Philosophy of information. Social Sciences Assignment

PHILOSOPHY OF INFORMATION
Name:
Course:
Date:
Introduction
The current age of information technology has opened up new possibilities that would initially be unimaginable. Increased connectivity through the use of computers and the internet has meant that people can easily meddle into the affairs of others without permission. This can be termed as espionage or even breach of personal privacy. When it comes to international matters, cyber technology has made it possible for countries to spy on each other, especially on issues to do with the military. Spying on the security matters of a foreign nation can even be considered as an act of war. This brings to the forth the issue of military cyber conflict concerning the ethical protocols.
Cyber Conflict
Cyber conflict can be defined as the utilization of the available technological resources at a country’s disposal to cause some significant degree of harm to another country; in a manner comparable to what is done in war. It always manifests itself in various ways that can sometimes start as simple spams in mails, to system jams, and even large scale disruption of communication networks. It is often correlated to cyber terrorism, as the impacts on a target country can sometimes border on catastrophic. It would be unimaginable to assess the threat posed by such intrusion, on nuclear power installations.[, Valeriano, Brandon, and Ryan C. Maness. 2015. Cyberwar versus cyber realities: cyber conflict in the international system.]
Cyber conflict presents the biggest weakness of the computer system; its ability to be hacked or infiltrated with or without knowledge of the owner. As a new frontier in the battle for internal security and even regional domination, militaries around the world have embarked on their own set of programs geared towards defense against or attack using cyber technology. While foreign armies might pose threats, there is also the underlying reality that some of these attacks can be from isolated individuals trying out their stuff. With the complex nature of network technologies across the globe, it becomes clear how complicated cyber conflict can get.[. David Weissbrodt, Cyber-Conflict, Cyber-Crime, and Cyber-Espionage, 22 Minn. J. Int'l L. 347 (2013), available at https://scholarship.law.umn.edu/faculty_articles/223.]
It brings to the fore the determination of state and non-state actors. Hackers are always scouring the internet, trying to find any loopholes in the security systems around critical installations. A field day for them can entail shutting down of entire government websites, or even hijacking the operations of the said systems or also coming up with clones of the same. As for fraudsters, this can be a chance for them to siphon funds and other relevant information from the systems secretly. All in all, cyber conflict provides an entirely new frontier for the military and security systems across the world.[Ventre, Daniel. 2012. Cyber conflict: competing for national perspectives. London: ISTE. http://site.ebrary.com/id/10660597.]
PART A: Virtue ethics and consequentialism as protocols for Ethical decision making in military cyber conflict.
* Ethical Responsibility of Technological Systems
When it comes to ethics concerning military cyber conflict, the underlying question is usually whether these technological systems have the ethical responsibility like human beings. Traditionally, the responsibility to behave and even reason ethical has been a domain for human beings. Human beings are the only creatures who are believed to have the moral authority to discern between right or wrong. With the current environment, it is impossible to completely and entirely separate human beings from their technological inventions when it comes to ascertaining their moral or ethical capacities.[Powers, T.M. On the Moral Agency of Computers. Topoi 32, 227–236 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11245-012-9149-4]
Such an inability to separate the two is what complicates even further the concept of a computer moral or ethical responsibility. Human beings presently cannot do much without the regular interactions with computer and technological systems. As a result, these systems impact how they operate, how they reason, their behavior, and to a great extent, even their attitudes. By assigning specific ethical responsibilities to an individual or entity, it is the consequences of these actions by the body that are used to judge its ethical responsibility. But again, who gives the orders to these computer systems? And who exactly should be punished for any ethical 'malpractices' of the computer systems? How should the computers be ‘punished’ for such?
The military is a distinct hierarchical entity. All the orders are taken from a higher rank. The planning and military strategies too, are done in the same manner. In this line of power, it is the commanders who usually issue the final order when it comes to military execution. With the development of technology, these commanders still have the final say when it comes to the final instruction keyed into these computer systems. The only exemptions are the automatic defense systems that are already programmed with a set of instructions on what to do depending on the situation. It is for this reason; however that computers might be considered to be surrogates of human beings.[Johnson, D., and Thomas M. Powers. "Computers as surrogate agents." Information technology and moral philosophy (2008): 251-269.]
(b).Virtue Ethics and Consequentialism as Military Protocols
A significant determinant of whether an entity is ethically responsible or not is an indication of its intention. According to Johnson and Powers, these systems might be having the purpose therein, but the original author of this intention is the human being who designed it. This means that computer morality is an instead derived form of it and not a unique version. This original version is only reserved for human beings because they can automatically generate and alter their intent in a split of a second, without the need to follow laid down procedures using codes keyed in, like in computers. Johansson terms it as computer ethics, and it plays a huge role in military protocols.[Johansson, Linda. "Robots and moral agency." Ph.D. diss., KTH Royal Institute of Technology, 2011.]
In the purest form of understanding, virtue ethics looks at probing an individual on how he or she can be a better version of oneself. Consequentialism is broad but is looking at the moral aspect of whether a final act is right or wrong. Consequentialism usually takes a more comprehensive approach to the moral question compared to virtue ethics, which mainly focuses on an individual's moral excellence or aspirations towards it. Consequentialism looks at the final outcomes of a given act, or simply, the consequences. In matters to do with the military, the employment of these two ethical approaches often ends up being lopsided.[Va...