take years to begin to pay for themselves. In the mad dash to take up Cloud market shares there is a strong possibility that rising energy costs will be mitigated by purchasing cheaper fuel. Infrastructure siting is not just about harnessing climatic features; it is heavily influenced by geographical resources. A company that decides to build a new data center in West Virginia is doing so because of the price of coal, not because of the cool mountain air.

If coal becomes the main fuel source of data centers, the environmentally friendly practices innovated by Cloud technologies will be vastly overshadowed by the sheer quantity of greenhouse gases produced by the industry. Energy efficient techniques like workload consolidation and virtualization will not be enough to level out the environmental impact [12]. Fuel is the one fundamental issue in Cloud Computing in which economic viability does not align with sustainability. If data centers turn to coal, Cloud Computing will cease to be â&#x20AC;&#x153;ethically responsibleâ&#x20AC;?. The potential for a new age of Sustainable Computing brought about by the burgeoning Cloud will fall by the wayside. Simply put, a Cloud industry that garners the majority of its fuel from coal will be environmentally disastrous.

6 Consumer Ethicality With the continual growth of the internet and the increasing market share of server-dependent companies, the demand for Cloud technologies and data centers is going to increase substantially. Cloud computing is in its embryonic stages. The possibilities are in many ways limitless, but as everyday consumers become increasingly accustomed to the possibilities of the Cloud, the temptation for data centers to tap cheap energy sources will prove difficult to resist. Low energy costs have the potential to subvert high energy efficiency. Cheap fuel will equal cheap digital storage. In an industry dictated by profit, it would seem that this business model would be difficult to combat. If offered the option to pay five cents or ten cents for a gig of space which would you choose? For the past few years Greenpeace has issued environmental report cards for Cloud Service Providers. Companies like Amazon and Twitter have literally failed in multiple categories. Yet, these are two of the most profitable companies in the Tech industry [11][13] [14].

As the Cloud continues to grow, economic viability will determine the policies and practices ofservice provider data centers. It is easy to say that large corporations should do more to protect the environment, but what is our role in all this?At the end of the day, it is not Google or Greenpeace that will decide the future of environmental sustainability in digital storage. It is the end user. It is whether or not we care. If the environment matters to the end user it will be economically advantageous to design, build, and utilize data centers in a way that coincides with the principles of Sustainable Computing. If the end user does not care, following these principles will cease to be economically pragmatic.

Companies like Yahoo, Facebook, and Google are spending millions of dollars on new, state-of-the-art, ultra energy-efficient data centers. By tapping renewable energy sources like nuclear, wind and solar, these companies are making

1669

strides to help ensure that the Cloud remains a green enterprise [15]. Their actions set the bar high for others to follow, but these are companies that are never too far from the public eye. Appearing environmentally trustworthy is good for business. But branding, like energy conservation, helps align economic viability with ethical and environmental responsibility.

7 Conclusions We use the Cloud to make our lives simpler—more streamlined, organized and accessible. Cloud Computing allows us to clean off our kitchen counters, throw out our scratched old CD’s, and travel anywhere in the world with a library in our pocket. But rarely do we stop and think about the cost of this convenience. Rarely do we consider the equation in its entirety. What is the cost of this digital information?

Within the Cloud, every undeleted email, every blurry family picture, every video of a cat wearing socks, is stored on a server.Innovations in server technology along with data center design and utilization have helped forge a digital storage industry that is environmentally responsible and economically profitable. The Cloud has brought about innovation in infrastructure siting, workload consolidation, and server virtualization.But, the rapid growth of the industry has the potential to undermine the environmental benefits of these innovations. The Cloud is an energy hungry enterprise. If data centers turn to coal as the main source of energy, the Cloud will cease to be ‘green’.

We as consumers hold the key tothis green potential. The industry of Cloud Computingwill become whatever we make it. Our decisions, our values, our beliefs, and, most of all,our dollars, will determine the future of the Cloud. The consumer will ultimately define the practices that are profitable. If cheap storage powered by coal is demanded, the market will be sure to supply it. While this understanding of the Cloud may lack a certain ideological flare for the ethics of capital markets, it in no way condemns the Cloud to a future of bleak possibilities. We as consumers should care about the environment, and perhaps we will. But the Cloud will not stay green because it ought to, or because Sustainable Computing is ethically correct. The Cloud will stay green if and only if it is economically viable.

