cs492 - Spring 2017
Societal Implications of Computer Science
Analytic Themes: lecture notes
Daily Announcements
In this course groups of students do things together. My philosophy
is that students don't mix enough at UW but stay too much within
their own group(s). I try to run the class so that students mix
as much as possible.
-
I use uwaterloo.ca e-mail addresses, which are the ones the
registrar gives me. Why?
-
How the assignments are marked. You get two marks:
-
one mark for content, and
-
one mark for style.
On your assignment you will probably see two marks out of
ten. The assignment mark is the sum of the two.
-
Who got e-mail last night or this morning? How I will divide
the class for the Wednesday/Friday seminars: randomly.
-
How teams will be formed for doing RPEs.
-
Prior to noon Friday, 12 May, students read RPE descriptions
and choose one or more that appeals, checking availability
in the chart.
-
After noon on Friday, 12 May, students can send me requests
by e-mail. I will process them first-come first-served,
putting successful requests into the chart and notifying
requesters about unsuccessful requests. Does anybody have
objections if I put userids into this chart, which makes
it easy for group members to contact one another?
-
If you are unsuccessful try again.
-
After class on Monday, 15 May I will accept no more
requests, putting students into groups at random.
When last I queried Quest there were 47 students
registered, compared to 17 RPE teams. At those numbers we
will have 13 teams of three and four teams of two.
-
Piazza? "Desire to unlearn learn!" Vis-a-vis piazza how would
you decide whether what you are giving to them is more valuable
to you than what you are getting from them in return.
-
Preferred names
-
What about the final day of term, Monday, 24 July?
Analytic Themes
The themes on this page are a small subset of the rich interlocking
set of rules, customs and institutions which hold together the
extremely complex interrelationships that make society more or
less work. The more I think about them the more I am amazed, not
that they fail occasionally, but how infrequently they fail.
What's here is not exhaustive, it's little more than a grab-bag
of ideas that you can try out when you are not sure where to start
thinking. You will find that most of these ideas are easy to apply
to concrete things like tables, computers or clothing. Their power
becomes apparent only when you apply them to abstract things like
education, the standards that allow computers to connect using
the internet, or social constructs like indecency.
Provision
Provision. Inside provision is the verb provide. To live we must
have provided to us things like food, clothes, shelter, etc. Most
of us get these things as a result of somebody working: work gives
money; money purchases possessions we need or want. A few things,
like the air we breathe, come to us otherwise, but for how long
will this remain true. Before society existed everything came
otherwise: we added our own effort -- catching the fish, or picking
the fruit -- to what came otherwise and that's what we had.
-
In the presence of society how we get things we want or need
is much more complex.
Extreme examples. In the examples below
-
Private: One gets it by exchanging something, usually money,
for the thing one wants.
-
Public: Everybody gets it as a matter of some quality they
have, such as being born in the right location. Air to breathe
is an example more or less unchanged since the stone age;
primary and secondary education is a modern example of a
public good based on societal institutions.
When you are a teen-ager private seems better: your parents
have been choosing quasi-public goods for you since you were a
baby. But a little thought shows that things are more complex.
If we all choose for ourselves how does any one of us decide which
side of the road to drive on? How do I choose to keep going to
class when the weather is good? (We used to call that brain-washing.)
Ideas that go along with provision
-
Regulation. Example the Bell Telephone system. The common
carrier idea, related to internet neutrality, goes along with
this. How is internet neutrality different?
-
Citizenship. This is a big issue in the early 21st century
because most countries use it as the elegibility criterion
for deserving items that are subject to public provision.
-
Contracts, which ameliorate caveat emptor by introducing the
idea of trust. Notice that contracts are null without a means
of enforcement: see below.
Daily Announcements
-
I use uwaterloo.ca e-mail addresses, which are the ones the
registrar gives me. There are also edu.uwaterloo.ca e-mail
addresses. How I have done addresses for RPEs.
-
How the assignments are marked. Some of you received low marks on
the style component of a1. If you did you should be seeing one of
the writing assistance programs at the university. (I recommend
the Writing and Communication Centre.)
-
How teams will be formed for doing RPEs.
-
After noon on Friday, 12 May, students can send me requests
by e-mail. I will process them first-come first-served,
putting successful requests into the chart. As of Saturday
afternoon 1/3 of the class has requested and all have been
successful.
-
After class today I will put students into groups at
random.
-
Piazza? Should have something this week.
Provision
Extreme examples. SA: stone age; AA: agricultural age; MA: modern
age.
-
Private: (SA) One's own effort; (MA) Almost everything.
-
Public: (SA) Almost everything; (MA) health care, pollution-free
environment.
In the modern age we have public (or regulated private) provision
only for things where there are substantial non-monetary
externalities. If I were to predict I would foresee that movement
is changing from private to public provision.
Ideas that go along with provision. Usually these ideas are MA
institutions designed to do formally what SA did informally.
-
Regulation. Regulated digital services.
-
Citizenship. Why do people in the south suddenly want to move
north.
-
Contracts. What is Uber all about?
Note that ideas that go along with provision are mostly attempts
to provide the smooth solial relationships of a simple tightly
bonded community within the complex, loosely bonded communities
of modernity. This will be true for most of the other themes as
well. I will try to provide examples where there is an obvious
computer science angle.
