I think artificial intelligence should be embraced, but it should be embraced responsibly. Sure, there are aspects and potential consequences of it that should be feared, but I think the best thing we can do is try to address how we plan on handling such situations. History shows us that innovation is inevitable, and so I don’t think this is a question of whether we should stop artificial intelligence and automation but rather how are we going to respond to it. There is a legitimate fear that such innovation can threaten many jobs, and I don’t think that can be prevented but we as a society can respond to such automation in a way that mitigates the harm that comes out of such a grand loss of employment.
I do believe offering some sort of a universal basic income as a large number of jobs have been automated or are in danger of being automated in the near future. Many people who have these jobs have been doing such work their whole life, so it’s not reasonable to expect them to smoothly transition to a higher skilled newly created job. Many don’t have the time or money for further education, rather they likely have immediate needs to take care of themselves and their families. Given that greater profits are being made out of their jobs being automated, it makes sense that more taxes are accumulated to support these people who have been stripped of their means to make a living. I know in class the concern that UBI would make the prices of everything go up so it wouldn’t really have a positive impact, but I don’t think that would be the case. Usually, prices rise when cost of living rises, which can be due to more demand to live in places with not enough housing to meet the demand and higher wages that correlate with the higher cost of living. UBI isn’t asking wages to be increased and it wouldn’t necessarily raise demand for housing in a particular area. I look at San Francisco, where many more millionaires are made with each IPO of a startup in the area, which also means many more people who can’t afford housing and may end up homeless. I think people receiving $1000 a month won’t change the prices in a city that has already been plagued by such gentrification. The biggest impact I see it having is that those struggling the most with poverty may finally afford to survive in the city or will at least have the means to move out of the city to a place with more reasonable prices. In the end, I think society’s greatest responsibility with the rise of such innovation is to make sure that the people of the present are forgotten. I get that there is hope that new jobs will be created, and that may be true. If that is not the case, we must be prepared to handle mass unemployment. Even if it does turn out to be the case, we should be mindful of the people of the present that are being harmed and will not receive any benefit from such newly created jobs.
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The greatest service that the internet provides is a convenient, accessible form of communication and expression. As it becomes more widespread across the world, fair access is definitely something that should be considered and think in the future people should have the option of at least one net netural internet provider.Regardless of where we are and who we are surrounded by, the internet allows us to learn what is going on in the minds of other people around the world. While this is a blessing, there can also be a downside, as many choose to express and share extremely unpleasant things on the internet. While there may be cases were such things should be limited, we have to be very careful about how much censorship we will tolerate as a society, or else our freedom of speech on the internet may be pulled out right from under us.
I agree with our government’s belief that speech that presents a clear and present danger to the safety of others should not be allowed. I like this idea because it stops speech that can harm others but the requirements of “clear and present” make it hard to abuse this rule to enforce censorship. I think such speech should not be allowed on the internet and support tech companies taking down such content. Beyond speech that presents a danger, I do not believe anything else should be required to be censored. When a website that promotes open and transparent communication, such as Twitter, starts censoring speech on their platform I worry because what we as the public see is based on their discretion, and I’m not sure we can always trust their discretion. Once we as a society start accepting censorship, we leave the door open for those with influence to censor to their advantage. I know it’s starting to sound like a cliche to say that this is a slippery slope to becoming like China, but this is the reality that exists on the other side of the world in a country where censorship is clearly abused. I thought Rayyan brought up a good point in class where he pointed out how the Chinese government uses their negative classifications of the Uyghurs to limit their speech. Our government and tech corporations as well likely have groups that they aren’t fond of, once we tolerate censorship we are making it easy for them to silence those groups. It may seem like it we should easily be able to recognize and go against censorship that is unjust, but we must remember that if the internet is censored we may be unaware of the reality of the situation, and therefore we could be ignorant of such injustice. I’m pretty sure many of the people in China would be against the unfair treatment of the Uyghurs if they were fully aware of it, but thanks to censorship they are not. Another reason I do not support most censorship on the internet is that I think it’s important for us to be aware of what others think and believe, regardless of whether we agree with it or not. Simply censoring others doesn’t solve the problem, it just makes us unaware of it. Another student in class brought up a great point when he said that the problem with removing all racist posts on social media is that then people on social media will have the misconception no longer exists. When you censor immoral thoughts, you are not resolving them but rather hiding them. When people who say terrible things are removed from the mainstream popular platforms, where they would see a majority of contrasting views, they tend to go to more infamous platforms that become echo chambers