Category: Editorial & Opinion

The Gap Between Policy and Implementation Has Roots in Academia

By on December 12th, 2024 in Articles, Editorial & Opinion, Human Impacts, Magazine Articles, Social Implications of Technology, Societal Impact

The discipline of public policy is largely about the process and prioritization of decision-making and is deeply rooted in economics. It is about how to decide what to do or accomplish, based on countless variables and inputs. Preparing the next generation of policymakers means acknowledging that public policy and technology are inextricably entwined.

Technology and Analytics for Global Development: Transforming Agriculture, Empowering Sustainable Livelihoods, and Ensuring Planetary Well-Being

By on November 30th, 2024 in Articles, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Case Studies, Editorial & Opinion, Environment, Ethics, Health & Medical, Human Impacts, Magazine Articles, Social Implications of Technology, Societal Impact

We initiated this special issue to highlight innovative and essential work underway on technology and analytics for global development. The panoply of important Adaptation and sustainability are essential, enabled by technologies that optimize crop production, improve quality, and protect the environment. topics discussed at ISTAS23 presented a difficult, but welcome challenge of deciding the theme for this special issue.

Regenerative Agriculture and Sustainable Stewardship

By on October 28th, 2024 in Articles, Editorial & Opinion, Environment, Ethics, Health & Medical, Human Impacts, Magazine Articles, Social Implications of Technology, Societal Impact

Regenerative agriculture involves improving, not depleting, the resources used. Cora and Mike’s methods emphasize the symbiotic relationship between the animals and the land, ensuring that both thrive in a balanced and healthy environment.

Food Security and Agriculture: Technology, Policy, Choices

By on October 1st, 2024 in Articles, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Case Studies, Editorial & Opinion, Environment, Ethics, Health & Medical, Human Impacts, Magazine Articles, Social Implications of Technology, Societal Impact

Food security and agriculture are complex systems that interconnect with many other issues, including poverty and environmental sustainability. These urgent issues inspire proposals for technological solutions. Emerging technologies are often proposed as ways to increase food supply to end hunger. Other proposals target agricultural practice, grounded in the knowledge that agriculture has a large carbon footprint, and the fear that the negative climate impacts of agriculture would worsen as the population increases.

AI and Data Technologies in Advancing Sustainable Development Goals

By on June 15th, 2024 in Articles, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Editorial & Opinion, Environment, Ethics, Health & Medical, Magazine Articles, Social Implications of Technology, Societal Impact

The articles in this special issue focus on the connected nature of the SDGs and the need to address them using community-based approaches and span essential steps for widespread SDG attainment, including planning, implementation, and monitoring.

A Social Technical Journey to SSIT

By on April 19th, 2024 in Articles, Editorial & Opinion, Ethics, Human Impacts, Magazine Articles, Social Implications of Technology, Societal Impact

IEEE Technology and Society Magazine is a rare place where social and technological concerns come together in a way that respects both the technological details as well as the critical, social areas that influence technological invention and adoption.

Human Centricity in the Relationship Between Explainability and Trust in AI

By on March 20th, 2024 in Articles, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Editorial & Opinion, Human Impacts, Magazine Articles, Social Implications of Technology, Societal Impact

The term “explainability” is a multifaceted concept within the realm of computer science. In essence, it encompasses various aspects and capacities of a system to effectively convey its internal processes, decision-making, capabilities, and constraints to its users. Providing explanations can notably enhance initial trust, especially when trust is measured as a multidimensional concept that includes aspects such as competence, benevolence, integrity, intention to return, and perceived transparency.

Gender Equality in Engineering: An Institutional Reflection

By on February 28th, 2024 in Articles, Editorial & Opinion, Ethics, Human Impacts, Magazine Articles, Social Implications of Technology, Societal Impact

We identified five key issues to prioritize when addressing gender equality: Reaching critical mass; Improving lived and living experience (maintaining critical mass); Selection and resource-allocation criteria; The misconception of merit in academia; Beyond gender equality.

Potential Impact of Data-Centric AI on Society

By on December 18th, 2023 in Articles, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Editorial & Opinion, Ethics, Human Impacts, Magazine Articles, Social Implications of Technology, Societal Impact

DCAI has the potential to revolutionize many industries and fields by enabling more efficient and effective decision-making based on insights extracted from data. Monitoring and evaluating the algorithm’s performance can help identify and mitigate biases over time, ensuring reliable and ethical results.

ChatSh*t and Other Conversations (That We Should Be Having, But Mostly Are Not)

By on November 3rd, 2023 in Articles, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Editorial & Opinion, Ethics, Human Impacts, Magazine Articles, Social Implications of Technology, Societal Impact

Generative artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly transforming people’s access to and attitudes toward knowledge. It is an extremely powerful technology, but this transformation presents numerous social, environmental, political, and educational considerations.

Securitization for Sustainability of People and Place

By on August 4th, 2023 in Articles, Editorial & Opinion, Ethics, Human Impacts, Magazine Articles, Social Implications of Technology, Societal Impact

The purpose of this special issue is to explore and address complex securitization-related challenges, from a broader perspective and across various dimensions and sectors, that transcend disciplinary boundaries, focusing on the role of technology relevant to the securitization of people and place, while also considering the transdisciplinarity and the socio-historical originals of securitization.

A 13-year-old girl is using her smartphone in the dark room.

Toxic Technology

By on March 16th, 2023 in Articles, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Communication Technology, Editorial & Opinion, Ethics, Health & Medical, Human Impacts, Magazine Articles, Social Implications of Technology, Societal Impact

Technology has always been about more than simply a route to increased productivity and economic growth; technology also provides the opportunity to enhance, enrich, and empower—basically, to improve shared qualitative values or people’s quality of life (however that is measured). On the flip side, technology also provides the opportunity to develop and project organizational control, which itself can be weaponized to quantitatively determine human value as an asset to that organization, or to reinforce asymmetric power relationships.

Learning From Indigenous Cultures

By on February 10th, 2023 in Articles, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Editorial & Opinion, Ethics, Human Impacts, Magazine Articles, Social Implications of Technology, Societal Impact

We would act wisely if we turn to alternative ways of thinking, other wisdom traditions, and learn from them. Ubuntu philosophy can help to draw attention to social issues, for example, the horrors of colonialism, exclusion, and oppression, and to find ways to promote social justice. Aboriginal wisdom can help to apply diverse ways of knowing, for example, knowledge that is related to place, to kinship, to stories, to patterns—not only knowledge in books. The Indigenous cultures and wisdom of the Americas can teach us how to organize economic and political systems more sustainably and to develop more caring relationships with nature. And Confucian culture and wisdom can help to design and apply technologies in ways that support us as relational and developmental beings.

Technological Stewardship and Responsible Innovation

By on November 7th, 2022 in Articles, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Editorial & Opinion, Ethics, Human Impacts, Magazine Articles, Social Implications of Technology, Societal Impact

The call for responsible innovation is a call to address and account for technology’s short- and long-term impacts within social, political, environmental, and cultural domains. Technological stewardship stands as a commitment to anticipate and mitigate technology’s potential for disruption and especially harm and to guide innovation toward beneficial ends. Dialogue and collaboration across diverse perspectives is essential for developing actionable technological solutions that attend in responsible ways to the evolving needs of society.