Acknowledgments I would like to thank Dr. William M. Fleischman for his support and guidance throughout this process. This article originated asa term paper in the Computer Ethics class offered through the Computer Science Department at the University of Villanova. Without Dr. Fleischman’s foresight and curiosity, I would never have been able to develop that paper into the article that it has now become.

1670

References 1.

Anderson, S., Improving Data Center Efficiency, Energy Engineering, Vol. 107, No. 5, pg 42-63. (2010)

2.

Armbrust, M., Fox, A., Griffith, R., Joseph, A. D., Katz, R., Konwinski, A., Lee, G., Patterson, D., Rabkin, A., Stoica, I., and Zaharia, M., A View of Cloud Computing, Communications of the ACM, April, Vol. 53, No. 4. (2010)

3.

Murugesan, S.: Harnessing Green IT: Principles and Practices, IEEE IT Professional, Januaryâ&#x20AC;&#x201C;February 2008, pp 24-33.

4.

Andonova, L.: Networks, Club Goods, and Partnerships for Sustainability: The Green Power Market Development Group, Colby College

5.

Greenberg, S., Mills, E., Tschudi, B., Rumsey, P., and Myatt, B., Best Practices for Data Centers: Lessons Learned from Benchmarking 22 Data Centers. ACEEE Summer Study on Energy Efficiency in Buildings. available at http://eetd.lbl.gov/emills/PUBS/PDF/ACEEE-datacenters.pdf, last accessed 10 May 2013 (2008)

6.

Accenture Microsoft Report: Cloud computing and Sustainability: The Environmental Benefits of Moving to the Cloud, available at http://www.wspenvironmental.com/media/docs/newsroom/Cloud_computing_and_Sus tainability_-_Whitepaper_-_Nov_2010.pdf. last accessed 21 June 2013 (2010)

7.

Verma, A., Koller, R., Useche, L., and Rangaswami, R., 2010. SRCMap: energyproportional storage using dynamic consolidation. 2010, Proceedings of the 8th USENIXconference on File and storage technologies (FAST'10), San Jose, California

8.

Robles, L. Four Trends that Shaped Cloud Computing in 2011, available athttp://venturebeat.com/2011/11/29/four-trends-that-shaped-cloud-computing-in2011/last accessed 21 May 2013 (2011).

9.

Greenpeace International: Make IT Green available at http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/publications/reports/make-it-greenCloudcomputing/, last accessed 21 July 2013 (2012)

10. Metreweli, K., Data Center Cost Savings Go Green, available at www.ebizq.net/topics/int_sbp/features/11740.html, last accessed 21 May 2013 (2009) 11. Greenpeace International: How Green is Your Cloud, available at, http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/Global/international/publications/climate/2012/iCoal/H owCleanisYourCloud.pdf last accessed 25 July 2013 (2012)

1671

12. Garg, K., Buyya, R., Green Cloud Computing and Environmental Sustainability, The University of Melbourne, Australia 13. Forbes Magazine: Global 2000: The Worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Biggest Public Companies available at http://www.forbes.com/companies/amazon/, last accessed 27 July 2013 (2012) 14. Shontell, A.: The Digital 100: The worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s most valuable private tech companies, Buisness Insider 2013, available at http://www.businessinsider.com/2012-digital100?op=1, last accessed 27 July, 2013 (2013) 15. Cook, G.,Van Horn J. How dirty is your data?, available at http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/publications/reports/How-dirty-is-yourdata/, last accessed 21 July 2013 (2011) 16. Comerford, T.: Principles of Data Center Siting and Economic Development Incentives, UEDA Winter Forum, Feb 23, 2011 available at http://www.blsstrategies.com/Docs/Events/Event_33.pdf, last accessed 27 July 2013 (2011)

1672

Why We Should Not Build Autonomous Robotic Weapons William M. Fleischman Departments of Computing SciencesandMathematicalSciences Villanova University Villanova, Pennsylvania 19085, U. S. A. william.fleischman@villanova.edu

Abstract.We discuss robotic weapons, their advantages and disadvantages, and their effect on the way humans wage war. We consider the factors favoring the development of lethal robotic weapons that can operate autonomously. We discuss the attempt to mitigate the dangers inherent in such weapons by means of an ethical controller implemented in software. We conclude that this is impossible to achieve and therefore that autonomous lethal robotic weapons should not be developed.