for people who think like them. Now these people are no longer exposed to contrasting views, while the mainstream general public will have the misconception that these people no longer exist. The unfortunate reality is that there are people in this world who will express thoughts and beliefs that we will find unpleasant and hurtful, but I think it is important that we remain aware of that reality, because it’s that awareness will drive us to improve the situation, rather than ignore it. I think corporations should have moral obligations and responsibilities in the sense that they should not be intentionally causing harm or knowingly aiding in harming society. It’s hard to expect them to do the right thing, because the law doesn’t even expect individuals to always do the right thing, it just expects them to avoid doing certain wrong things. In the end it’s going to come down to what leadership and board members of these corporations value and find the most important. If their main focus is profits and they break the law to work towards their goal, then they should be punished by the government. However, if they reach their goal through morally questionable, but legal, ways, then it’s going to be up to the consumers and employees of the company to push back in the ways they can impact the company. We see this today through customer boycotts and employee petitions/resignations. The reality is that corporations are going to pursue their financial interests, and if we end up being in the leadership positions that make us a part of that conversation, then we should ensure that such pursuits are ethical. Even if we are not in that position, whether we are a consumer or an employee, we can still make our voices heard.
The government needs to enforce fair play and competition between corporations. First the main concern is financially abusing the consumer. We don’t want a case where a single company can drive up the prices of their products without concern because they have no competition. That would be awful, especially if it’s for something that people really need. Therefore, the government always needs to monitor that. Also, corporations should not be able to abuse the positions they are in to unfairly target competition. That means using whatever leverage you have to hide a competitor's product from the consumer is not right. Consumers should have the fair choice of the product they prefer. This ensures better overall customer satisfaction and encourages each competitor to produce the best product they can, thereby winning over customers through quality and not through other tactics. This is harder for the government to monitor, as it would take more investigation, but unfair tactics to attack competition need to be recognized and punished. Corporations needs to accept the fact that if they want their products and services to succeed, then that is going to depend on the quality they are providing. I know this idealistic, but I think the examples we have gone over in class have shown us that companies do play better when they are forced to suffer consequences for unfair play. These companies that break the rules, their main goal is to grow, and if the government punishes them to a point where that hurts their growth, then it will be in their best interest to run and compete fairly. The government must be involved for the sake of consumers, smaller companies, and quality products. As we’ve seen, the US and EU have made some effective moves in this regard, hopefully this positive trend continues. I think national security becomes a concern when its efforts bring fear to those they are trying to protect. I understand that there is a certain degree of surveillance that is effective in keeping us safe and I believe people are approving of that. However, there is a point when a Big Brother dystopia is a concern. I do not believe that narrative is not complete paranoia, as countries like China seem to be heading towards that direction, especially with the way they collect data and their new social credit score system that they are going to be implementing next year. When a government continues to grow in surveillance power, there seems to be no going back as governments are typically reluctant to give up power. One can argue that currently our central government is the strongest it’s ever been in terms of have power over the country, which can be due to increased technology as well as evolving political ideologies. Yes, while we may currently be in a state of concern for our national security due to countless tragic events that have occurred in this century in this country, we need to be careful how we react to such events in terms of giving our government more power. We need to consider the reality of the power that is given will likely difficult take back, and that can be a problem in the case that our government becomes influenced by troubling ideologies. For example, currently our government seems to have troubling anti-immigrantion sentiments and a lot of technology has been used to deport many innocent migrants. History shows that any group of people can be the target of the government. I like how Seun mentioned how the FBI worked against the Black Panther party, as this is an example of how the government can abuse their capabilities to harm Americans. I think more needs to be done, like possibly making another amendment, to draw a line for the protection of our privacy. I’m not sure where that line should be drawn, but I think it should prevent our government from using technology to know everything possible about us. If this is a democracy, then I would say privacy needs to be paramount, because losing privacy takes away the power of the people and it can suppress the voice of the people. Without protection of privacy, the power goes to those who are able to infiltrate people’s privacy, and if the government has that unlimited ability, then we may find ourselves under a totalitarian regime. I think it’s good that our country has this back and forth on the issue. Everyone has different perspectives and many make fair points. We may never get it just right, but the important thing is that we avoid the extremes of either total lack of privacy or complete ignorance in terms of national security. Our government has a fair need for gathering intelligence, they just have to be kept in check, as all parts of our balanced government should be.
