Sustainability, Computing and Ethics

Neil Gordon
Department of Computer Science and Technology
University of Hull, Hull, HU6 7RX England
[Link]@[Link]
BCS ICT Ethics Workshop: AI/Machine Learning and ethics

BCS, London, Oct 2019

Introduction
• AI offers new opportunities and challenges for Computer
Science, and graduates need an ethical framework as they
develop and apply this to problems
• Sustainable Development offers a context to aid in
motivating and engaging students with suitable real-world
applications of computer science, and especially AI
• In this talk, we will consider how global challenges can
provide a framework for developing and contextualising
ethical dilemmas and choices, especially with applications of
AI
Sustainable Development

• SD has been defined as development that meets the needs of

the present without compromising the ability of future
generations to meet their own needs.
[Link]

• Education for Sustainable Development:

“empowers people to change the way they think and work
towards a sustainable future”
[Link]
The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals: a setting
for Professional and Research skills
1. End poverty,

2. End hunger;

3. Ensure health & well-being;

4. Ensure access to education;

5. Achieve gender equality;

6. Ensure clean water and sanitation;

7. Achieve access to sustainable energy;

8. Promote sustainable economies and decent work for all;

9. Build industry, and infrastructure and foster innovation;

The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals: a
setting for Professional and Research skills
10. Reduce inequality;

11. Ensure sustainable cities and

communities;

12. Ensure supportable

production and consumption;

13. Take climate action;

14. Conserve and clean oceans;

15. Protect and restore ecosystems (land);

16. Promote peace & justice;

17. Strengthen SD through partnerships to develop the goals.

The dark side of computing and AI
• Intrusion of rights
• Energy use/ through big data
pollution and AI
• Waste • E.g. Cambridge
• Health Analytica

• Video game • The singularity –

addiction Hawkins

• Privacy • Amazon – sexist AI

shortlisting
Estimates of the % of carbon footprint attributable to computing vary: typically 5%
to 12% (the latter equivalent to aviation)
UK Government plans to achieve the UN SD Goals

• Goal 4: Promote digital skills and inclusion by continuing to tackle the

root causes of digital exclusion and increasing digital capability
• Goal 9: Harness digital technologies to drive inclusive economic growth
and alleviate poverty, including through a technology accelerator
programme to bring UK and African entrepreneurs together to learn
from each other
• Goal 9: Support growth and security through international partnerships
in digital, tech, cultural and creative industries
• Goal 14: Champion reform of the WTO to enable it to tackle 21st century
trade issues, by advocating new rules for digital trade, liberalisation of
trade in services, advancing ongoing negotiations on fisheries subsidies,
and addressing level playing field issues such as industrial subsidies
[Link]
The cost of AI and Machine Learning

• IT/computing is a significant consumer of resources: both

raw materials, and the energy to function
• Transmitting, storing and processing large volumes of data
all have associated costs
• The consequences of some of the wider use – with impacts
on employment, society and human welfare – all raise
questions about the ethical use of these
The benefit of AI and ML

• The challenge for computing as a discipline, and for our

students as they embark on their professional lives – is how
to ensure the benefits of AI and ML are realised and out
weigh the concerns
• Ensuring students can respond to the ethical challenges is
part of that preparation
• Use of these technologies to reduce the 90% of carbon and
energy use not attributed directly to computing
Sustainable Computing: Global Challenges
• Sustainable Development is concerned with utilisation of
resources in a sustainable way, and the appropriate use of
science (i.e. technology) to inform such use
• Computer Science offers the potential to develop systems
which reduce resource demand (e.g. optimising transport;
intelligent cities and homes; developing “smart” energy
systems)
• As both a solution and a contributor to the problem makes it
important to understand the connection between SD and CS
hardware and software methods. Social & Political

The Impact of
Computing Technology
Economic &
Environmental
and Science
Ethics and Computing
• Privacy and data-veilance • Safety Critical software