Keywords: Computer ethics, Robotic weapons, Autonomous moral agents.

1 Introduction In this paper, we argue that fully autonomous robotic weapons that have the capacity to kill should not be developed or deployed. We begin with an overview of current robotic devices that are deployed or under development by the military. We discuss the advantages and disadvantages that these weapons confer in combat and in the larger context of decisions to wage war and attitudes toward the conduct of war. We consider the thorny problem of keeping humans “in the loop” in situations where these weapons are used with potentially lethal effects and discuss efforts to develop a so-called “ethical governor” to restrict the behavior of robotic weapons capable of autonomous operation. We present an instructive example from the history of the Cold War that underscores the importance of human deliberation in situations of belligerent confrontation. This example is followed by a discussion of the problem of responsibility and accountability as it applies to autonomous robotic weapons. We conclude with a section of general observations about the choices involved in opting to invest important material and human resources in the development of lethal autonomous weapons.

2 An Overview of Robotic Devices in Use and Under Development We begin with a short discussion of the recent accelerated development of robotic weapons – unmanned ground and aerial vehicles (UGVs and UAVs) under the impetus of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Numbers tell at least part of the story.

There were few of either type of system deployed in the 2003 invasion of Iraq. By 2011, there were an estimated 12,000 UGVs and 7,000 UAVs in the inventory of the

1673

U.S. military forces. Significantly, the U.S. Air Force currently trains more UAV operators than fighter and bomber pilots combined. [1] Enemy deployment of IEDs in Iraq created an instant demand for Packbots – a ground-based, essentially defensive device developed by iRobot, the Boston-area company originally famous for manufacturing the Roomba robotic vacuum cleaner.

The Packbot was used to detect and, if necessary, disarm IEDs without the risk of loss of human life. Initially, it was simply thought of as a “mobile pair of binoculars.”

With the addition of simple effector arms and grippers the Packbot acquired the capability to disarm and destroy improvised explosive devices concealed by the enemy. [2] The initial problem addressed was that of locating and identifying non-human threats. A related problem, of course, is the location and identification of human threats – enemy snipers. In this application, however, once a threat is identified, the next job is to eliminate it by killing the sniper. Quite logically, a mobile device that carries a weapon in addition to its cameras provides the possibility of eliminating the threat by aiming and firing remotely under control of a soldier who does not have to appear in the sight of the sniper’s weapon. Once again, the desire to shield one’s soldiers from situations in which their lives are at risk provides the incentive for development of a robotic device with additional capabilities. As has often been observed [3], the desire to increase the killing effectiveness of one’s soldiers while increasing the distance between them and the enemy is a constant in the history of warfare. So this was a natural application for Packbot, Warrior, its more heavily armed successor, and congeners such as the Talon and SWORDS devices manufactured by Foster-Wheeler, a second Boston-based robotics firm. In essence, arming the Packbot or similar robotic device is simply a next step in this historical process.

Not all UGVs have direct combat roles. The special dangers of the role of human medics serving in battlefield situations has led to the development of a version of the Packbot that can search for wounded soldiers and provide a video feed that allows a distant human controller to deploy medical equipment on the so-called “med-bot” in order to evaluate and treat the wounded individual. [2] UAVs have undergone a similar rapid transformation. Perhaps the best-known UAV is the twenty-seven foot long Predator, capable of carrying out 24-hour reconnaissance and surveillance missions, returning high quality images day and night by means of normal and infrared cameras. Furthermore, the Predator’s synthetic-aperture radar can provide valuable information even where the terrain is obscured by clouds, smoke, or dust. As Singer notes, [t]he exact capabilities of the system are classified, but soldiers say they can read a license plate from two miles up.” [4]. The same logic that has driven changes in the design of UGVs has resulted in the arming of UAVs which now can carry out offensive missions under the direction of a human pilot or operator located thousands of miles away. In addition, UAV technology has spread in both directions along the size and mission-length continua with the Raven (thirty-eight inches in length and ninety minutes in the air), the Wasp (fifteen inches in length, forty-five minutes of endurance), with microUAVs the size of insects in the planning stage. At the other end of the spectrum, the newer Reaper [get some specs if you intend to include this UAV in the discussion] and the Global Hawk (nearly forty-eight feet long with an endurance of thirty-five

1674

hours) provides both wide-area search and high-resolution single target identification and has the capability of autonomous operation between the signals to taxi, take off, and land provided by its human operator. [4] In addition to deploying its own force of UAVs, the U.S. Navy is also developing various types of unmanned surface and underwater vessels (USVs and UUV’s). [4]

3 Advantages and Disadvantages of Robotic Weaponry It is not hard to see (and it is very hard to resist) the advantages of robotic weaponry.

