In this particular case the issue isn't even the technology it's parenting. The students generating these images are in their teens and are more than capable of understanding that using images of their classmates is not only immoral but also likely illegal. But when left to raise themselves using the iPad-Babysitter you end up with the moral free for all that we are seeing today. Until 18, parents should be held equally responsible for the actions of their kids.
I find it interesting how you contradict yourself in your very first sentence. "Technology is neutral, except when it isn't". To me it means that it is not neutral, doesn't it?
Deserts are dry places except for rare occasions, when they can even be flooded. No contradiction just how language works.
I did not mean to ask "Is technology sometimes neutral?", but rather "Is technology always neutral, and in this case, is this particular technology neutral?". I did not write all that, but I assumed that it would be inferred from the context. And that, too, is how language works.
Also note that my above reaction was not aggressive. I genuinely find it interesting that they think "technology is neutral" but start their explanation with a sentence that clearly shows that they think technology is not neutral.
In common language there is no difference between "Yes, almost always, except.." and "No, not 100% always, there are some very rare exceptions". That sounds contradictory at first because one starts with yes and one with no, but both say the same thing and people are perfectly fine with shortening "90% true" to true.
The reason for that is that your question is kinda trivial to answer and kills any discussion for no gain of insight. "Is A literally, always B with absolutely no exceptions?". No, unless you talk about mathematics you don't get absolute statements.
> The reason for that is that your question is kinda trivial to answer and kills any discussion for no gain of insight.
Is it, really? What is the trivial answer? Is technology neutral or not? You seem to acknowledge that there are exceptions, so... does that mean that you think that technology is trivially not neutral? Because let me tell you that it is absolutely not a large consensus (to the point where I am genuinely not sure if that is your opinion or not).
But assuming that you agree with me that technology is not neutral, then my point was: maybe those who worked on that technology should have thought more before doing it. And there I was expecting constructive comments like "the technology itself is really useful for [saving lives / helping biodiversity / put something nice here], and unfortunately some abuse it with deepfakes". Because if we all "kinda trivially" agree on the fact that the technology behind deepfakes is evil, then maybe we should do something about it. Like teach ethics to engineers.
In this case, I don't see what good comes from the technology that enables deepfakes, but I would love to be enlightened.
I still don't understand what your opinion is, though.
This is a bad example, hollow points have a legitimate use in the prevention of collateral damage, among other things. Unless you mean it's an exception because it's clearly a good technology, but I'd also say that's not true. It falls under neutral.
Given most offensive weapons have a defensive purpose, both active and deterrent, their is a case for them being neutral.
A bio weapon, near shore detonated nuclear device, or other doomsday devices that are designed to indiscriminately kill large numbers of civilians strike me as evil tech.
Ok, so some laws were adjusted around the use of small cameras. Yet there are still issues today. I mean, you have to actually catch someone using it. How many people are redlight scanning their airbnbs? Many people breaking the law just aren't getting caught. I fail to see how the laws really fixed anything. All that happened is people learned to live in this new reality and the news stopped reporting it because it's not new.
I'm not sure what you're getting at with the hollowpoint comment. In theory it could be applied for evil (murder) or could be applied for good (self defense, public defense, food, etc depending on one's beliefs about what is good vs evil).
20 years ago long before iPads when I was in high school there were definitely kids that would have done this exact same thing if the technology was available. Lets not pretend as though lose morals are a recent invention.
Deep fakes aren't the issue here. This same thing could have been done before AI with Photoshop or even scissors and glue.
If any technology is at fault here, it's social media, because that's likely where whoever is making these is finding the pictures of the girls to feed the AI.
That's probably a valid argument, but you should elaborate. What does this particular technology bring to society that balances for deep fakes that can destroy someone's life?
Cryptography can protect people, which sounds like a good thing, but it can protect bad actors, which is a bad thing. One could debate it, but overall it feels like cryptography is useful in many cases. On the other hand, I feel like we would be better off without e.g. blockchain or without e.g. SpaceX making space flights affordable for businesses in a world where the climate crisis may soon destroy us.
What about deep fakes then? What good does it bring that would balance the bad use-cases?
I have a feeling you're going to have a problem with any kind of "general" technology in the future. Or, lets change the initial premise this this Heinlein quote
>"Specialization is for insects," the science fiction author Robert A. Heinlein famously wrote. "A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly."
The thing is with a generalized image creation software is it will do things you won't like. Be that representation of minors, or offending your king/glorious leader, religious sacrilege, or whatever it is you don't like.
Generalized software, much like humans, is capable of heresy.
I can agree to the argument that "everything can be used in a bad way". But that is not my point.