Decision-making
Groups that desire coordinated action must make decisions that affect
many people.
Extreme examples of decision-making methods
-
Expertise. We select a wise person and ask him or her what
we should do. An example is me asking a surgeon which operation
gives me the best chance of the improving the state of my
body. But experts easily become prisoners of their own
expertise: when you have a hammer in your hand the whole world
looks like a nail.
SA: Wise (usually elderly) man or woman; MA: Credentialled ...
-
Democracy. Everybody gives their opinion, regardless of their
education or status, and based on that set of opinions a
decision is determined. Everybody participates when decision-making
is democratic, whether the decision is what movie we'll go
to or who will be the next prime minister. In theory it means
that all accept the decision in which all have participated.
You can see this theory under strain in the United States,
doubts about the integrity of election results on one hand,
refusal to accept the winner on the other. We know what this
means when we see it in a "third-world" country!
SA: around the fire; MA: informal consensus, formal institutions.
Ideas that go along with decision making
-
Representation: our representatives become experts in our
places. They may be people we elect; they may be people we
hire: whatever we do we can now look over their shoulders.
-
Credentials. Outsourcing the judgement of wisdom. When we
disrupt the sources of credentials we disrupt the concept of
expertise.
Disagreement -- carrot/stick
When a group shares the same environment, which occurs when working
or playing together, or simply sharing the affordances of common
space, it is common for disagreements to arise. At our best we
negotiate by offering rewards and threatening punishments.
Forms of rewards
-
Habits, customs. As we walk along the sidewalk ... Habits and
customs that function smoothly are their own reward. Some
customs are thought to be culture-independent, such as
-
First come, first served.
-
Take turns.
-
Being part of a disagreement is worse than not being part
of a disagreement, no matter who is right and who is
wrong. This is effectively the basis of the rights of
minorities in a democracy.
How does one learn the habits and customs? SA: conformity,
modelling on others. MA: add education.
-
Explicit prizes. SA: extra food, grooming. MA: money, honour,
recognition.
Extremes of punishment
-
Lightweight.
SA: avoidance, such as not talking. MA: avoidance, such as
looks of disapproval, crossing the street.
-
Heavyweight. SA: expulsion, physical harm. MA: fines,
confinement.
Things that go along with disagreement
-
Courts, lawyers, police. Again note that they must be seen
by both sides to be impartial.
-
Arbitration, which is usually informal, but is increasingly
formal. Be careful of arbitration. It used to be an informal
way of reducing legal costs. In the 21st century it is
increasingly a way of taking away rights from consumers.
Production
Many of the institutions of our society are engaged in producing
things, making, assembling, modifying, etc. Sometimes a single
individual can produce a complete thing, but not often. A professor
may think that he or she works all alone in giving a course. But
without a complement of other courses to produce a degree, a
collection of students, a registrar to tell the students where
to go and when, a classroom to go to, and on and on standing up
and talking is not worth much. How workers work together to produce
something is the subject of industrial organization, a subject
found in economics and business degrees. How tightly together
are those who co-operate to produce things is central to industrial
organization.
Extreme examples.
-
Individuals working independently. Skills mainly mental.
SA: Foragers, gatherers; MA: Consultants, contractors
-
Specialized team members. Skills mainly physical.
SA: Hunters, burial groups; MA: construction workers
Concepts that go along with production
-
Standardization
-
Meetings
-
Management
Origin
Equilibrium
Path-dependent
Frustration
Temporal granularity
Some things happen fast, getting a fish, getting to school; some
things happen more slowly, getting to a new camp, getting a degree;
some things happen very slowly, getting grand-children. Things
at different time scales interact; humans show strong recency
effects.
Lengths of time
-
Hour. SA: Activity, like grooming. MA: Lecture.
-
Day. SA: Foraging. MA: Assignment
-
Week. SA: Hunting. MA: Project
-
Season. SA: Moving camp. MA: New product cycle.
-
Year. SA: Having a child. MA: New job.
-
Decade. SA: Raising a child. MA: Career. New technology.
-
Generation. SA: Maximum memory span. MA: Career, New technology, New infrastructure.
-
Century. SA: Stonehenge. MA:
Months
Generations
Provisional acceptanceLong tails
Endowment
Examples of sources of endowment
-
Private, usually parents: which may be genetic -- this is the
normal argument that supports hereditary methods of choosing
leaders (my genes made me a leader; my son shares my genes;
my genes will make him a leader; why waste resources having
a race when we already know who will be the winner) -- or may
be material -- this is the normal argument that supports
progressive taxation.
SA: genes, not much more. MA: genes, material goods, position
in society.
-
Public
In a cultural environment that focusses so strongly on efficient
cause -- Aristotle's four causes: material cause, formal cause,
efficient cause, final cause -- it is very hard to identify
inherent features of myself that caused me to be born to well-educated
parents, in a first-world country.
Concepts that go along with endowment
-
Redistribution. Once upon a time, not even very long ago, I
could dig a hole on my land and do whatever I wanted with the
water that collected in it. Then it was discovered that the
water is part of a large aquifer lying under most of the
Region of Waterloo. Taking water from it I am taking water
from my neighbour; putting waste into it I am poisoning my
neighbour's water. The community passed a law taking ownership
of the water into the community, giving me in return part
ownership of the entire resource.
-
Taxation.
Return to: