Syllabus

Overview

Course Description:

Most decisions today are made by software, most of the rules of society are interpreted and enforced by programs, and much human interaction is now mediated by computing platforms that decide what people see and who they can talk to. As the people who decide what software gets written and how it is deployed, computer scientists have disproportionate power to mold society — for both good and bad. This will be a discussion and project-based seminar focused on ethical issues faced by computing systems and the people who design, build, and deploy them.

Course Objectives: The goal of this course is to raise awareness and increase understanding of the moral and ethical aspects of computing systems. This course is more about raising questions and developing intellectual frameworks for thinking about difficult problems than about developing technical skills. Few, if any, of the problems we will discuss have easy answers, but hopefully we will have an engaging time discussing them and develop more sophisticated ways of thinking about them.

Class Meetings: The scheduled course meetings are Tuesdays and Thursdays at 9:30-10:45am. Because this is a discussion-based course, it is essential that students attend and fully participate in the scheduled class meetings.

All planned meetings will be conducted on-line, with no expectations for in person meetings. (In the happy, but unlikely, event that we are all fully vaccinated before the end of the semester, we might have an in person meeting, but we won’t do this until it is confirmed that everyone in the class has completed the vaccination schedule.)

Pandemic. The challenges we are facing with the current pandemic places our community under tremendous stress, and we appreciate that many of our students are dealing with extreme personal challenges this semester. You should prioritize your own physical and mental health, and the well-being of your friends and family, over any class.

I endeavor to teach the class in a way that provides an experience that is as valuable as what you would receive if we were able to hold in person classes, but know that remote learning presents substantial challenges, and that many students will have circumstances that make things especially difficult. I want the class to be a low stress, high value experience for everyone.

I will do everything I can to accommodate students varying situations, and to ensure that every student has the best opportunity possible to succeed in the class and have a good experience. Please communicate with me (Dave) to let us know about difficulties you are facing, or anything I can do to make things better for you.

Preparation

We expect students entering cs3501 to be familiar enough with computer science and software development to be able to read technical papers and engage in discussions about how we build and evaluate computing systems. We will discuss topics that involve machine learning, cryptography, and network protocols, but do not expect all students to have previous background in these areas.

Instructor

David Evans

This is the first time this course (or anything similar) has been offered. Although this course will be quite different from any previous course I have taught, my closest previous course is a a Pavillion Seminar on How will Artificial Intelligence Change Humanity?. I have also taught courses on Security and Privacy of Machine Learning, Markets, Mechanisms, and Machines, and cryptocurrencies, which might include some of the topics we will touch on in this class.

Email: Students should feel free to email me at evans@virginia.edu anytime and about anything you would like to discuss or think it would be good for me to know. I usually respond to emails quickly and reliably (at least I try to!), so if you don’t hear back within 24 hours, please send a follow-up reminder.

Office Hours and Scheduling Meetings: I will hold open office hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays after class. You don’t need to schedule an appointment to come to office hours - they are open to everyone. If you would like to schedule a meeting at another time, use https://davidevans.youcanbook.me/ to schedule a time (if you can’t find anything that works there, email me your scheduling constraints).

Communication

We will primarily use the course website for one-to-many communications (posting course materials) and the github Discussions site for interactive discussion.

Course Website: All course materials that can be posted publicly will be posted at https://csethics.github.io. We may occasionally use the collab site to post materials we cannot post publicly.

Discussion: We will use the github discussions site for interactive discussions: https://github.com/csethics/csethics.github.io/discussions. (See more about this below.)

Course Format

The course will be divided into five teams of five students each. Most weeks, one of the teams will be responsible for leading the class; one of the teams will be responsible for writing the blog post about the week; and the remaining students will be responsible for writing short reaction posts and engaging in the discussion both on-line and in class.

