Onlife community debate, thinking about ethics in the Infosphere

Abstract

1. Social shift, onlife citizenship
2. Phenomenological approach to ethics in the infosphere
3. Social constructivists approach, rethinking of the social contract
4. Fear and Fear ! Future design of the social norms

The development of the information technology and the global spread of the Internet shaped the social discourse in a revolutionary new way. The hyper connectivity of the world created a new sphere of human intersections-the infosphere. The new virtual dimension of basic human interaction created new perceptions of the basic human social institutions, nowadays is quite normal to be part of an open or closed virtual community with members from all around the globe who most probably, would never interact in other social conditions, most of us have been part of a process of virtual education, and maybe the majority of us are engaged in spreading social virtual encounters using the social virtual platforms. Virtuality extends the social in unprecedented ways.

Full text

Onlife community debate, thinking about ethics in the Infosphere
VIKTOR MILOSHEVSKI PHD Student
Doctoral School of the University of the Balearic Islands
miloshevskiviktor@gmail.com,
viktor.miloshevski1@estudiant.uib.eu
Republic of Macedonia/Bulgaria
Country of residence: Spain
SUMMARY
1. Social shift, onlife citizenship
2. Phenomenological approach to ethics in the infosphere
3. Social constructivists approach, re-thinking of the social contract
4. Fear and Fear ! Future design of the social norms
The development of the information technology and the global spread of the Internet
shaped the social discourse in a revolutionary new way. The hyper connectivity of the
world created a new sphere of human intersections-the infosphere. The infosphere, as
Luciano Floridi calls it, is the combination of the internet and computer technology
that is revolutionizing our lives and work. (Handy, 2015). The new virtual dimension
of basic human interaction created new perceptions of the basic human social
institutions, nowadays is quite normal to be part of an open or closed virtual
community with members from all around the globe who most probably, would never
interact in other social conditions, most of us have been part of a process of virtual
education, and maybe the majority of us are engaged in spreading social virtual
encounters using the social virtual platforms. The proponents of the virtualization of
society (and its institutions) argue that virtuality extends the social in unprecedented
ways (Fernback 1997, Rheingold 1993a, 1993b, Turkle 1995, 1996, Benedikt 1991,
Horn 1998 as cited in Sullins,2016). The very essence of this new social condition is
the possibility to create new unique ways to be(self-creation) and to relate to others
(self-creations) in a virtual hyperconnected domain. Turkle (1996) argues that the
new social domain that is part of the infosphere “make possible the construction of an
identity that is so fluid and multiple that it strains the very limits of the notion [of
authenticity]. These new identities could create and actually are already part of a
parallel social domain where the inclusion of participants from different social groups
is highlighted. One may see this a new social domain or may see it as a transformed
social domain, either way the implications on our current understanding to ethics and
moral are present. The foundations of the ethics as we know it and perceive it, can be
found in the philosophy of virtue ethics on the West philosophical by Plato and
Aristotle, and on the Eastern by Mencius and Confucius. Based on the writings and
philosophical debates in the field of virtue ethics another theory emerged. The “virtue

