Responses to the sudden emergence of widely available artificial intelligence tend to swing between those who believe these technologies will deliver a utopia of unlimited growth and opportunity or inflict a robot-dominated dystopia of human obsolescence. In the space between those two polls, some are engaged in serious ethical reflection that attempts to weigh out the possible impacts of AI in light of the preexisting social trends.

One of the more thoughtful, and fair-minded critics of emerging technologies is Evan Selinger, a professor of philosophy at Rochester Institute of Technology. In his research, Dr. Selinger asks how technology has affected our personal obscurity in society (the right not to be known), and how mass surveillance and optimization affects human work. 

Mentioned in the Episode

Don Ihde

Patrick Grim

Woodrow Hertzog

Social obscurity paper

Digital doubles – in production and manufacturing

Reengineering Humanity

Taylorism

Frederick Winslow Taylor

Brett Frischmann