Floridi Research Articles

Two Concepts of Group Privacy

Luciano Floridi was not the first to discuss the idea of group privacy, but he was perhaps the first to discuss it in relation to the insights derived from big data analytics. He has argued that it is important to investigate the possibility that groups have rights to privacy that are not reducible to the privacy of individuals forming such groups. In this paper, we introduce a distinction between two concepts of group privacy. The first, the “what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas” privacy (in the following: WHVSV privacy), deals with confidential information shared with the member of a group and inaccessible to (all or a specific group of) outsiders. The second, to which we shall refer as inferential privacy, deals with the inferences that can be made about a group of people defined by a feature, or combination thereof, shared by all individuals in the group. We show why we unreservedly agree with Floridi that groups can have a form of privacy that amounts to more than the mere fact of being sets of individuals each of whom has individual privacy; moreover, like Floridi, we find it plausible that at least some groups (those satisfying our definition of type-a groups) may have a right to a species of group privacy (that is, WHVSV privacy) as groups (and not just as individuals who belong to those groups). However, by turning our attention to the context of big data analytics, we show that the relevant, new notion of group privacy is one of inferential privacy. We argue that an absolute right (either of individuals or groups) to inferential privacy is implausible. We also show that many groups generated algorithmically (those satisfying our definition of type-b groups) cannot be right holders as groups (unless they become type-a groups).

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND THE FUTURE OF LEGAL EDUCATION: A PROVOCATION

This short paper explores, albeit in a preliminary fashion, challenges to legal education arising from the significant and radical impact of new information and communications technologies (ICTs) on law and legal practice. It uses the pervasiveness of ICTs to reframe the question of ‘law and technology’ from a philosophical perspective that sees information technology as an “environmental force”[1] that is capable of re-shaping our identity, agency and social relations, and hence constitutes a very significant means through which we make sense of the world.[2] The key question the paper poses thus emerges: how should we design the law curriculum when the law-technology relation is itself understood as a critical part of a continuing and profound transformation in what it means to be both a lawyer, and a human being?[1] Luciano Floridi (ed), The Onlife Manifesto. Being Human in a Hyperconnected Era (Springer, 2015) 1; Luciano Floridi, The 4th Revolution: How the Infosphere Is Reshaping Human Reality (Oxford University Press, 2014).[2] This contrasts with the broad but more limited, functional, orientation to technology which defines it (eg) as “any tool or technique, any product or process, any physical equipment or method of doing or making, by which human capability is extended” - Donald A Schön, Technology and Change: The New Heraclitus (Delacorte Press, 1967) 1.

Establishing the rules for building trustworthy AI

The European Commission’s report ‘Ethics guidelines for trustworthy AI’ provides a clear benchmark to evaluate the responsible development of AI systems, and facilitates international support for AI solutions that are good for humanity and the environment, says Luciano Floridi.

The Challenge of the Digital and the Future Archive: Through the Lens of The National Archives UK

On the 7th of June 2018, The National Archives UK held its inaugural digital lecture, delivered by Professor Luciano Floridi entitled “Semantic Capital: What it is and how to protect it”. The lecture was followed by a poster exhibition, showcasing nine cutting-edge digital research projects at The National Archives (You can listen to the lecture’s podcast and see the posters at: https://media.nationalarchives.gov.uk/index.php/digital-lecture-semantic-capital/ Accessed on 12 July 2018). This paper aims at giving a distinct overview of The National Archives’ digital research priorities, drawing on examples from the active and recently completed research projects, which were displayed at the exhibition on the 7th of June 2018. The focus of this paper is to discuss the research challenges that we are facing as we seek to become a second-generation digital archive, that is digital by instinct and design. By placing a particular emphasis on the conceptual and epistemological challenges relating to trust and openness, the paper suggests that research is the key for us as a rapidly evolving digital archive; enabling us not only to inform but also innovate around the forthcoming digital challenges, and helping us to define future directions and lead the shaping of the future archive.