The standard week for the course will be something like this:

Wednesday night (or earlier): Reading/Viewing Assignment specified

Sunday, 10:59pm: Initial responses to reading assignment due (posted in Discussions forum)

Tuesday, 9:30-10:45am: Class meeting (first meeting on the week’s topic)

The team leading the week should have a plan for what to do both Tuesday and Thursday, but should be adaptive to what happens in class on Tuesday. This could include assigning additional (but not overly time consuming) tasks for students to do before Thursday, as well as provoking on-line discussion that would build on the in-class discussions Tuesday, and set-up the Thursday meeting.

Before Tuesday’s class meeting, the group responsible for leading the following week’s discussions should have prepared a plan and candidate list of materials for the next week (with my help), and meet with me after class Tuesday to finalize the plan for the following week.

Thursday, 9:30-10:45am: Class meeting (second and final meeting on the week’s topic)

Projects/Papers

Students will work on a semester-long project that can take the form of a paper, video, or computing artifact. The project should have some connection to the goals of the class, but these are interpreted broadly. The project can be done individually or in a team, but team projects must have ambition commensurate with the team size. My hope is the students to do projects that will be valuable and worthwhile to them personally as experience, but that will result in something of value beyond just as a course project.

Some ideas for potential projects include:

  • Select a software system deployed at UVA (e.g., SIS or anything used by this course) and evaluate it from an ethical viewpoint and considering how it could be designed to better serve some ethical goal.

  • Select a research paper in a recent conference, and evaluate its ethical aspects.

  • Write a paper that explores some ethical issue in computing.

  • Develop a web or mobile application that illustrates something relevant to this class (e.g., White Collar Early Warning System).

  • Consider a professional code of ethics (e.g., ACM Code of Ethics and Processional Conduct) and evaluate how useful it is in guiding difficult decisions as well as the ethical framework it assumes; evaluate how well the ACM (or other organization) actually follows its own ethics code.

There will be several intermediate project milestones during the semester, listed on the course schedule, and students will present their projects during the final week of class (May 4 and May 6).

Assessment

Grades will be determined based on four main components:

  1. (30%) Contributions fo the Class Discussions: this includes posting your responses to the readings, participating constructively in the on-line forum, and engaging usefully during the class meetings.

  2. (25%) Leading Classes: for the weeks where your team is leading the class, you will be evaluated on the plans for the week, how well they are executed, and how well you work together as a team. If the team works well together and everyone on the team contributes equitably, everyone will receive the same grade; if the team does not work together well, or individuals do not contribute equally to the team’s success, students will be graded based on their individual contributions.

  3. (15%) Blogging classes: for the weeks where your team is responsible for writing the blog summary, you will be evaluated on the quality of the content and writing.

  4. (30%) Projects

These weightings are just a rough guideline, and they will be adjusted on a case-by-case basis to reward students who make outstanding contributions in any areas.

Creating a Safe and Engaging Community

One of the topics we will discuss in the class is the tension between free speech and protecting society and individuals from harmful speech, and the challenges communication and publishing platforms have in deciding which constraints should be placed on users, and when people should be banished from the platform (and when platforms should be banished from other platforms for failing to do this adequately).

Because of the trusting and respectful community we are fortunate to have at the University of Virginia, balancing these goals should be easier for our class than it is for open Internet platforms. Still, we will discuss many difficult and sensitive topics in this class, and we want everyone to feel like they can discuss freely and to express contrarian opinions without fear of retribution, but also to avoid offending or traumatizing others. For this to work, everyone should:

  • Start from a presumption of mutual respect, and acknowledging that we all have different experiences and backgrounds, and that the experiences others have had may not be what you would guess.

  • Assume everyone in the class is well-meaning and that if something someone says seems offensive, to give them the benefit of the doubt that it is a result of careless wording, lack of experience, or misspeaking rather than of hateful intent.

  • But, not to tolerate offensive conduct from others. If someone says or does something that is hurtful or insensitive, to respectfully raise the issue and hope that it can be a learning and growing experience.

At times, you may be asked to argue for positions that are the opposite of what you believe. This is one of the best ways to understand other perspectives, as well as to develop one’s rhetorical skills.

