Debriefing on Ethics Bowl

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Debriefing on Ethics Bowl

• Dr. William J. Frey

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Why I posed these two scenarios

• Responding to Wallys Questions
• Concept Confidentiality (What is it and what are
  its limits)
• Exploring Confidentiality (right/duty grounded in
  property)
• Difficulty with tension between protecting IP and
  disseminating IP
• Fred has to work with diplomatic skills but be
  ready to exercise moral courage
• A value consideration
• How can Fred develop a response that balances
  reasonableness with responsibility? (To
  Chemitoil and Phaust)

• Wallys dilemma
• Balancing environmental values with safety. All
  of this within flexible cost constraints.
• Go back to Mountain Terrorist Dilemma
• One way to respond is to reject Wallys dilemma
• Recognizing a dilemma in two very different
  contexts
• Problem framing and specification
• Question rigorously whether, given strict
  financial constraints, we have to trade off
  safety and environmental security

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Why I posed these two scenarios?

• Inkjet
• Analogy between ethics and design
• solutions realize specifications and respond to
  constraints
• Need to integrate ethics into design upstream
• Multiple framings/definitions of an ethical
  problem

• Therac
• Making ethical decisions in face of uncertainty
• Uncertainty implies risk
• Where does risk fall? (Patients? Company?
  Manufacturer?)
• Issue of whistle-blowing
• Best practices in resolving ethical problems
• forming interest groups to exchange info and
  exert pressure
• Hager a moral exemplar in action

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Inkjet

• Defining problem as carrying out social
  responsibility
• Solution needs to respond to and integrate
  social/employment problem with environmental
  problem
• Realizing value within financial constraints
• Develop an effective recycling program
  (advertise, set up facility, solicit
  community/government support, sell solution to
  Board of Directors)
• Defining problem as developing a technical
  solution that realizes key ethical values
• Designing cartridges as recyclable
• Designing new printers (laser technology)
• Finding best practices in cartridge/ printer
  design or developing new technologies
• Feasibility? What do you do until you discover
  new technology?

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Therac

• Whistle-Blowing
• Morally Permissible
• Clear and present danger
• Notification of immediate supervisors
• Exhaustion of internal channels
• Morally Obligatory (1-3 plus)
• Documented Evidence
• Reasonable chance of success
• Consequences of Whistle-Blowing
• Disrupts trust within an organization
• Harms the whistle-blower
• Justified as a last resort in the face of
  overwhelming evidence of an impending serious and
  considerable harm

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Outcomes

• Inkjet
• Turning toward laser technology
• Outsourcing printers and technology to other
  companies
• Finding new applications for inkjet technology
  (medicine)

• Therac
• Hager worked carefully with operator to recreate
  error sequence
• AECL sent representatives to Texas
• Went to FDA who required CAPs from AECL
• Notified patients and other operators
• Formed Therac user groups

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What you did well

• You presented forcefully, courageously, and
  eloquently
• You responded to intensive criticism by
  practicing the virtue of perseverance
• Integrated broad moral considerations (integrity,
  responsibility, reversibility, whistle-blowing,
  patient safety/informed consent)
• You tested/debated Intermediate Moral Criteria
• Safety, Confidentiality, Social Responsibility,
  Environmental Integrity
• You practiced and realized reasonableness

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Communication Gaps

• Intended Message
• How you interpreted the criteria and what you
  intended to communicate
• We gave an intelligible presentation
• We integrated ethical concerns
• We dealt with feasibility issues
• We exercised moral imagination and creativity

• Received Message
• What your opponents and peer review teams heard
• We had trouble following parts
• We had trouble identifying the ethical
  considerations that guided your presentation
• Your solution strikes us as unrealistic
• You really didnt understand our disagreement and
  the other teams position