My point is: is any technology always worth existing? As a thought experiment, I can easily imagine a technology that would only be useful for torture, and I would consider it fundamentally evil. To the point where I would not want this technology to exist at all.
If you agree with that, then it means that it is possible to imagine a technology that should not exist. And consequently, it raises the question for every new technology: should this one exist, or not?
In real life, the ones that humans actually occupy true black and white situations almost never exist. Your last sentence will always fall afoul of "In my moral framework" and since moral frameworks differ between cultures and individuals you will always find disagreement on the question of worth. The idea of fundamental evil is not a scientific measurable concept.
To turn around your concept and reverse the danger. I see any non-Christian* as fundamentally evil and it is my moral and just duty to remove any non-believers from this planet in order to preserve the sanctity of what is good.
At best we can make a rule of laws at attempt to fairly balance the needs of others and attempt to deter actions that are so dangerous for society they cannot be allowed. But never believe that your rule of law is universal.
* replace with whatever religion/belief system suits your needs.
Of course, the question of whether a particular technology is good or evil requires a moral framework, that's a necessity from the "good or evil" part.
Now those who say "technology is neutral" imply - if I understand correctly - that technology is out of this discussion. They think that the use of technology can be good or bad, but the technology itself is neither.
And that is what I question: should we consider that technology is completely out of the moral debate, or not? Obviously if we conclude that it is part of the moral debate, then it depends on the moral framework. In this case, the technology behind deepfakes was developed by people that I am convinced don't approve of the use in the original article.
So it seems legit to me to ask whether those people questioned the technology they were developing, within their moral framework, before doing it and releasing it to the world.
Am I missing something?
I mean, it's a useless question of pedantry. It rarely changes the outcome.
I cannot say that I am a free speech absolutist, there are many people that write software that are, and in addition believe that software is speech. Which particular rules of this framework do you want to apply? I think greedy people that value money above all else are terrible, but they exist and create software regardless of your abohorance of doing so.
That would be assuming that the people who built the technology bringing deepfakes are such people, which I would question.
Maybe they just don't think about the consequences of their work. Maybe there is something to teach to engineers about ethics. I'm saying that because I feel like personally, I could have use some ethics class. Maybe it would have given me some keys when thinking about all that.
Is technology ever neutral by those standards? Seems like anything that has legitimate uses could be used for evil too.
Ok, let's assume that anything that has legitimate uses can be used for evil. But what if the technology is mostly useful for evil? Would you call it neutral?
Your example of a torture machine would depend on if you consider any scenarios where torture would be justified/good/useful. If it does have legitimate uses, then there should be no problem creating it and trying to limit its use. This is where your analogy breaks down though. You can't just cp/ctrl-c a torture machine like you can data/software. Restricting software and its use becomes much more difficult when we talk about stuff like deep fakes while trying to balance liberty.
It does make a difference: a machine that is mostly useful for evil should probably not be built, whereas a machine that is mostly useful for good things but is mostly used for evil... well... that's a people problem.
> Your example of a torture machine would depend on if you consider any scenarios where torture would be justified/good/useful.
Let's consider a democracy where civilians decide to build a torture machine - the conditions behind the deepfake technology ;-).
> Restricting software and its use becomes much more difficult when we talk about stuff like deep fakes while trying to balance liberty.
Note that I never mentioned restricting it. I mentioned not building it. I find that engineers tend to hide behind "technology is neutral" and "it is not illegal". But morals and ethics do exist for engineers too.
It was totally legal to build the technology to make deepfakes. It doesn't mean that it was ethical.
We're not debating if it was ethical, only if it was neutral. Technology is applied by people so it's always a people problem. If there exists a state where it is good and a state where it is evil, then it's neutral. If it has only one state, them it is not neutral (either it's good or bad; either of those is rare).
Is that a formal definition coming from an official source, or is it your personal opinion?
You seem to say "good = 1, neutral = 0, bad = -1, hence good + bad = neutral". What if a technology has a "good" score of 1 and a "bad" score of -1000? Does "good + bad" make it neutral then?
You can look up neutral in the dictionary - if it doesn't belong to one side or the other then its neutral. Better to think of it as a 0-1 probability scale. If you're a 0 or a 1, then you belong to one side or the other. Anything in-between is neutral since its not a certainty nor exclusively aligned with one side or the other.
My initial point was that IMO, we should always think about the impact a technology may have on society before we build it. I am not completely sure what the technology behind deepfakes brings to society, but I clearly see serious problems. If a technology makes significantly more harm than good, maybe it should not be built in the first place.
Maybe I need another word to make you understand my point, because "neutral" clearly did not work.