The first, and most compelling for an armed force possessing these weapons, is that they replace humans on the battlefield and therefore reduce the number of human casualties this force will sustain. Beyond this, they are markedly superior to humans in what military strategists describe as the “three D’s” – situations that are dangerous, dirty, and dull.

Dirty environments include not only those, like desert battlefields affected by smog, smoke, sand and dust, but also those which have been contaminated by biological, chemical, or radioactive agents. Robots have a very clear advantage in these environments where humans would be encumbered by bulky protective suits and related gear.

Many military missions require concentration over long periods of time. In addition to the physical stress of the activity, there is the psychological stress of paying steady attention in otherwise boring circumstances. Humans can do this for limited periods of time and need downtime or pauses to recover the necessary level of acuity. By contrast, robots don’t need to sleep, to eat, or to take a break for “rest and recreation.”

The human body is limited in the speed and limits of reaction to threats and forces to which it is exposed in combat situations. From g-forces acting on human pilots of advanced aircraft to speed of recognition and reaction to battlefield dangers, robotic systems appear to have a clear advantage. As already noted, the first advantage of a robot in a dangerous environment is that its destruction involves the loss of a machine (although this may be more consequential if it falls into the hands of an enemy who can study and copy it) and not the loss of a human life.

Related to these factors is calculation regarding risk. Singer notes that, “The unmanning of [an] operation also means that the robot can take risks that a human wouldn’t otherwise, risks that might mean fewer mistakes.” [4] He cites friendly fire incidents during the Kosovo campaign in 1999 in which the imperative to avoid loss of NATO pilots resulted in orders that planes not be flown at altitudes below 15,000 feet. One of the most grievous errors of this nature occurred when NATO planes flying at these altitudes bombed a convoy of buses carrying Kosovar refugees mistakenly identifying them as a convoy of Serbian tanks. Singer also notes that the “removal of risk allows decisions to be made in a more deliberate manner than normally possible. Soldiers describe how one of the toughest aspects of fighting in cities is how you have to burst into a building and, in a matter of milliseconds, figure out who is an enemy and who is a civilian.” In this situation, a robot that can enter a room and shoot only at someone who shoots first has a distinct advantage over the

1675

human who must take fire and somehow instantly manage to determine the source, return fire, and avoid hitting any civilians. [4] Another advantage that robots have in situations of combat is that they do not suffer from human emotions of rage against adversaries who have caused harm or death to a soldier’s comrades. We know of many episodes where otherwise good individuals have given way to extreme emotion and committed atrocities after experiencing the loss of or grievous harm to someone with whom they have bonded and upon whom they have depended in situations of danger. Surely eliminating the danger of such episodes is an important advantage favoring robotic agents over humans.

With all these advantages noted, what could possibly be the downside of the use of robotic weapons? These may be more subtle and harder to see but, in a certain sense, the disadvantages of these weapons are identical with their advantages. One of these disadvantages, clearly recognized by those in command positions in the military, is that over a long time and haltingly we have negotiated barriers against barbaric behavior in war. The Geneva Conventions and treaties barring the use of chemical and biological weapons are among these barriers. When, however, one side in a conflict has such technological superiority, when there is marked asymmetry in the resources each brings to battle, there is an inescapable lessening of the respect that each side owes the other out of recognition of the parity of the risks the combatants share. The sense that the weaker forces can be eradicated like insects by the “magic” of advanced technology acts, in a mutually reinforcing manner, on both sides to undercut the restraints erected against barbarity. [5] Perhaps the most serious disadvantage of robotic weapons has to do with another set of barriers. General Robert E. Lee, commander of the Confederate forces in the American Civil War of the 19th century once wrote, “It is good that we find war so horrible, or else we would become fond of it.” [3] The act of declaring war is or should be a grave existential decision for any country. But we have seen, perhaps most notably in the case of the ill-considered invasion of Iraq by the United States, how consciousness of technological superiority lowers the barrier against waging war.