Stuxnet and international law on the use of force: an informational approach

This article considers the Stuxnet cyberattack in the context of international law on the use of force below the armed attack threshold. With a focus on the concept of ‘force’ within Article 2(4) of the UN Charter, it is argued that international law embodies an anthropocentric and materialist view of violence. Violence, as traditionally understood in the context of Article 2(4), involves a state using kinetic weapons to damage or destroy physical property, or injure or kill human beings within another state. Using the Stuxnet incident as a case study and as a tool of critique, it is argued that the law's one-dimensional conception of violence, which focuses on physical damage, limits its ability to recognise the non-material harm Stuxnet caused to countless virtual entities and processes. As such, the law does not adequately account for the non-material ways in which states that are increasingly dependent on information and communication technologies can be harmed. As a means of overcoming the law's limited conception of violence, this article draws on Luciano Floridi's information ethics. This is a theory that extends its ethical concern beyond the material world to include all entities, whether natural or artificial, physical or virtual. In this article it is used both to critique the law's anthropocentrism and materialism and to provide an alternative account of the harm that Stuxnet caused.

Ethics

Whether an organisation is now large and powerful, or is in a garage in Silicon Valley waiting to launch the next disruptive wave, there is a feeling that IT has lost sight of basic social philosophies, and the ethics and fairness that underpin them. Brian Runciman MBCS spoke to Luciano Floridi, the Oxford Internet Institute’s Professor of Philosophy and Ethics of Information, about the issues.

Symposium 1: Using Philosophy of Information to look at teaching, technology and networked learning

In this conceptual paper, Luciano Floridi's philosophy of Information (PI) is interpreted and used for generating and presenting alternative or deviating, even provoking, understanding and scenarios on Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs), in connection with teaching and networked learning, today and in the future. The relation between teacher and technology and the functions of networked learning are here in focus for the application of Philosophy of information (PI) on issues of teachers, learners and technology. We are as humans, according to Floridi, presently changing our self-understanding, as we also have done at earlier occasions during history, for adapting to scientific and technological developments while still keeping but also changing our agency as humans. Humans are seen as the only known "semantic engines" in the world. The digital technology we presently use, with ICTs who process information and communicates in networks to other ICTs, changes our position and role as humans, as information-processing earlier was purely human activity. Now we have ICTs that are "syntactical engines"; they can process information both fast and precise, although they have "intelligence as a toaster". Humans today are in PI called "inforgs", living in an "infosphere", where information is the most critical asset, and we increasingly experience the world in informational terms. Floridi categorises ICTs as documenting, communicating and information-processing. A longer historical perspective on ICTs in teaching and learning, from Sumer 2000 B.C. and forward leads here to questioning if not the concepts of distance-, e- and online learning are soon old and obsolete, and mainly were continuing something traditional. What is characteristic for digital ICTs is according to Floridi the processing of information, and what we can find when we look for these ICTs in teaching and learning is Learning Analytics, Adaptive Learning, Calibrated Peer Review and similar ICTs for e-teaching. Furthermore, the general concepts of living together with information-processing ICTs are re-ontologisation, enveloping and transdiegetisation. These concepts describe what the ongoing integration of ICTs affects the human, as a teacher or a learner. Networked learning persists and is highly relevant, but includes also networking with applications of artificial intelligence. A critical discussion wraps up the paper.

Syntactical Informational Structural Realism

Luciano Floridi’s informational structural realism (ISR) takes a constructionist attitude towards the problems of epistemology and metaphysics, but the question of the nature of the semantical component of his view remains vexing. In this paper, I propose to dispense with the semantical component of ISR completely. I outline a Syntactical version of ISR (SISR for short). The unified entropy-based framework of information has been adopted as the groundwork of SISR. To establish its realist component, SISR should be able to dissolve the latching problem. We have to be able to account for the informational structures–reality relationship in the absence of the standard semantical resources. The paper offers a pragmatic solution to the latching problem. I also take pains to account for the naturalistic plausibility of this solution by grounding it in the recent computational neuroscience of the predictive coding and the free energy principle.

Regulate artificial intelligence to avert cyber arms race.

Define an international doctrine for cyberspace skirmishes before they escalate into conventional warfare, urge Mariarosaria Taddeo and Luciano Floridi. Define an international doctrine for cyberspace skirmishes before they escalate into conventional warfare, urge Mariarosaria Taddeo and Luciano Floridi.