theory”, is characterised by the inclusion of accounts of virtue within the other
approaches. Interest in Kant’s virtue theory has redirected philosophers’ attention to
Kant’s long neglected Doctrine of Virtue, and utilitarian’s have developed
consequentialist virtue theories (Driver 2001; Hurka 2001). It has also generated
virtue ethical readings of philosophers other than Plato and Aristotle, such as
Martineau, Hume and Nietzsche, and thereby different forms of virtue ethics have
developed (Slote 2001; Swanton 2003, 2011a as cited in Hursthouse and Pettigrove
2016).
In our own perception as humans, ethics and moral is inter-related to our family,
culture, political and social institutions. We are living in an era where the
communities step out of the current established condition and create new virtual
domain. Since the domain has changed, we will need to re-think the principles and
the framework according to the newly created conditions and norms.
Since the very design capabilities of information technology influence the lives of their
users, the moral commitments of the designers of these technologies may dictate the course
society will take and our commitments to certain moral values (Brey 2010; Bynum 2000;
Ess 2009; Johnson 1985; Magnani 2007; Moor 1985; Spinello 2001; Sullins 2010 as cited in
Sulins 2016).
Hierarchical patterns were key models for social order. Political organisations
were represented by Westphalian States, exerting sovereign powers within their territory.
Within such States, legislative, executive and judiciary powers were deemed to balance each
other and protect against the risk of power abuse. By enabling multi-agent systems and
opening new possibilities for direct democracy. ICTs destabilize and call for rethinking the
worldviews and metaphors underlying modern political structures. (Floridi 2009, p.8)
In a hyper connected world the social shift is also reflected in the centers of power.
These social institutions and closed communities now face a challenge, nowadays
private entities and civil communities have more control over the stored data, in this
case Big Data since they are engaged in the gathering, storing and analysis of this
data. Today each citizen has access to more and more of that stored information
without the necessity of utilizing the traditional mediators of that information and
therefore a greater individual share of social power (Lessig 1999).
Phenomenological approach
The complex transformation of the social domain under the galloping development of
information technology and the spread of the virtual networks makes the definition of
human nature and the essence of human behaviors vis a vis human interaction even
more challenging for the new wave of infosphere philosophy.

The phenomenological approach carries out a rather very essential exploration of the
conditions of artefacts -phenomenology investigates the conditions of what makes
things appear as such (as that which we take them to be) (Ihde 2003). The second
philosophical marker is that this theory unites different scientific discourses in their
intersections while exploring the co-constitutive relations between humans and
phenomena. The relationship between humans and the virtual communities and the
relations between the members from and within one community are co-constitutive
relations of engagement and disengagement with artefacts on the trajectories of
modern human living. Heidegger famously claimed that “the essence of technology is
nothing technological” ( Heidegger 1977). For Heidegger the essence of technology
is the way of being of modern humans—a way of conducting themselves towards the
world—that sees the world as something to be ordered and shaped in line with
projects, intentions and desires—a ‘will to power’ that manifest itself as a ‘will to
technology.’ (Intorna 2017).
A bit more moderate approach constitutes the Stiegler arguing that human and the
technical are co-original—in other words that the technical did not emerge out of the
(already constituted) human or the human out of the (already constituted) technical
but that these two ontological domains co-constituted each other from the very start.
(Stiegler, 1998)
Stiegler goes deep as the very beginning of human interactions beyond voice, the first
inscriptions of forms of art, hieroglyphs and other forms of sources that we base our
history and knowledge of the past. Technology in this sense is not understood sole as
ICT in the form we see today, but in the very original form that facilitated the
developments. Thus, for Stiegler the constitutive transcendental horizon of the human
is technicity, from which emerges the conditions of possibility of time, society and
culture. (Intorna 2017).
Leroi-Gourhan is on the same line, connecting the biological process and the
development of the hands as a technological mediates process which resulted with
social development and political progress in the form we know it now.
A very relevant critique was produced by the work of Dreyfus, according to him the
way skill development has become understood in the past has been wrong. Skills and
knowledge are understood as artefacts that should be approached from a different
perspective undermining the old studies of the philosophy related mostly to virtue
ethics and the very beginning of democracy as a political system and the production
of the early moral codex. In his arguing he perceives the classical conception of skill
development is outdated and he offers a theory based on the claim that what we
observe when we learn a new skill in everyday practice is in fact the opposite. We
most often start with explicit rules or preformulated approaches and then move to a
multiplicity of particular cases, as we become an expert. (Dreyfus 1992)