Paradoxically, to the extent that atrocities committed by otherwise decent soldiers of our military remind us of the horror of war, they serve as a factor that should give pause to anyone contemplating “loosing the dogs of war.”

4 Keeping Humans ‘In the Loop’ This section is the easiest to write and the most frightening. When it comes to giving robotic weapons lethal capabilities, official military policy seems to be very clear and emphatic: “Humans must be kept in the loop.” The meaning of this is, or should be, that a human must give authorization before any robotic weapon can fire on a human target. In fact, however, whenever this matter is raised in serious discussion, the result is averted eyes and a change in topic. The reasons for this are also clear.

Although the ideal is to keep humans in the [command] loop, there are so many factors militating against this that in practice it seems impractical. Why, if there is risk of loss of life on your side in the interval between identification of a lethal threat

1676

and authorization to fire issued by a human controller, should the robotic weapon not be given the capability to fire immediately upon locating the threat? Since the authorization requires communication between controller and weapon, and this communication can be cut or disrupted by the enemy, why should there not be an emergency back-up capability for the weapon to operate autonomously in this situation?

Singer points out that the logic of human control of robotic weapons seems to demand a many-one correspondence between weapons and controllers. But humans are notoriously ill equipped and unreliable for the task of controlling multiple units at one time, even under relatively calm conditions. A Pentagon-funded report notes that, “Even if the tactical commander is aware of the location of all his units, the combat is so fluid and fast-paced that it is very difficult to control them.” [3] Further, as Singer points out, human control of automated weapons systems has already been seriously compromised by the human tendency to “believe what the computer says.” The paradigmatic example of this is the case of the downing of Iran Air flight 665 over the Persian Gulf in July 1988 by an American naval vessel patrolling the gulf during the Iran-Iraq war. Iran Air Flight 665 was an Airbus passenger jet on a commercial flight from Tehran, Iran to Dubai via Bandar Abbas.

On the morning of the flight, the U. S. Navy guided missile cruiser, the Vincennes, equipped with the Aegis combat system, an integrated weapon control system that uses powerful computers and radars to coordinate, track, and guide weapons to destroy enemy targets. Even though the passenger jet was climbing after takeoff from Bandar Abbas, flying a consistent course, and “squawking” the appropriate radio signal that proclaimed it to be a civilian airliner, the Aegis system radars on board the Vincennes seemed to identify the plane as an assumed enemy fighter jet on a descending attack profile. Even though most members of the crew of the Vincennes and almost everyone on board its sister ships on patrol that morning were reading data that accurately identified the nature of the flight, not one of the eighteen sailors and officers of the Vincennes were willing to question the Aegis system’s apparent mistaken designation of an attacking enemy fighter aircraft. As a result, the captain of the Vincennes, an officer with a known penchant for aggressive action, gave the authorization to fire resulting in the destruction of Iran Air Flight 655, killing all 290 passengers and crew, among them sixty-six children. [3, 6] The problem with Singer’s analysis and the flaw in the conclusion drawn is that a software design or software-engineering error that should not have evaded the eye of even undergraduate software engineering students was one of the principal factors implicated in the mistaken characterization of flight 655. In fact, in the process of coordinating data on the radars of the three ships in the patrol, a tag used within the previous hour to label a (friendly) fighter jet making a landing (thus descending) was reassigned as the label for Iran Air Flight 655 on the radars of the Vincennes. [6] So while it is not entirely inaccurate to think of this as an illustration of the way in which humans defer to the “judgment” of computer-controlled systems, it is far more relevant to see this as a warning against placing too much trust in the reliability of even state of the art software engineering.

1677

5 Compensating for the Human ‘Out of the Loop’ If the superior capabilities of robotic weapons and the limitations of humans acting as controllers so far compromise the military principle of always keeping the human in the loop, then perhaps we can substitute an “ethical governor” implemented in software for the absent human controller. Properly programmed, weapons acting in autonomous mode could perhaps be constrained to “act ethically in war,” observing all the articles of the Geneva Conventions, the laws of war, and, in the local context of the combat in which they are deployed, the relevant rules of engagement. And since they are not subject to the psychological and emotional stresses that affect human combatants, we might even expect that they would act more morally than the human soldiers whose combat roles they assume.