Curating the infosphere

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to re-examine the proposal that Luciano Floridi’s philosphy of information (PI) may be an appropriate conceptual foundation for the discipline of library and information science (LIS).Design/methodology/approachA selective literature review and analysis are carried out.FindingsIt is concluded that LIS is in need of a new conceptual framework, and that PI is appropriate for this purpose.Originality/valueFloridi proposed a close relationship between PI and LIS more than a decade ago. Although various authors have addressed the aspects of this relationship since then, this is the first proposal from an LIS perspective that PI be adopted as a basis for LIS.

Ethics of information by Luciano Floridi – problem of informational privacy and morality of artificial agents

Introduction. The article tackles the concept of IE (information ethics), the fundamental principles of IE and its place in the contemporary philosophical discourse by Luciano Floridi which are being represented in his publication “The Ethics of Information” (2013). The purpose of the article is to elucidate the major characteristics of information ethics, to analyze the interconnection between ethics and concept of information, to consider the problems of the informational privacy and the morality of artificial agents as one of the most challenging issues which are indicated as an important part of the IE research as well. To achieve the aim mentioned above we apply the methods of comparative analysis, methods of the hermeneutic reconstruction and reinterpretation, analytical and synthetic methods. Based on the latest investigations and critical reviews it should be stressed that ethics was always considered a strictly human business and it has experienced a methodological crisis along with the whole philosophical discourse as well. As the major practical discipline, ethics deals with the ambivalent nature of human existence, its daily troubles and deepest concerns on how to be a human, its vision of the Self as a subject of a moral action and duty, therefore it regulates adequacy of norms of human behavior in society turning moral conventional norms into a law for the benefits of all. However, it should be noted that the sphere of ethical research is not restricted to human matter anymore, morality can also be extrapolated on artificial agents, an approach to ethics can be re-formulated in order to adjust it to the demands of the informational age. Information ethics (IE) can be a crucially helpful field of research with handling digital information, identity theft, informational privacy, cyber war, computing devices and developing artificial intelligence. Conclusion. After reviewing the topics mentioned above it is necessary to mention that computer science and its technological applications influenced the world’s progress in social communication, media studies, cultural life and sphere of economy, in other words, a contemporary scientific picture of the world was transformed by ICTs. Ethics is supposed to be at the center of informational operations, digital information processing, furthermore, IE (information ethics) can regulate the informational flow in different ways based on its renewed principles. Due to the exponential increase in common knowledge (Luciano Floridi), information can be a dangerous tool used for wrong purposes which make IE more relevant than ever because everyone should share a responsibility for the world we live in.

Regulate Artificial Intelligence to Avert Cyber Arms Race

Define an international doctrine for cyberspace skirmishes before they escalate into conventional warfare, urge Mariarosaria Taddeo and Luciano Floridi.

The Ethics of Biomedical Big Data

The availability of diverse sources of data related to health and illness from various types of modern communication technology presents the possibility of augmenting medical knowledge, clinical care, and the patient experience. New forms of data collection and analysis will undoubtedly transform epidemiology, public health, and clinical practice, but what ethical considerations come in to play? With a view to analysing the ethical and regulatory dimensions of burgeoning forms of biomedical big data, Brent Daniel Mittelstadt and Luciano Floridi have brought together thirty scholars in an edited volume that forms part of Springer’s Law, Governance and Technology book series in a collection titled The Ethics of Biomedical Big Data. With eighteen chapters partitioned into six carefully devised sections, this volume engages with core theoretical, ethical, and regulatory challenges posed by biomedical big data.

The 2007 cyber attacks against Estonia and international law on the use of force: an informational approach

ABSTRACTThis article considers the 2007 cyber attacks against Estonia and international law on the use of force. It argues that the prohibition on the use of force in article 2(4) of the United Nations Charter embodies an ontologically constrained conceptualisation of violence that requires some form of material damage to property or injury or death of human beings. As a result, the law is incapable of adequately recognising the harm caused by cyber attacks with non-material effects like those against Estonia. In an effort to overcome these constraints, this article draws on Luciano Floridi’s information ethics. This theory extends its ethical concern beyond the material world to include all entities, whether natural or artificial, physical or virtual. It is argued that by viewing the Estonian entity as an information system, the 2007 cyber attacks can be seen to have constituted a form of informational violence against this entity.