The main point of whistleblowing is to provide a service for the common good. There was no guarantee that it would turn out well for Roger Boisjoly or Chelsea Manning, but how speaking up impacts the person who blew the whistle shouldn’t determine its value. Rather it should be valued based on how the common good benefited from it. Knowing about the issues with the Challenger was important because it made many more engineers and businesses aware of the severe consequences that arise when certain risks are ignored. I do think that tech workers should speak the truth when the common good needs it. Of course it is hard to analyze whether one is truly helping the common good through speaking up, so it would take a lot of contemplation of the situation before committing to such a major action. Nevertheless, people must be proactive in their judgement and not simply be blind followers of whoever they are under. History does not look well upon people who were complicit in wrongdoing. If one has any sort of power to stop or expose such wrongdoing, then one should be willing to act. Of course it is a difficult decision to make, as it could cost one everything, as in the case of Roger Boisjoly, but the unfortunate reality is that can be the cost of doing the right thing. This reminds me of the slogan from Colin Kaepernick’s Nike commercial: “Believe in something, even if it means sacrificing everything.” I guess it is important to note that everything in this context is restricted to more worldly desires. Kaepernick may have lost his football career for what he did but he may have gained a lot more value on a personal level. Same with Roger and Chelsea, they lost a lot, but maybe they gained more in the intangibles. If we want to use a Christian lens, all the past martyrs lost the physical world through death, but they have glory in heaven. In the end it is all about standing up for what you believe is right, many can go their lives without encountering a situation where they have to make huge sacrifices for what is right, but some face such a scenario in the most grandest terms, and the sacrifices they will make will have unbelievable impact. Given the large influence technology is having on the world, speaking up in this industry can be huge. Of course, people must use their best judgement when speaking out. If there are internal protocols for addressing a grievance, those proper channels should be taken. The goal shouldn’t be to take someone down, but rather to fix what is wrong, and speaking out to the public should only be done when it is clear that this is the only reasonable way to fix that wrong. In most cases it won’t come to this, as most people are reasonable and will be willing to work with you. It is only in the extreme cases were drastic measures have to be taken, and that is when people need to rise to the occasion. When done right, speaking up can be one of the greatest things a person can do.