In fact, the NSF and U.S. government agencies associated with the Department of Defense have funded an initiative of precisely this nature. Singer quotes the assertion of Ronald Arkin, a professor of computer science at Georgia Tech who has received support various agencies of the government for just such a project, “Ultimately these systems could have more information to make wiser decisions than a human could make. Some robots are already stronger, faster, and smarter than humans. We want to do better than people, to ultimately save more lives.” [5] In a recent paper, Gerdes and Øhrstrom discuss the possibility of devising a Moral Turing Test, which, in their words, “might enable us to distinguish principles for evaluating morally correct actions rather than (as in the original Turing test) skills of articulation.” [7] Such a test would constitute a necessary but not sufficient condition for the development of what is referred to as an Artificial Moral Agent. Their analysis, rooted in the work of the logician A. N. Prior [], leads to the conclusion that “Prior was right in claiming that the formulation of a formal system which correctly incorporates all aspects of moral reasoning would in principle require a complete description not only of all relevant moral rules and laws but also of all relevant aspects of the situation in question. However, having such descriptions is tantamount to having a God’s eye view of all relevant aspects of reality.” Although they conclude that it may still be “possible to formalize important aspects of ethical reasoning in a specific context and thereby contribute to a system which may pass a comparative Moral Turing Test,” I take their paper as indicating that even this partial approach to creating an Artificial Moral Agent represents a software engineering project of considerable difficulty and complexity. Since the conditions of actual combat constitute a context of such fluidity and rapid change as to defy the simple description of “a specific [i.e., closed] context,” it is not unreasonable to conclude that the project envisioned by Arkin has an impossible goal. The similarity of this case with that of the Strategic Defense Initiative (the so-called ‘Star Wars’ project) from which David L. Parnas withdrew in a well-known letter and series of critical papers [8] suggests that the appropriate response of computer scientists of good conscience toward Arkin’s project or any other claiming to have the purpose of devising an “ethical governor” for autonomous robotic weapons should be to condemn it.

In this light, I think it is important to ask, “What is the purpose of the NSF in funding this “research?” Why should anyone want to do this? One possible motivation is as a salve to the consciences of those who are participating in and drawing public funds from the Department of Defense and the National Science

1678

Foundation in research that they know to be, in the last analysis, destructive and antihuman. We are building these lethal autonomous robotic weapons but they are going to be “stronger, faster, and smarter than humans.” We are going to do better than mere humans and we will save many lives. We believe (or convince ourselves that) we can achieve this chimera and therefore we must try (and, of course, inure ourselves to the burden of accepting the public’s money in furtherance of this grotesque illusion.)

Again, I want to insist on the question, “Why should anyone want to do this?” In the words of Joseph Weizenbaum, “Technological inevitability can thus be seen to be a mere element of a much larger syndrome. Science promised man power. But, as so often happens when people are seduced by promises of power, the price exacted in advance and all along the path, and the price actually paid, is servitude and impotence. Power is nothing if it is not the power to choose. Instrumental reason can make decisions, but there is all the difference between deciding and choosing.”[9, emphasis added] What is it that we are choosing when we choose to develop the ability to make war in a way that is better than the way humans wage war?

6 An Instructive Story As In mid-October of 1962, photographs taken during a U2 surveillance flight over Cuba revealed the presence of missile sites and Soviet missile components on the island. Assurances given both by Andrei Gromyko, the Soviet Foreign Minister, and Nikita Khrushchev, the leader of the Soviet Union, that no Soviet missiles would be installed in Cuba were thus revealed to be a deception. This precipitated what was in all probability the most dangerous episode of the Cold War, a period of fifteen days in which the two superpowers were on a path to war that would have involved attacks using nuclear weapons by each on the other. The consequences of this were and are unimaginable.

