Contributions to the Debate On the Moral Relevance of Technological Artifacts
Abstract
This article is a review of the recent debate on the moral relevance of technological artefacts, fundamentally generated from the approaches of Peter-Paul Verbeek, and it also proposes some contributions to the discussion. Preceded by the theories that assert its moral agency, the assertion of the moral relevance of artifacts is possibly the most important approach made in the field of technology ethics in recent decades. To understand this approach, the text synthesizes the thesis of the moral relevance of the artefacts; then, it makes some precisions about the arguments supporting the thesis to clarify some misunderstandings around which a wide debate has been generated. additionally, it values its contributions to the field of technology ethics; finally, it evaluates the criticisms of this perspective. The text concludes with the presentation of some contributions to the debate, related to the conceptions of agency and moral relevance. Specifically, it is argued that this approach can be sustained in several theories of moral agency, as opposed to criticisms reducing the sense of this conception to the theory of moral agency sustained from the Actor-Red Theory.
References
Akrich, M. (1992). The De-Scription of Technical Objects. In W. E. Bijker & J. Law (Eds.), Shaping Technology / Building Society (pp. 205-224). Cambridge: MIT Press.
Arzroomchilar E. & Novotný, D. (2018). Verbeek on the Moral Agency of Artifacts. Organon F, 25(4), 517-538.
Broncano, F. (2009). La melancolía del cíborg. Barcelona: Herder Editorial.
Broncano, F. (2012). La estrategia del simbionte. Cultura material para nuevas humanidades. Salamanca: Editorial Delirio.
Brey, P. (2014). From Moral Agents to Moral Factors: The Structural Ethics Approach. In P. Kroes & P. P. Verbeek (Eds.), The Moral Status of Technical Artifacts (pp. 125-142). New York: Springer.
Barandiaran, X., Di Paolo, E., & Rohde, M. (2009). Defining Agency: Individuality, Normativity, Asymmetry, and Spatio-temporality in Action. Adaptive Behavior, 17(5), 367–386. https://doi.org/10.1177/1059712309343819
Foucault, M. (1990). The History of Sexuality 1. The Care of the Self. London: Penguin.
Foucault, M. (1992). The History of Sexuality 2. The Use of Pleasure. London: Penguin.
Echeverría, J. (1998). Ciencia y valores: propuestas para una axiología de la ciencia. Contrastes, 3(s. III), 175-194. http://dx.doi.org/10.24310/Contrastescontrastes.v0i0.1540
Gunkel, D. (2012). The Machine Question. Critical Perspectives on AI, Robots, and Ethics. Cambridge: The MIT Press.
Habermas, J. (1973). Conocimiento e Interés. Ideas y Valores, 42(45), 61-76.
Ihde, D. (1990). Technology and the Lifeworld. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Ihde, D. (1993). Postphenomenology: Essays in the Postmodern Context. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press.
Ihde, D. (2009). Postphenomenology and Technoscience. The Peking University Lectures. Albany: SUNY Press.
Ihde, D. (2010). Heidegger’s Technologies: Postphenomenological Perspectives. New York: Fordham University Press.
Illies, M. & Meijers (2014). Artifacts, Agency, and Action Schemes. In P. Kroes, & P. P. Verbeek (Eds.), The Moral Status of Technical Artifacts (pp. 159-184). New York: Springer.
Illies, C., & Meijers, A. (2009). Artefacts without Agency. The Monist, 92(3), 420-440. Recuperado de https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/27904134.pdf?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
Kroes, P. & Verbeek, P. (Eds.). (2014). The Moral Status of Technical Artifacts. New York: Springer.
Kuhn, T. (1982). La Tensión Esencial. Estudios selectos sobre la tradición y el cambio en el ámbito de la ciencia. Madrid: Fondo de Cultura Económica.
Latour, B. (1992). Where are the Missing Masses? The Sociology of a Few Mundane Artefacts. In W. Bijker & J. Law (Eds.), Shaping Technology-Building Society. Studies in Sociotechnical Change (pp. 225-258). Cambridge: MIT Press.