Privacy and anonymity

Another thing we want to balance in this seminar is the desire to have an open course where the things we do may be valuable to the outside world, and to provide the advantages of anonymity in open discourse. For most of the course assignments, as well as the open discussion, we will be using the github Discussion site. To participate in the class, students will either need at least one github account, or to make a convincing argument why they are uncomfortable with this (in which case I will find an alternative).

The discussion site is publicly visible, which I think is usually a good thing and I hope will end up resulting in content that will be valuable beyond just this class, but is important to be aware of if you are posting something that some might consider controversial (and we do want this to be a place where contraian and dangerous ideas can be safely discussed without fear of repercussions).

You are encouraged to create a new github account with a pseudonym that is not connected to your known identity to participate in the on-line course discussions, and can use multiple pseudonyms if you would like. The one constraint is that if you would like to get credit (as far as course evaluation is concerned) for your contributions to the discussion, you should let me know the pseudonym you are using (which I will keep confidential). If you want to post using a pseudonym that is not known to me, that is fine (but won’t be possible to count this towards your class contribution).

Honor Expectations

We believe strongly in the value of a community of trust, and expect all of the students in this class to contribute to strengthening and enhancing that community. The course will be better for everyone if everyone can assume everyone else is trustworthy. I start with the assumption that all students at the university deserve to be trusted.

Collaboration Policy: For some assignments in this class you will work in teams; for other assignments, you are expected to work on your own. It should be clear which is which, and since most submissions are submitted to the Discussions forum, it would be silly to misrepresent someone else’s work as your own. I aim to make the language describing the policy as clear and unambiguous as possible, but if anything is ever unclear about the stated policy for an assignment, please clarify with me. The penalty for policy violations will be considered on a case-by-case basis, with a penalty commensurate the severity of the offense.

Additional Information

Special Circumstances: The University of Virginia strives to provide accessibility to all students. If you require an accommodation to fully access this course, please contact the Student Disability Access Center (SDAC) at (434) 243-5180 or sdac@virginia.edu. If you are unsure if you require an accommodation, or to learn more about their services, you may contact the SDAC at the number above or by visiting their website https://studenthealth.virginia.edu/sdac

Conflicts: It is our policy and practice to reasonably accommodate students so that they do not experience an adverse academic consequence when personal or family responsibilities, sincerely held religious beliefs or observances, or essential and inflexible activities (this might include academic conferences, music performances, and athletic events) conflict with academic expectations. The university has a specific policy for academic accommodations for religious observance or religious beliefs which this course will follow, but we do not consider religious observances to be more important than other kinds of important personal obligations which students do not have scheduling control over. If something is going on that conflicts with your coming to class or doing the assignments, please let me know about it.

Safe Environment: The University of Virginia is dedicated to providing a safe and equitable learning environment for all students. To that end, it is vital that you know two values that we and the University hold as critically important:

  1. Power-based personal violence will not be tolerated.
  2. Everyone has a responsibility to do their part to maintain a safe community on grounds (including in virtual environments).

If you or someone you know has been affected by power-based personal violence, more information can be found on the UVA Sexual Violence website that describes reporting options and resources available: https://www.virginia.edu/sexualviolence.

As your professors and as humans, know that we each care about you and your well-being and stand ready to provide support and resources as we can. As faculty members, we are responsible employees, which means that we are required by University policy and federal law to report what you tell us to the University’s Title IX Coordinator. The Title IX Coordinator’s job is to ensure that the reporting student receives the resources and support that they need, while also reviewing the information presented to determine whether further action is necessary to ensure survivor safety and the safety of the University community. If you would rather keep this information confidential, there are Confidential Employees you can talk to on Grounds (see https://eocr.virginia.edu/chart-confidential-resources ). The worst possible situation would be for you or your friend to remain silent when there are so many here willing and able to help.

Well-being: If you are feeling overwhelmed, stressed, or isolated, there are many individuals here who are ready and wanting to help. The Student Health Center offers Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) for all UVA students. Call 434-243-5150 (or 434-972-7004 for after hours and weekend crisis assistance) to get started and schedule an appointment. If you prefer to speak anonymously and confidentially over the phone, Madison House provides a HELP Line at any hour of any day: 434-295-8255.