In a chapter of the excellent book, Humanity: A Moral History of the 20th Century, Jonathan Glover recounts the story of how Khrushchev and Kennedy managed to step back from the brink in spite of the strong forces – intense military competition, mutual suspicion and misjudgment, internal political pressures, the actions of military subordinates in the forces of both countries that exceeded their standing orders – that tended toward war and nuclear disaster. The conditions surrounding the Cuban Missile Crisis enumerated by Glover recapitulate, in an eerie correspondence, the set of misjudgments, miscalculations, and reckless actions that in 1914 led the European powers into a war that can only be considered a disaster for those who fought and for the generation that survived the conflict. How, then, did the leaders of the two superpowers in 1962 avoid the trap?

It is a riveting and illuminating story worth the attention of anyone considering the role of autonomous weapons in war. [10] The story is riveting because this was a very close call. There were pressures on both leaders – from both the political and military establishments as well as the Cuban leader Fidel Castro – to take actions (including on the U. S. side, an air attack and/or invasion of Cuba) which, with Soviet tactical nuclear weapons already deployed in

1679

Cuba, would almost certainly have led to a catastrophic nuclear exchange. Among the factors that appear to have prevented this, there were two that are worthy of reflection in the context of this paper.

The first is that historian Barbara Tuchman had published earlier that year her study, The Guns of August, which carefully dissected European internal political pressures, misunderstandings in regard to treaty commitments, ambiguous signals, poor communication among allies and between potential belligerents, and the military preparations once begun that seemed impossible to roll back that led ineluctably to war and disaster for the continent. Both President Kennedy and his closest advisors (including his brother Robert) had read the book and referred to it during the meetings at which the possible responses to the Soviet threat were discussed. According to the memoirs of Robert Kennedy, quoted in Glover [10], JFK spoke with his brother about the European leaders in 1914 saying ”they seemed to tumble into war through ‘stupidity, individual idiosyncrasies, misunderstandings, and personal complexes of inferiority and grandeur.’ He said, ‘I am not going to follow a course which will allow anyone to write a comparable book about this time, The Missiles of October. If anybody is around to write after this, they are going to understand that we made every effort to give our adversary room to move. I am not going to push the Russians an inch beyond what is necessary.’”

Of equal weight, on the Russian side, Khrushchev, early in the crisis, sent a letter to President Kennedy in which he wrote: “Should war indeed break out, it would not be in our power to contain or stop it, for such is the logic of war. I have taken part in two wars, and I know that war ends only when it has rolled through cities and villages, sowing death and destruction everywhere … If people do not display wisdom, they will eventually reach the point where they will clash like blind moles, and then mutual annihilation will commence … You and I should not now pull on the ends of the rope in which you have tied a knot of war, because the harder you and I pull, the tighter this know will become. And a time may come when the knot is tied so tight that the person who tied it is no longer capable of untying it, and then the knot will have to be cut.” [10] Both the words of Nikita Khrushchev and the import of Barbara Tuchman’s analysis that was present in the minds of John Fitzgerald Kennedy and his advisors resonated with the warning articulated by Robert E. Lee: “It is good that we find war so horrible, or else we would become fond of it.” This was a crisis that both leaders understood would forever indelibly bear their signatures, however it unfolded. That personal sense of responsibility and the consciousness of the horrors of war were the factors that made it possible to pull back. Let us imagine the computer system, designed and implemented by individuals without names and without the wisdom of those who read and reflect and are conscious of the horror, let us indeed pause and imagine the system capable of the saving wisdom of Khrushchev and Kennedy.

7 The Question of Accountability and Responsibility The “Problem of Many Hands,” articulated by Helen Nissenbaum in her 1994 paper [11], has become a common-place, a cliché. We cite this problem by name, nod

1680

knowingly in acquiescence of the certainty that any large software engineering project is bound to have some unanticipated failure modes with serious negative consequences. If, as is customary, the project is developed over a significant period of time by a team the membership of which is not fixed, it will be difficult, perhaps impossible, to determine who is responsible for the failure, to say who should be held accountable for harms ultimately engendered in the use of such a system. This is just a fact of life in our technologically sophisticated world. Get over it and move on.

Perhaps we can agree that there are areas of application where the expectation of future benefits resulting from the development of a new technology justifies accepting the risks of such negative consequences – without, however, relinquishing the understanding that, while we are waiting for the realization of such benefits, someone, some organization must be held accountable and accept responsibility for these harms. There are some areas of application where we can agree to take these risks.

But there are assuredly areas where this attitude is unjustifiable. The development of autonomous robotic killing weapons is one of them.

