Why stop here? We can also blame the people, who implemented such features on the TVs, the people who worked at companies, who used data acquired by these devices for advertisement, the people who worked on the mentioned ads for such devices and the people who bought products from companies, that spend money on such marketing techniques.
At this point you might as well blame the average guy for global warming...
The average guy is exactly the person responsible for global warming. The evil of the world is just the meta accumulation of the average person following their mirco incentives.
Having you own morale and ethics is far from futile. Each individual should be able to question the law and object taking part in something they don't agree, as long as it doesn't break the law.
Killing someone is legal in certain countries for different reasons (I'm not talking about war). Not sure I would like to get involved in that business, for instance if I don't agree on how and why people are sentenced to death in my country.
Some people are built with low ethics. Sure, if it's not made illegal, they'll always find someone to do it. Looks like in that case it might be illegal, as TV makers are sued.
It isn't ethically unsound. It's a commons/coordination problem. What is the optimal strategy in infinite-round prisoners dilemma with randomized opponents? The randomization effectively makes it an infinite series of one-round prisoners dilemma. So the best strategy is always to defect.
The only way you can change this is very high social trust, and all of society condemning anyone who ever defects.
If morality never factors into your own decisions, you don't get to be upset when it doesn't factor into other peoples'. In other words, society just sucks when everyone thinks this way, even if it true that resolving it is hard.
It is definitely ethically unsound and it is definitely a common example even related to Nazis. Similar to "just following orders". Which I'll remind everyone, will not save you in a court of law[0]...
You are abdicating your own moral responsibility on the assumption of a deterministic reality.
The literal textbook version of this ethical issue, one you'll find in literally any intro to ethics class is
If I don't do this job then somebody else will. The only difference is that I will not get paid and if I get paid I will do good with that money where as if somebody else gets paid they might not.
Sometimes a variant will be introduced with a direct acknowledgement of like donating 10% of your earnings to charity to "offset" your misgivings (ᶜᵒᵘᵍʰ ᴱᶠᶠᵉᶜᵗᶦᵛᵉ ᴬˡᵗʳᵘᶦˢᵐ ᶜᵒᵘᵍʰ).
But either way, it is you abdicating your personal responsibility and making the assumption that the job will be done regardless. But think about the logic here. If people do not think like you then the employer must then start offering higher wages in order to entice others. As there is some function describing people's individual moral lines and their desire for money. Even if the employer must pay more you are then helping deter that behavior because you are making it harder to implement. Alternatively the other person that does the job might not be as good at the job as you, making the damage done less than had you done the job. It's not hard to see that often this will result in the job not even existing as truthfully these immoral jobs are scraping the bottom of the barrel. Even if you are making the assumption that the job will be done it would be more naive to assume the job is done to the same quality. (But kudos on you for the lack of ego and thinking you aren't better than other devs)
If, for ethical reasons, fewer people were willing to take these jobs, then either salaries would have to rise or the work would be done less effectively.
If salaries rise, the business becomes more expensive and harder to scale.
If effectiveness drops, the systems are less capable of extracting/using people’s data.
Either way, refusing these jobs imposes real friction on the surveillance model.
If you want a deontological answer:
You have a responsibility not to participate in unethical behavior, even if someone else would.
The fact that it can be used to "justify" almost anything. It obviously doesn't work as a defense in the court, and neither does it work as a justification for doing legal but unethical things.
This attitude is the reason “someone is going to get paid”.
If you see a unattended laptop in a coffeeshop, do you steal it because “someone will steal it, so it might as well be me”?
Why stop here? We can also blame the people, who implemented such features on the TVs, the people who worked at companies, who used data acquired by these devices for advertisement, the people who worked on the mentioned ads for such devices and the people who bought products from companies, that spend money on such marketing techniques.
At this point you might as well blame the average guy for global warming...
The average guy is exactly the person responsible for global warming. The evil of the world is just the meta accumulation of the average person following their mirco incentives.
Where I'm from, it probably would not be stolen by anyone.
Where do you draw the line?
Ready to do anything for money as long as it seems legal-ish or your ass is covered by hierarchy?
If something should not be done: make it illegal. Trying to have a gentlemen's agreement not to do something seems like a futile position.
Having you own morale and ethics is far from futile. Each individual should be able to question the law and object taking part in something they don't agree, as long as it doesn't break the law.
Killing someone is legal in certain countries for different reasons (I'm not talking about war). Not sure I would like to get involved in that business, for instance if I don't agree on how and why people are sentenced to death in my country.
Some people are built with low ethics. Sure, if it's not made illegal, they'll always find someone to do it. Looks like in that case it might be illegal, as TV makers are sued.
Yeah, there are reasons why "someone is going to do it anyway" is a classic example of an ethically unsound argument.
It isn't ethically unsound. It's a commons/coordination problem. What is the optimal strategy in infinite-round prisoners dilemma with randomized opponents? The randomization effectively makes it an infinite series of one-round prisoners dilemma. So the best strategy is always to defect.
The only way you can change this is very high social trust, and all of society condemning anyone who ever defects.
If morality never factors into your own decisions, you don't get to be upset when it doesn't factor into other peoples'. In other words, society just sucks when everyone thinks this way, even if it true that resolving it is hard.
5 replies →
It is definitely ethically unsound and it is definitely a common example even related to Nazis. Similar to "just following orders". Which I'll remind everyone, will not save you in a court of law[0]...
You are abdicating your own moral responsibility on the assumption of a deterministic reality.
The literal textbook version of this ethical issue, one you'll find in literally any intro to ethics class is
Sometimes a variant will be introduced with a direct acknowledgement of like donating 10% of your earnings to charity to "offset" your misgivings (ᶜᵒᵘᵍʰ ᴱᶠᶠᵉᶜᵗᶦᵛᵉ ᴬˡᵗʳᵘᶦˢᵐ ᶜᵒᵘᵍʰ).
But either way, it is you abdicating your personal responsibility and making the assumption that the job will be done regardless. But think about the logic here. If people do not think like you then the employer must then start offering higher wages in order to entice others. As there is some function describing people's individual moral lines and their desire for money. Even if the employer must pay more you are then helping deter that behavior because you are making it harder to implement. Alternatively the other person that does the job might not be as good at the job as you, making the damage done less than had you done the job. It's not hard to see that often this will result in the job not even existing as truthfully these immoral jobs are scraping the bottom of the barrel. Even if you are making the assumption that the job will be done it would be more naive to assume the job is done to the same quality. (But kudos on you for the lack of ego and thinking you aren't better than other devs)
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superior_orders
6 replies →
Care to articulate them?
If you want a consequentialist answer:
If, for ethical reasons, fewer people were willing to take these jobs, then either salaries would have to rise or the work would be done less effectively.
If salaries rise, the business becomes more expensive and harder to scale. If effectiveness drops, the systems are less capable of extracting/using people’s data.
Either way, refusing these jobs imposes real friction on the surveillance model.
If you want a deontological answer:
You have a responsibility not to participate in unethical behavior, even if someone else would.
The fact that it can be used to "justify" almost anything. It obviously doesn't work as a defense in the court, and neither does it work as a justification for doing legal but unethical things.