This can go into favour of the current focus on AI exploitation to get as much data on
everyday human behaviour, habits and expertise in living life and making decisions.
In the new societies and the onlife these explorations of the basic human values are
crucial for development in a new direction. The social constructs of the old
societies(the one we currently live in) failed many times to enforce the implications
of the constructed ethics and prevent the inclination that this state of concerns may
cause. Technology and society as co-constructed, co-influence the course of human
future.
Social constructivists theory
The social constructivists theory centers its claims around the technology as socially
constructed, being as such, part of the wider political system, include ethical
implications already pre-determined by the political processes. Given as such, we are
faced with a situation of inapplicable political response to a newly raised era of
freedom and global spread of information. Although politics tends to shape and
design the trajectories of public and private life of the citizens, the perceptions of
public and private are re-negotiated in the infosphere and are becoming integral part
of the onlife. In terms of ethics and moral, constructionists perceive the social norms
not as discovered truth but created by the interactions of human race within different
time periods.
This theory although represented with few directions in general is mostly concern
with the subjective sides of human existence rather than the objective norms and the
objective scientific concerns of the natural.
According to Klein and Kleinman the first is interpretive flexibility. This idea, taken
from the empirical program of relativism (cf. Collins 1975; Pinch 1977, 1986;
Pickering 1984) in the social studies of science, suggests that technology design is an
open process that can produce different outcomes depending on the social
circumstances of development.
According to Klein and Kleinman the concept of the relevant social group is a second
component of the SCOT approach. Relevant social groups are the embodiments of
particular interpretations: “all members of a certain social group share the same set of
meanings, attached to a specific artifact” (Pinch and Bijker 1987, 30 as cited in Klein
and Kleinman 2002).
The main critique here is addressed to the naïve presumption of equality among the
social groups and the members within one group. This assumptions have been already
proven wrong in the previous era of democracy, they simply should be re-discovered
in a new digital contest with another setting of the power division.

The third component of the framework is closure and stabilization. As Klein and
Kleinman argue a multigroup design process can experience controversies when
different interpretations lead to conflicting images of an artefact. This may refer to
the future design of the ethical and moral codex of the infosphere where the
discussions of the perception and the utilization of the artefacts will be created. As a
forth component Klein and Kleinman the wider context which summarise the wider
sociocultural and political milieu in which artefacts development takes place. This
can be very interesting for the process of creation of AI, where if we follow the
Steedman arguing-‘ most of what is known and most of the knowing that is done is
concerned with trying to make sense of what it is to be human, as opposed to
scientific knowledge’ (Steedman 2000) we could see that the very beginning of the
machine learning has been challenged. In a perspective of the virtual communities
this arguing is mostly relevant since the relation between the members of the
communities and the communities within the communities are in the centre of the
research perimeter.
Fear and Fear, Future design of the social norms
Luciano Floridi as one of the lead scientists in the field of the infosphere recognises
the need and deconstructs the concept of Information Ethics above computer and
machine ethics. He distinguishes the concept of Information ethics from the closely
cognitive links of the computer and machine ethics, to a wider and more universal
discourse, a centre of moral claims, which now includes every instance of
information, no matter whether physically implemented or not. The objects here are
the information itself and the creator putting the moral question of IE in a simple
form, what is good for an information entity and the infosphere in general? (Floridi,
1999).
The fear of the cognitive applications of AI and the ethical and moral discourse
within which these advancements will be made remains present in the academic
world in particular after Elon Musk’s investment in a company there are called
Neuralink. This company should focus the research on how to physically interface
computers and the human brain, presumably to speed up the output speed of the brain
far beyond the few bytes a second it is capable of now. The research should result
with creation of “neural lace” technology that would involve electrodes that move
thought messages from the brain to a computer and back again faster than ever before
possible. (Hanley, 2017). Musk’s statement on the World Government Summit in
Dubai on the topic of artificial intelligence once again confirm his efforts and calls
for advancement in this field as it becomes more and more common in out everyday
life. In his interview for Russia Today International, asked about the Musk’s
intentions and investment Zizek expressed concern about the control over this process
and more importantly the control of the end result of the research the will be
conducted. He even goes as far as claiming that if the link between the human brain

and digital space becomes direct then in a way we will be no longer humans. (Russia
Today, 2017).
In his other writings on the topic Zizek approach the relation between human and
computers as “the computer inscribes itself on our symbolic universe’ (Zizek, 1996,
2003). Zizek describes the relation to technology as ‘a medium of mastery and
control both in the control it is thought to have over society and in its use as a tool’
The social implications of these developments remain open for research and
interpretation, indeed we still could not recognise the limitations and the
advancements in the field of creation of info ethics and the future design of the moral
and ethical codex of the infosphere.
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