• Hacking and Cybersecurity • Safety critical applications

• Cyber bullying and Cyber-stalking • Globalisation

• Blogs, Post-Truth and social media • Digital divide

• Cloud and data protection • Changes to work

• Computer Games and Society • VR and sense of self

• Computers and Health • Internet of Things and pervasive

(invasive) computing
• Computing and the environment
• Rights of people and rights of
• Intellectual Property Rights (IPR): machines
ownership and recognition

Example topics used in the module: students were free to identify their own

There are similar ethical, moral & social questions in all academic areas.
AI and Sustainable Computing
AI for Good — How Artificial Intelligence can Help
Sustainable Development
• AI use case of satellite data is Global Fishing Watch to
protect global fisheries
• Stanford University project to use high resolution images of
rural areas in Africa in order to identify infrastructure and
characteristic features and predict needs
• monitor and optimize their distribution grids in real time
• Digital ethics needed to ensure suitable use
• [Link]
sustainable-development-58b47d1c289a
Education (Goal 4)

• AI and education
• Intelligent and
adaptive learning
systems that
• Ensuring fair and
equitable access

Gordon, N. (2014) Flexible pedagogies: technology-enhanced learning, AdvanceHE,

[Link]
Gender equality

• Improving access to
education and work
• Avoiding bias, not
learning it
• E.g. Amazon
shortlisting
Health

• Improved health processes

• Improved health education
• Ensuring fair access
• Filtering for reliable
information

Gordon, N. (in press). Technologies for analysing and improving healthcare processes. In W. Leal Filho, T. Wall, A. Azul, L. Brandli, & P. Özuyar
(Eds.), Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals, Springer.
Sustainable Cities
• Smart cities that create sustainable
communities
• Tools to aid in running and maintaining
communities
• Intelligent cities – reducing pollution,
managing needs
• Optimised transport
Work, robots and AI

• Need to engage with

wider policy and
decision making
• Efficiency is relative:
what do the displaced
do? Is it energy
efficient overall? Share
the work and the
benefits?
Intelligent approaches to manufacturing and
logistics
• AI applications for
farming (on land and
sea)
• For logistics and
manufacturing
• Intelligent energy
systems and
distribution
SD as a A Framework for Legal, Social, Ethical
and Professional issues6
• Professional
Sustainable Development

Team Work and Peer Assessment

attributes can be
mapped onto
with Authentic Tasks and
Inquiry Based Learning
many aspects of
Environ-
SD Social Economic
mental

• Expectations of
social, economic Strong,
healthy & just
Good Sustainable Use Science
Live within
environ-
governance Economy responsibly
and environment society mental limits

reflect many
professional Social & Legal & Professional Professional
Ethical
topics Professional Ethical & Social & Ethical

6 Adapted from Gordon, N (2014), Sustainable Development as a framework for ethics and skills in Higher Education Computing courses,
in Integrative Approaches to Sustainable Development at University Level: making the links, Ed. Leal, W. Springer. Pp345-357
Sample Course topics

1. Introduction to 7. Cyber security and Team

Sustainable Working
Development
2. Ethics, Professionalism 8. Green Computing
and Codes of Conduct
9. Sustainable Computing,
3. Professional Practice, related topics and
Society and coursework
Sustainability
4. Research Methods 10. Encryption
5. Data Analysis 11. Digital Identities
6. Data and Cybersecurity 12. Module conclusions
In practice

• These topics offer a range of ways to engage students

• Focusing on societal positive impact can provide more
motivation for different student categories
• Given 80%+ male cohorts, of majority 18-21 year olds,
experience indices a majority of students seem to have naïve
or laisse faire attitudes to responsibility itself, and ethical
quandaries
Conclusions
• Computer Science should have a key role in supporting
Sustainable Development
• AI and ML technologies in particular can be applied to a
range of SD problems (goals)
• This application of CS technologies can offer a counter
balance to some of the more negative perceptions of these
technologies
• The examples from Sustainable Computing offer an effective
framework to discuss ethical and professional issues for
students