Latour, B. (Trans. Porter, C.). (1993). We Have Never Been Modern. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Latour, B. (2002). Morality and Technology: The End of the Means. Theory, Culture & Society, 19(5/6), 247-260. https://doi.org/10.1177/026327602761899246
Latour, B. (2003). Science in Action: How to Follow Scientists and Engineers through Society. Cambridge / Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
Laudan, L. (1984). Science and Values: The Aims of Science and Their Role in Scientific Debate. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Rescher, N. (1993). La racionalidad. Una indagación filosófica sobre la naturaleza y la justificación de la razón. Madrid: Tecnos.
Merleau-Ponty, M. (1945). Phénoménologie de la perception. Paris: Gallimard.
Mitcham, C. & Waelbers, K. (2009). Technology and Ethics: Overview. In J. K. B. O. Friiss, S. A. Pederson, & V. F. Hendricks (Eds.), A Companion to the Philosophy of Technology (pp. 365-480). Malden: Blackwell. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781444310795.ch64
Moreno Ortíz, J. C. & Osorio García, S. N. (2017). El punto de partida del análisis bioético de la ciencia y la tecnología: críticas al determinismo. Revista Latinoamericana de Bioética, 17(33-32), 76-91. https://doi.org/10.18359/rlbi.2142
Olsen, B. (2003). Material Culture After Text: Re-Membering Things. Norwegian Archaeological Review, 36(2), 87-104. https://doi.org/10.1080/00293650310000650
Parente, D. (2016). Los artefactos en cuanto posibilitadores de acción. Problemas en torno a la noción de agencia material en el debate contemporáneo. Revista Colombiana de Filosofía de la Ciencia, 16(33). 139-168. https://doi.org/10.18270/rcfc.v16i33.1937
Peterson, M. & Spahn, A. (2011). Can Technological Artefacts Be Moral Agents? Science and Engineering Ethics, 17(3), 411-424. http://doi.org/10.1007/s11948-010-9241-3
Putnam, H. (1981). Reason, Truth and History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Rosenberger, R., & Verbeek, P. P. (Eds.). (2015). Postphenomenological Investigations: Essays on Human-Technology Relations. Blue Ridge Summit: Lexington Books; Rowman Littlefield Press.
Rosenberger, R. (2017). Notes on a Nonfoundational Phenomenology of Technology. Foundations of Science, 22(3), 471–494. http://doi.org/10.1007/s10699-015-9480-5
Simondon, G. (2007). El modo de existencia de los objetos técnicos. Buenos Aires: Prometeo libros.
Simondon, G. (2015). La individuación a la luz de las nociones de forma y de información (2ª ed.). Buenos Aires: Editorial Cactus.
Snow, C. P. (1987) Las dos culturas y un segundo enfoque. Madrid: Alianza Editorial.
Verbeek, P. P. (2005). What Things Do: Philosophical Reflections on Technology, Agency, and Design. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press.
Verbeek, P. P. (2006). Materializing morality - Design ethics and technological mediation. Science Technology & Human Values, 31(3), 361-380. https://doi.org/10.1177/0162243905285847
Verbeek, P. P. (2008). Obstetric Ultrasound and the Technological Mediation of Morality: A Postphenomenological Analysis. Human Studies, 31(1), 11–26. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10746-007-9079-0
Verbeek, P. P. (2009). The Moral Relevance of Technological Artifacts. In P. Sollie & M. Düwell (Eds.), Evaluating New Technologies. Methodological Problems for the Ethical Assessment of Technology Developments (pp. 63-77). Netherlands: Springer.
Verbeek, P. P. (2011). Moralizing Technology: Understanding and Designing the Morality of Things. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Verbeek, P. P. (2014). Some Misunderstandings About the Moral Significance of Technology. En P. Kroes & P. P. Verbeek (Eds.), The moral status of technical artifacts (pp. 75-88). New York: Springer.
Winner, L. (1980). Do Artifacts Have Politics? Daedalus, 109(1), 121-136. Recuperado de https://www.jstor.org/stable/20024652?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
Downloads
