CS 291 - Course Plan

Date	Topic	Lecture-Reading	Recommended Reading	Event
Feb 5	Introduction
Feb 7	What is Computer Ethics?	Moor, What is computer ethics? CESV Barlow, Coming into the country CESV Gotterbarn, Computer ethics: responsibility regained CESV Winograd, Computers, ethics, and social responsibility CESV Johnson, CE Chapter 1
Feb 12	Risks of computing	Borning, Computer system reliability and nuclear war CESV Corbato, On building systems that will fail CESV Littlewood and Strigini, The risks of Software CESV Parnas, et. al., Evaluation of safety-critical systems CESV Smith, The limits of correctness CESV Petroski, From slide rule to computer CESV Friedman and Kahn, Human agency and responsible computing CR Schrader- Freschette, Risk (to be circulated in class)
Feb 14	Responsibility	Leveson and Turner, An investigation of the Therac-25 accidents CESV Hart, Responsibility and retribution CESV Nissenbaum, Computing and accountability CESV Samuelson, Liability for defective electronic information CESV Johnson, CE Chapter 7
Feb 19	Professional Responsibility	Weizenbaum, On the impact of the computer on society CESV Johnson, Professional ethics CESV Collins and Miller, Programming and the public trust CESV Fried, Rights and roles, pp117-133 CR	Applbaum, Professional detachment CR	Movie to be shown this week
Feb 21	Professional Codes	Roland and Schinzinger, Professional codes CESV Ladd, The quest for a code of professional ethics CESV Davis, Thinking like an engineer CESV Jamal and Bowie, Theoretical considerations for a meaningful code of professional ethics CR ACM Code of ethics CESV
Feb 26	Responsibility continued
Feb 28	Guest speaker, Rebecca Mercuri--Computing and risk	CPSR, Vulnerable on all counts CR		In addition to regular class hour, students should attend the Computer Science Colloquium at 4p.m. when Rebecca Mercuri will talk on computerized voting.
Mar 1				1st Paper due
Mar 4	Guest speaker, Prof. Ed Felten
Mar 6	Deontological and consequentialist frameworks	Lyons, Utilitarianism CR Fried, pp 73-95 CR Johnson, CE Chapter 2
Mar 11	Justice and rights	Rawls, sections 3,11 CR Gewirth, Rights CR Fried, pp 96-102 CR
Mar 13	Law and morality	Devlin, Morals and criminal law in The enforcement of morals, chapter 1 (NY: Oxford 1972, 1965) To be distributed in class Hart, Law, liability and morality CR Rawls, section 53 in CR
Mar 16-23				Spring Recess
Mar 25	Unauthorized copying of software	Nissenbaum, Should I copy my neighbor's software? CESV Software License, Any shrinkwrap license Arthur Kuflik, Moral foundations of intellectual property rights CESV Johnson, CE Chapter 4
Mar 27	Intellectual property rights over software	Office of Technology Assessment, Evolution of case law on copyrights and computer software CESV Snapper, Intellectual property protections for computer software CESV Stallman, Why software should be free CESV Kahin, The software patent crisis CESV Stern, Tales from the algorithm war CESV US District Court, D. Massachusetts, Lotus development corporation v. Paperback Software International and Stephenson Software CESV Samuelson, How to interpret the Lotus decision CESV
Apr 1	Privacy and government	Orwell, 1984 Laudon, Information systems in a democracy CESV Shattuck, Computer matching is a serious threat to privacy CESV Kusserow, The government needs matching to root out waste and fraud CESV Hunter, Public Image CESV	Movie and Paper 2 due!
Apr 3	Moral and legal foundations	Gavison, Privacy and the limits of the law CESV Rachels, Why privacy is important CESV Posner, An economic theory of privacy CESV
Apr 8	Privacy, continued
Apr 10	The private sector	Culnan and Smith, Lotus Marketplace CESV Barlow, Private life in cyberpace CESV Chaum, A new paradigm for individuals in the information age CESV Ramirez, How 'unlisted' is becoming 'kind of listed' CR Andrews, The '96 race on the internet CR Sipior and Ward, Legal quandary CR Weisband and Reinig, Managing user perception of email privacy CR
Apr 15	Policy	Rule et. al., Preserving individual autonomy in an information-oriented society CESV Berman and Goldman, A federal right of information privacy: the need for reform CESV
Apr 17	Computer Crime and Hacker Ethics	Eisenberg, The computer worm CESV Spafford, Are computer break-ins ethical? CESV Denning and Drake, A dialog on hacking and security CESV Stallman, Are computer property rights absolute? CESV Johnson, Computer Ethics: Old and New, Chapter 6 Lewis, Between and hacker and a hard place CR Gabriel, Reprogramming a convicted hacker CR Markoff, A most wanted cyberthief is caught in his own web CR Markoff, How a computer sleuth traced a digital trail CR Branscomb, Rogue computer programs and computer rogues: tailoring the punishment to fit the crime CESV Rotenberg, Computer virus legislation CESV
Apr 21				3rd Paper due
Apr 22	Access to computing	Gore, Global information infrastructure CESV Chapman and Rotenberg, The national information infrastructure: a public interest opportunity CESV Fried, pp 102-116 CR Civille The Internet and the poor CR RAND Universal Access to E-mail, Chpts. 2 & 6
Apr 24	Civil liberties in cyperspace	Kapor, Civil liberties in Cyberspace CESV Greenawalt, Rationales for freedom of speech CESV Andrews, Senate supports heavy penalties on computer smut CR CPSR Board of Directors, Just say no to censorship CR Lewis, Despite a new plan for cooling it off, cybersex stays hot CR Lewis Libel suit against Prodigy tests on line speech limits CR Huber Electronic smut CR The Economist, Sex on the Internet CR Markoff On line service blocks access to topics called pornographic CR Cowell Neo-Nazis now network on line and underground CR Schneider, Hate groups use tools of the electronic trade CR
Apr 29	Networks and social values	Denning, The United States vs. Craig Neidorf CESV Jensen, An electronic soapbox: computer bulletin boards and the First Amendment CESV Banisar, Prodigy held liable CR Brooke, Scientologists loose a battle in Cyberspace CR Levy, Battle of the Clipper Chip CESV Samuelson, Intellectual property rights CR Samuelson, The NII intellectual property report CR Barlow, Property and speech CR
May 1	Conclusion and Overview	Forster, The machine stopped CESV
May 6				4th Paper due

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