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Responding to the Gap

• Treat it as a challenge, not as a criticism or
  put down
• If you said it and they didnt hear it, then say
  it more carefully and say it again.
• Tell us what you are going to say, say it, tell
  us what you said
• Listen carefully to opponents and try to
  negotiate criteria
• What I heard you saying
• Have you considered interpreting it as X as well
  as Y?
• Use this as an opportunity to practice the skills
  and virtues of reasonableness

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Some Best Practices

• Intelligibility
• Tell us what you are going to say/do
• Say/Do it
• Summarize Tell us what you have done
• Ethical Integration
• Use the values and the tests
• Our solution is good because it is just
• Our solution is reversible, minimizes harm, and
  stands up to the light of publicity
• Feasibility
• Be proactive and anticipate an implementation
  problem (id resource, interest, and technical
  constraints
• Solve that problem
• Moral Imagination/Creativity
• Somebody might disagree with our position. They
  might say the following
• Think out of the box on inkjet cartridges (using
  technology for something else)
• Strength projecting into standpoint of employees
  in PR town or patients in Therac

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Use the software development cycle

• 1. Problem Specification
• 2. Solution Generation
• 3. Solution Testing
• 4. Solution Implementation

• 1. Intelligibility and Moral Imagination (more
  than one perspective)
• 2. Moral Creativity
• 3. Ethical Integration (integrate by testing
  solutions)
• 4. Use the feasibility test to id latent
  problems resource, interest, and technical
  constraints can block solution implementation

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Be Prepared to Be Lucky

• Go to module, Practical and Professional Ethics
  Bowl Activity Follow-Up In-Depth Case Analysis
  m13759
• Start by filling out worksheets
• STS, STS Values
• Develop a defensible problem statement plus other
  framings
• Fill out a Solution Evaluation Matrix
• Fill out a Feasibility Matrix
• Deepen your solution and arguments
• Start closing out you group activities for
  semester
• Review goals
• Identify some of the obstacles you encountered
• Review and describe some of your best practices
  and cautionary tales

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Final exam

• May 7 last class
• Assessment of Frey and course modules
• May 11 945, F329 Groups Carry Out Exercise
  Three, Team Work Module
• May 17 Turn in Group materials/final exam from
  730 to 430

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Areas for attention and improvement

• Right claim framework essential, vulnerable, and
  feasible. (Connect to autonomy)
• Reversibility Project yourself into the shoes of
  another (stakeholder)
• How does the action look from the receiving end?
• Avoid extremes of too much (getting lost) and too
  little (no sympathy)
• Keep working on values/virtues
• Each virtue can be specified into mean between
  extremes of too much and too little
• Build virtues into ethics bowl debate. Our
  solution realizes X values/virtues for Y and Z
  reasons.

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What you need to focus on now

• In depth case study analysis (Using STA to
  formulate problems, brainstorming lists, SEM, and
  Feasibility)
• Execute the software development cycle
• Respond to the feedback from the ethics bowl (and
  tell me in your self-evaluations)
• Review m13759 (Practical and Professional Ethics
  Bowl Activity Follow-Up In-Depth Case Analysis)
• Include the charts verbal explanations
• Process is as important as product.
  (Brainstorming lists, refined lists, explanation
  of process)

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What you need to focus on now

• Return to Ethics of Team Work Module (m13760) and
  carry out exercise three (final group
  self-evaluation)
• Review preliminary report
• What did you change?
• What did you learn?
• What were your obstacles and how did you overcome
  them?
• Individual member evaluation forms
• Each team member fills one out anonymously
• Evaluate yourself and your team members

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What you need to focus on now

• Case Summaries
• Concentrate on
• STS Values table for STS of case
• simple problem statement
• Brainstorming list of solutions refining
• solution evaluation matrix
• Feasibility matrix
• Solution Justification (ethics and feasibility)

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What is important now

• Closing out the ethics bowl
• Debating and reflecting on the challenges of
  ethics advocacy
• Peer Reviewing and how to instantiate the virtue
  of reasonableness (active/critical listening)
• Building reactions into self-evaluation