Computer Ethics from Obscure to Ubiquitous

This paper reviewed literature reported on computer ethics. This paper is divided into four sections, first section deals with understanding of what is computer ethics, second section deals with history of computer ethics third section discusses the Ethics code of conduct of conduct adopted by many organisations and fourth section discusses about future perspective of computer ethics.The author of this review ask questions with regards to what constitutes computer ethics and works systematically from filling “conceptual vacuum” to understanding of meta-ethical discourse of computer ethics. This paper discusses historical milestones achieved by trial blazing work of researchers from Norbert Wiener to Luciano Floridi and identifies research questions that have not been addressed sufficiently in the literature and suggest specific research areas for further investigation. Keywords: Computer ethics; code of ethics; information ethics; flourishing ethics; uniqueness debate

Scepticism in Information Society

This article analyzes contemporary writings on the philosophy of information with special attention to the concept of informational scepticism. The author of the concept, Luciano Floridi, supposes that scepticism that arises as the result of the attempt to differentiate real and virtual objects in modern information society is epistemologically harmless, since the difference between the real and the virtual does not have any specific informative content. This article points out logical and epistemological difficulties of this theoretical viewpoint and proposes a way of overcoming them.

Compelling truth: legal protection of the infosphere against big data spills.

The paper explores whether legal and ethical concepts that have been used to protect the natural environment can also be leveraged to protect the 'infosphere', a neologism used by Luciano Floridi to characterize the totality of the informational environment. We focus, in particular, on the interaction between allocation of (intellectual) property rights and 'communication duties', in particular, data breach notification duties.This article is part of the themed issue 'The ethical impact of data science'.

Why Humans Matter (The 4th Revolution: How the Infosphere is Reshaping Human Reality by Luciano Floridi)

Why Humans Matter (The 4th Revolution: How the Infosphere is Reshaping Human Reality by Luciano Floridi)

Inventing the Educational Subject in the ‘Information Age’

This paper asks the question of how we can situate the educational subject in what Luciano Floridi has defined as an ‘informational ontology’ (Floridi in The philosophy of information. Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2011a). It will suggest that Jacques Derrida and Bernard Stiegler offer paths toward rethinking the educational subject that lend themselves to an informational future, as well as speculating on how, with this knowledge, we can educate to best equip ourselves and others for our increasingly digital world. Jacques Derrida thought the concept of the subject was ‘indispensable’ (Derrida in The structuralist controversy: the languages of criticism and the sciences of man. Johns Hopkins Press, Baltimore, 1970, 272) as a function but did not subscribe to or accept any particular theory of how a subject could be defined or developed because it was always situated in and as a context. Following Derrida, Bernard Stiegler explains in Technics and Time: 1 that ‘the relation binding the “who” and the “what” is invention’ (Stiegler in Technics and time 1: the fault of epimetheus. Stanford University Press, Stanford, 1998, 134). As such, the separation between self and world can be seen as artificial, including if this world is perceived wholly or partly as technological, digital or informational. If this is the case, a responsibility is placed on the educator and their part in ‘inventing’ this distinction (or its absence) for future generations. How this invention of the educational subject is negotiated is therefore one the many philosophical tasks for digital pedagogy.

Deletion as second death: the moral status of digital remains

There has been increasing attention in sociology and internet studies to the topic of `digital remains': the artefacts users of social network services (SNS) and other online services leave behind when they die. But these artefacts also pose philosophical questions regarding what impact, if any, these artefacts have on the ontological and ethical status of the dead. One increasingly pertinent question concerns whether these artefacts should be preserved, and whether deletion counts as a harm to the deceased user and therefore provides pro tanto reasons against deletion. In this paper, I build on previous work invoking a distinction between persons and selves to argue that SNS offer a particularly significant material instantiation of persons. The experiential transparency of the SNS medium allows for genuine co-presence of SNS users, and also assists in allowing persons (but not selves) to persist as ethical patients in our lifeworld after biological death. Using Blustein's "rescue from insignificance" argument for duties of remembrance, I argue that this persistence function supplies a nontrivial (if defeasible) obligation not to delete these artefacts. Drawing on Luciano Floridi's account of "constitutive" information, I further argue that the "digital remains" metaphor is surprisingly apt: these artefacts in fact enjoy a claim to moral regard akin to that of corpses.