For us to make progress in developing and improving the tech industry, we have to acknowledge and address two facts. First, the tech community is currently lacking in diversity. Second, historical and cultural limitations placed on certain groups can be to blame for such a lack of diversity. If everyone could see this, then I don’t think there would be as much outrage against diversity conferences or affirmative action. Rather, I think people would be more willing to accept the fact that we need things like these to open up a community that has been closed off to many and is currently unbalanced for unfortunate reasons. It is going to take more effort and extra consideration to open up this community and truly make it a welcoming place for all who are interested. The process is not going to be easy, both for people entering the community as representatives for their minority groups, and for the people who historically have an advantage in the community as they will have to give up some power. From the conversations we saw in class, it is tough feeling the pressure and expectations of being a minority going into tech, and it can also be difficult for those who aren’t a minority in tech to see others get extra help or consideration especially in the job market. No one said this process was going to be easy or completely fair, if there was a potential perfect solution to solving tech’s diversity problems, then there wouldn’t be a controversy in the first place. Regardless of whether we can get everyone to recognize the problem, it is absolutely necessary that we try to solve it. The tech industry is continuously growing and terms of power and influence on the world. Given the current scale of globalization, it is dangerous to have this power be exclusively dominated by a homogenous group. If tech is going to serve the world, then we should make sure that the people it are diverse in every sense of the word. Also, the tech industry is taking over the job market, and there may be a point where the majority of available jobs are going to come from this industry. If at this point the issues of diversity have not been improved, then women and minorities may severely economically suffer as they may be left out of the only jobs that will provide them a source of income. For a society that has been putting great effort into empowering its underrepresented groups, we could take a big step backwards if we do not address this issue. There are good efforts right now being made to address the issue of the lack of diversity, but it seems like there are still a lot of people in the industry who still don’t acknowledge the issue. True change will require more hands on deck, so as we try to fix these issues we must put effort into converting people to at least recognize the issue, and then hopefully progress will be expedited.
In general I find the tech hiring process reasonable. There are a lot of things about it that can be fixed, but I find myself agreeing with Joel’s remarks from class that there is no such thing as a perfect hiring process. While whiteboard interviews can be stressful and may not have much to do with the actual work that is done on the job, I think they are a reasonable way to evaluate new grads going into industry. As long as the greater the focus is on how we work and communicate when trying to solve problems rather than the solution itself, I think companies can get a fair assessment on how you will work on a team. The typical questions asked are especially fair for new grads as they generally cover data structures and algorithms that we should have learned in college. I think it gets a little more blurry when we talk about interviewing industry veterans, as the focus should be on their experience rather than concepts they learned back in college. One concern with big tech companies is that I feel they do not seem to pay much attention to anything beyond technical skills in their interviews. I have been through an interview process that was four back to back whiteboarding interviews. I think I got a few quick questions about some of the technical stuff I worked on in my resume, but none of it felt behavioral. The Cracking the Coding Interview book talks about passing the “Can I have a beer with this person” test, which means whether one can work with this person, and I feel without a behavioral portion of an interview you are missing an important examination of one’s ability to work on a team, a necessary skill for software engineering. The other unfortunate reality of the hiring process for many tech companies is that while there are a lot of students that want jobs at such companies and apply to them, there are probably not even enough people at those companies to look at every application, much less give everyone a chance to show their skills at an interview. So just getting through the gate and even having a chance at an interview can be a result of luck and seizing opportunities. Connecting with the right people at career fairs and going to conferences can do wonders (if I could tell my incoming-freshman self one thing it would be to go to every conference you can go to), so like most professional industries, getting hired is not just the result of applications and interviews, as there are many other factors that go into it. Careerwise, I have been really blessed to go to Notre Dame, as the school encourages and provides resources for being proactive in your career search. However, many talented people with a lot of potential do not get as much resources or support but are definitely qualified for the tech industry. With that in mind I hope that hiring processes involve a deeper search for talent than simply looking at school names, as Bui reference when talking about his time at Eau Clare. Hiring people from the same schools carries the risk of having a lack of diversity and further giving future students from those schools a greater advantage thanks to alumni connections.
