The Interplay of Technology, Ethics, and Policy: Student Perspective
The May 2nd event, “The Interplay of Technology, Ethics, and Policy”, was deeply fascinating to me. As a 22 year old, I have grown alongside the evolution of technology. Beginning with desktops and the creation of the internet to now interacting with artificial intelligence.
Technology has become increasingly influential in our society, businesses, politics, and relationships. The conversation surrounding the ethics of this growing force is one I believe everyone should want to be a part of. An important point was made by Professor Mehran Sahami about how a small group of individuals at these companies are doing more than just creating new technology, they are impacting people's lives and creating real life implications.
Is there a point where these individuals will care more about their social responsibility and impact over innovation and the evolution of technology. When does the creation of big tech get too far where it is no longer able to be controlled or regulated.
As a student when Chat GPT was released the school was unable to regulate the use of this technology in time for harm to be done to the value of education. Students were able to use this artificial intelligence to write entire papers for them or assist them in taking exams. This is dangerous for a couple of reasons.
The first reason the use of artificial intelligence can be dangerous for students' education is that there is no understanding of the course material needed to turn in assignments. Artificial intelligence can be given articles and course materials and produce writing with no human error. The program can find answers to exams in seconds pulling information from all across the internet. Students are not invested in the learning process the same way they were before these technological advances.
The second reason that artificial intelligence can be dangerous for students to use is that the software is not programmed to say it can not do something or to further ask questions to deeper understand a topic. As a student who is trying to use technology to assist them in writing a paper, the AI may write them a 3 page paper using made up sources or evidence that is either irrelevant or that doesn’t even exist. This happened in my marketing class last semester where my professor became frustrated after reading a paper turned in about flying squirrels, an answer to a prompt about a Mountain Dew ad campaign.
Later in the lecture the questions were posed about how new technology can influence the country's economic well-being and the relationship between citizens and their government. The idea that technology created by for profit companies having so much influence over the trajectory of our society is scary for myself as someone beginning to enter the job force who is unsure if I will even be able to get a job in 10 years due to the take over of artificial intelligence. I hope that events like “The Interplay of Technology, Ethics, and Policy” will help promote the importance of conversation around the ethics of technology and its impact in all of our current and future lives.
You can watch the video of the event on our youtube channel here.
About the Author:
Meredith is a senior at the University of Maryland majoring in Marketing and Management. After college, she hopes to travel the world and learn more about different countries and cultures. Meredith wants to combine her interest in business with her passion for helping others.