Whose name will be on the disaster precipitated by the predictable malfunction of one of these weapons? Whose name will be attached, as Khrushchev and Kennedy were aware theirs would beto the nuclear disaster precipitated by a reckless gesture in the course of the Cuban Missile Crisis? Who will own the damage to what little of civilized culture we still imagine we possess? Certainly not foolish and opportunistic computer scientists like Arkin, whose names will have long been forgotten. In a sense, this is appropriate. However much their work contributes to this damage, the disaster will be ours as a society if we do not recognize the folly of the path we are taking.

8 Concluding Observations Finally, it is important to recognize that, although many profound thinkers have contributed to our understanding of what it means to act ethically, our ideas about ethical behavior are as much a product of our experience and our emotional wisdom as of our analytical intelligence. Beware the scientist or engineer who claims that technique will substitute for human instinct and wisdom and enable us to program a machine to behave ethically. Even to approximate this would require the solution of a software engineering problem of forbidding complexity. A moment’s reflection on our discouraging experience with such systems should give us pause. [12] Long ago, Joseph Weizenbaum cautioned against the seduction of technique applied to problems for which its application is utterly inappropriate. “There are two kinds of computer applications that either ought not be undertaken at all, or if they are contemplated, should be approached with utmost caution. …The first kind I would call simply obscene. These are ones whose very contemplation ought to give rise to feelings of disgust in every civilized person. … I would put all projects that propose to substitute a computer system for human understanding for a human function that involves interpersonal respect, understanding, and love in [this] category. [9] Beyond this, in choosing to invest in the chimerical pursuit of the ability to build machines that can “do better than people” at waging war, we are distorting the

1681

priorities on which a civilized society should rest. We seem unable to make a commitment to educating or providing adequate health care for all the children who live among us, but we find it easy to lavish great sums in the pursuit of an obscenity, oblivious to the warning, “It is good that we find war so horrible, or else we would become fond of it.”

References 1. Singer, P. W.,Military Robotics and Ethics: A World of Killer Apps, Nature, vol. 477, 22 September,2011, pp. 399-401 2. Singer, P. W., Wired for War: The Future of Military Robots, in Wired (UK), August 2009, available at http://www.brookings.edu/opinions/2009/0828_robots_singer.aspx, last accessed 15 July 2013 3. Singer, P. W., Wired for War: The Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the 21st Century, Penguin Press, New York, (2009) 4. Singer, P. W., Military Robots and the Laws of War, The New Atlantic, Winter 2009 available at http://www.brookings.edu/research/articles/2009/02/winter-robots-singer, last accessed 15 July 2013 5. Singer, P. W., The Ethics of Killer Applications: Why Is It So Hard to Talk About Morality When It Comes to New Military Technology, Journal of Military Ethics, vol. 9 no. 4, pp.

299-312 (2010) 6. Iran Air Flight 655, in Wikipedia, at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655, , last accessed 15 July 2013 7. Gerdes, A. and Øhrstrom, P., Preliminary Reflections on a Moral Turing Test, in Proceedings of ETHICOMP 2013, The Possibilities of Ethical ICT, University of Southern Denmark, Kolding, Denmark, pp. 167-174 (2013) 8. Parnas, D. L, Letter to James H. Offutt, in Introduction to Computer Ethics, Parts 1 and 2, at www.stanford.edu/class/cs181/materials/CS181-Parts1and2.pdf, last accessed 15 July 2013 9. Weizenbaum, Joseph, Computer Power and Human Reason: From Judgment to Calculation, W. H. Freeman, New York, (1976) 10.Glover, Jonathan, Humanity: A Moral History of the 20th Century, 2nd edition, Yale University Press, New Haven, (2012) 11.Nissenbaum, H., Computing and Accountability, Communications of the ACM, vol. 37, no.

1, pp. 73-80 (1994) 12.Fleischman, W., Electronic Voting Systems and the Therac-25: What Have We Learned?, in , Proceedings of ETHICOMP 2010, The “Backwards, Forwards, and Sideways Changes” of ICT, UniversitatRoviraiVirgili, Tarragona, Spain, pp. 170-179 (2010)

1682

Declarado de InterĂŠs Municipal por el Honorable Concejo Deliberante del Partido de General Pueyrredon