Overall, if I were to be identified by one thing it would be as a servant of God. That’s an identity I have to strive for everyday. This does not necessarily call for a life of religious vocation, as I feel like we all have opportunities to serve in our own unique way. Through my career, I hope to provide a quality service to the world. Careerwise, I do identity as a Software Engineer, as I hope to be a part of producing and maintaining technological solutions to people’s problems. I have been really privileged to be able to have studied Computer Science at Notre Dame and to have received the opportunities to gain experience at the places I have worked at. I want to make sure I make good use of the privileges by having a positive impact on the world, and I think the best way for me to do that is by being a Software Engineer. Yes I do share an interest with the hacker mentality of focusing on creation, but I have a passion for ensuring quality. While our generation has seen countless innovations, we must not forget all the tech controversies that have made much the general public skeptical about technology. Whatever I create or maintain as a Software Engineer, I want to make sure it is something that people can trust. The article “Programmers: Stop Calling Yourselves Engineers” made me upset, not just because of the accusations, but moreover the fact that the author’s points were valid. Currently, Software Engineers are not held to as high as a standard as compared to other engineers. This is worrisome, because given the role technology plays in our society, Software Engineers should be more than willing to hold themselves to such a standard. Sure, there is the excuse that this is one of the newer forms of engineering and it with that comes some learning experiences, but now we have plenty of examples to learn from in these past decades. There is no excuse for the tech industry to not clean up its act by now. There seems to be a stereotype for “techies”: that we are full of hubris and indifference, that we go to places like Silicon Valley to make a lot of money, flex our tech intellect, and do it all without a care for the places we are gentrifying or the people we could be harming through our production. This is the public perception, and there is a reality to such a thought, but as true Software Engineers we must work to prove such a perception wrong and regain public credibility. Technology is impacting people all over the world, and we must make sure that as producers of such technology that such people’s needs and wellbeing are being prioritized. I hope the world sees Software Engineers as people dedicated to crafting sound solutions that they can trust, same as they would see a civil or mechanical engineer. As a Software Engineer I see the world as our stakeholders, and the focus should be using technology to serve them. By serving others, we serve God, and that’s how I see my career identity complementing the life identity I strive for.
Ethical responsibility comes down to having a positive impact on the world. Are we somehow, someway making the world better through our existence? This isn’t just calculated as some moral sum of our lives; you could have done benevolent things the majority of your life but it doesn’t really matter if you do something awful today. Rather being ethically responsible is a choice we make every moment in our life. We can’t undo are ethical failings of the past, but we can learn from them and put those lessons to practice in the present. We shouldn’t rest on the laurels of our ethical successes of the past either, but rather keep striving to have a positive impact today. When I talk about what I look for in a career, I always say I want to use technology to have a positive impact on the world. However, Bui made me rethink the future tense of this motto when he said we shouldn’t simply think about doing good when we’re well into our careers but rather try to use our skills to do good today. I keep saying I want to do good, but there’s no reason I can’t be doing that right now. Sometimes I can fall into the trap of being complacent with “I’m not doing anything wrong.” But the Parable of the Talents teaches us that such complacency is wrong, as we should be contributing our talents to the world. I shouldn’t wait to contribute such talents, as what really matters ethically is the I am making contributions right now. I hope to do more now to help the community, as I know that simply going to class and working a campus job is not morally sufficient, but rather complacent. I need to be morally proactive, and see how I can better contribute to society. The class discussions about whether coding is a superpower and the reference to Uncle Ben’s “With great power comes great responsibility” reminded of the DVD cover of Spiderman 3, one of my personal favorite movies. It reads “Every Hero Has a Choice.” I think it can be argued that anybody in any career has an opportunity to be a hero, and it all hinges on the choices that we make. As a devout Catholic I believe one of the greatest gifts God has given us is free choice, as it allows us to really prove ourselves in life. Through the choices we make each and every day, the goal is to express that I am a servant to others, and therefore a servant to God. I knew this goal going into college, and it feels like ever since then I go through cycles of proactively achieving it and passively neglecting it. What I really need to strive for is consistency, so I that I am always actively express such ethical responsibility. I heard a lot of great interpretations of living an ethical life in class this week, but the one that hit me the hardest was the one from Ed Mylett that Horacio shared at the end of Thursday’s class: “My dream is that at the end of my life when I meet the man I could have become, the best version of myself... we are identical twins. For me that is heaven.” With the large impact of tech and recent controversies, there are a lot of moral concerns when it comes to careers in technology. As people pursuing those careers, the best thing we can do to ensure a good future is to be the best versions of ourselves as we approach these high impact jobs.
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AuthorMarcos Salamanca Archives
October 2019
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