Tech 63100 Week 13
Technology and Society
Question: How is BCI evolving?
Engineering the Brain
Implanted deep brain stimulators and brain control interfaces (BCI) are neural engineering technologies that alter brain function in order to improve human health and well-being. Some BCIs connect to prosthetics, creating automated movement directly from thought, blending human and machine into one. Other BCIs can help regulate chemicals based on brain activity in order to balance hormones and emotions. With these benefits come six core areas of ethical concern as identified by Klein, Brown, et al. (2015):
Identity: Does the extension of human to machine change the way we see ourselves or how others see us? Does the manipulation of chemicals and hormones affect the authenticity of who we are, masking our mood or creating confusion on how we truly feel?
Normality: For BCI to properly make decisions based on data processed from the brain, they require a baseline of normality. Who sets this baseline? Can it be adjusted as the boundaries for what is "normal" changes based on context in physical, social, and mental environments.
Authority: Who controls the accuracy of the algorithms and how the data is interpreted to ensure the BCI is responsive to the user? For example, if the user wants to have a sensitive grip, do they control the sensitivity of the grip or does the BCI?
Responsibility: Should an accident or undesired outcomes occur directly related to the implanted deep brain stimulators, who is accountable? The user or the BCI?
Privacy: BCI controls substantial data on the user from psychological traits and mental states (brain-otyping), attitudes toward other people, and truthfulness. However, they are vulnerable to tampering, misuse, and attack. How do we secure these BCI especially as they become more advanced, connecting to other devices through bluetooth and connected to web-enabled platforms like social media, etc.
Justice: How do we ensure that the end user is involved in the design of these technologies. It is the end user that takes on potential risk and adverse effects as well as impacts to form / fit / factor.
These six areas of ethical concerns becomes more complex as the advancement as industry looks to integrating AI. Neuralink, Bitbrain, NextMind are just a few companies leading in BCIs and exploring its evolution in the adoption and application AI. Research is focusing on moving toward less invasive methods for capturing electrical brain activity as well as brain-to-brain interfaces (Marr, 2023).
Virus in the Age of Madness
Question: What caused globalization?
Goodbye, World
"Globalization describes the growing interdependencies of the world's economies, cultures, and populations brought about by cross-border trade in goods and services, technology, and flows of investment, people, and information." (PIEE, 2022).
While globalization has had tremendous value in reducing poverty, Lévy (2020) questions whether - in terms of the COVID-19 pandemic - we would have been better off using the Silk Road for trade as that was more contained, limiting the global impact of a pandemic. Potentially, but it can be argued that the Silk Road was travelled by many countries so an infected Silk Road could still have a global impact. The difference is that, without globalization as it is today, we would be without the technologies and capabilities to quickly respond and contain a pandemic at a global scale.
References
Klein, E., Brown, T., Sample, M., Truitt, A., and Goering, S. (2015). Engineering the Brain: Ethical Issues and the Introduction of Neural Devices. In D.G. Johnson, & J. M. Wetmore, Technology and Society: Building our Sociotechnical Future (pp. 55 - 66). Cambridge: The MIT Press.
Lévy, B. (2020, Jul 28). The Virus in the Age of Madness. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Marr, B. (2023). AI's Next Frontier: ARe Brain-Computer Interfaces the Future of Communication? Retrieved Apr 2024 from Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/sites/bernardmarr/2023/08/11/ais-next-frontier-are-brain-computer-interfaces-the-future-of-communication/.
PIEE (2022, Oct 24). What is Globalization? And has the Global Economy Shaped the United States? Retrieved April 2024 from Peterson Institute for International Economics: https://www.piie.com/microsites/globalization/what-is-globalization.