Computational visualization for critical thinking

This paper looks back at historical precedents for how computational systems and ideas have been visualized as a means of access to and engagement with a broader audience, and to develop a new more tangible language to address abstraction. These precedents share a subversive ground in using a visual language to provoke new ways of engaging with about complex ideas. Two new approaches to visualizing algorithmic systems are proposed for the emerging context of algorithmic ethics in society, looking at prototypical algorithms in computer vision and machine learning systems, to think through the meaning created by algorithmic structure and process. The aim is to use visual design to provoke new kinds of thinking and criticality that can offer opportunities to address algorithms in their increasingly more politicized role today. These new approaches are developed from an arts research perspective to support critical thinking and arts knowledge through creative coding and interactive design

Teaching psychology to computing students

The aim of this paper is twofold. The first aim is to discuss some observations gained from teaching Psychology to Computing students, highlighting both the wide range of areas where Psychology is relevant to Computing education and the topics that are relevant at different stages of students’ education. The second aim is to consider findings from research investigating the characteristics of Computing and Psychology students. It is proposed that this information could be considered in the design and use of Psychology materials for Computing students. The format for the paper is as follows. Section one will illustrate the many links between the disciplines of Psychology & Computing; highlighting these links helps to answer the question that many Computing students ask, what can Psychology offer to Computing? Section two will then review some of the ways that I have been involved in teaching Psychology to Computing students, from A/AS level to undergraduate and postgraduate level. Section three will compare the profiles of Computing and Psychology students (e.g. on age, gender and motivation to study), to highlight how an understanding of these factors can be used to adapt Psychology teaching materials for Computing students. The conclusions which cover some practical suggestions are presented in section four

The ethics of machine translation

In this paper I first describe the two main branches in machine translation research. I then go to discuss why the second of these, statistical machine translation, can cause some malaise among translation scholars. As some of the issues that arise are ethical in nature, I stop to ponder what an ethics of machine translation might involve, before considering the ethical stance adopted by some of the main protagonists in the development and popularisation of statistical machine translation, and in the teaching of translation

What Should We Share? : Understanding the Aim of Intercultural Information Ethics

The aim of Intercultural Information Ethics (IIE), as Ess aptly puts, is to “(a) address both local and global issues evoked by ICTs / CMC, etc., (b) in a ways that both sustain local traditions / values / preference, etc. and (c) provide shared, (quasi-) universal responses to central ethical problems” (Ess 2007a, 102). This formulation of the aim of IIE, however, is not unambiguous. In this paper, I will discuss two different understandings of the aim of IIE, one of which advocates “shared norms, different interpretations” and another proposes “shared norms, different justifications”. I shall argue that the first understanding is untenable, and the second understanding is acceptable only with qualification. Finally, I shall briefly suggest an alternative way to understand the aim of IIE

A Value-Sensitive Design Approach to Intelligent Agents

This chapter proposed a novel design methodology called Value-Sensitive Design and its potential application to the field of artificial intelligence research and design. It discusses the imperatives in adopting a design philosophy that embeds values into the design of artificial agents at the early stages of AI development. Because of the high risk stakes in the unmitigated design of artificial agents, this chapter proposes that even though VSD may turn out to be a less-than-optimal design methodology, it currently provides a framework that has the potential to embed stakeholder values and incorporate current design methods. The reader should begin to take away the importance of a proactive design approach to intelligent agents

Educational software reflecting two philosophical approaches to ethics education

Ethics education can vary considerably in its instructional strategies based on differences in the theoretical positions underlying the approach to moral development being stressed. Two such approaches are the 'justice' approach as exemplified by Kohlberg's six stages of moral development, and the 'care ethic' approach as exemplified by Gilligan's work on empathy as a base for moral decision-making. Each of these approaches can be demonstrated through different instructional strategies in the ethics education course, but each strategy is often difficult to execute in practice, given time and resource constraints

Large-Scale Analysis of the Accuracy of the Journal Classification Systems of Web of Science and Scopus

Journal classification systems play an important role in bibliometric analyses. The two most important bibliographic databases, Web of Science and Scopus, each provide a journal classification system. However, no study has systematically investigated the accuracy of these classification systems. To examine and compare the accuracy of journal classification systems, we define two criteria on the basis of direct citation relations between journals and categories. We use Criterion I to select journals that have weak connections with their assigned categories, and we use Criterion II to identify journals that are not assigned to categories with which they have strong connections. If a journal satisfies either of the two criteria, we conclude that its assignment to categories may be questionable. Accordingly, we identify all journals with questionable classifications in Web of Science and Scopus. Furthermore, we perform a more in-depth analysis for the field of Library and Information Science to assess whether our proposed criteria are appropriate and whether they yield meaningful results. It turns out that according to our citation-based criteria Web of Science performs significantly better than Scopus in terms of the accuracy of its journal classification system

A précis of philosophy of computing and information technology

The authors recently finished a comprehensive chapter on “Philosophy of Computing and Information Technology” for the forthcoming (fall 2009) Philosophy of Technology and Engineering Sciences (Ed.: A. Meijers), Volume IX in the Elsevier series Handbook of the Philosophy of Science (Eds.: D. Gabbay, P. Thagard and J. Woods). The purpose of the chapter is to review and discuss the main developments, concepts, topics, and contributors in the intersection between philosophy and computing, as well as provide some suggestions on how to structure the many subcategories within what is loosely referred to as philosophy of computing. In this short synopsis, we will give an outline of the kinds of issues raised in this chapter

An exploratory investigation of aberrant consumer behaviour in Libya: a sociocultural approach

Studies concerning aberrant consumer behaviour (ACB) are dominated by research conducted in the West. By examining the impact social and cultural factors have on the management and understanding of ACB in Libya, a Muslim country, this paper extends knowledge by exploring this issue in a different setting. Materials were collected by conducting in-depth interviews with 26 sellers in Libya and ACB was explored in three different contexts: grocery stores, computer stores and hotels. The study finds that the sellers use alternative marketplace behaviours to manage ACB to that described in the literature, namely informal, community based approaches which reflect accepted societal and cultural norms. Furthermore, the study finds that not all activities reported to be ACB in the literature are perceived to be misbehaviour by the Libyan sellers

"Revolution? What Revolution?" Successes and limits of computing technologies in philosophy and religion

Computing technologies like other technological innovations in the modern West are inevitably introduced with the rhetoric of "revolution". Especially during the 1980s (the PC revolution) and 1990s (the Internet and Web revolutions), enthusiasts insistently celebrated radical changes— changes ostensibly inevitable and certainly as radical as those brought about by the invention of the printing press, if not the discovery of fire.\ud These enthusiasms now seem very "1990s�—in part as the revolution stumbled with the dot.com failures and the devastating impacts of 9/11. Moreover, as I will sketch out below, the patterns of diffusion and impact in philosophy and religion show both tremendous success, as certain revolutionary promises are indeed kept—as well as (sometimes spectacular) failures. Perhaps we use revolutionary rhetoric less frequently because the revolution has indeed succeeded: computing technologies, and many of the powers and potentials they bring us as scholars and religionists have become so ubiquitous and normal that they no longer seem "revolutionary at all. At the same time, many of the early hopes and promises instantiated in such specific projects as Artificial Intelligence and anticipations of virtual religious communities only have been dashed against the apparently intractable limits of even these most remarkable technologies. While these failures are usually forgotten they leave in their wake a clearer sense of what these new technologies can, and cannot do