By Alison Flood
The Guardian
Originally published February 18, 2016
Here is an excerpt:
The system was named Quixote, said Riedl, after Cervantes’ would-be knight-errant, who “reads stories about chivalrous knights and decides to emulate the behaviour of those knights”. The researchers’ paper sees them argue that “stories are necessarily reflections of the culture and society that they were produced in”, and that they “encode many types of sociocultural knowledge: commonly shared knowledge, social protocols, examples of proper and improper behaviour, and strategies for coping with adversity”.
“We believe that a computer that can read and understand stories, can, if given enough example stories from a given culture, ‘reverse engineer’ the values tacitly held by the culture that produced them,” they write. “These values can be complete enough that they can align the values of an intelligent entity with humanity. In short, we hypothesise that an intelligent entity can learn what it means to be human by immersing itself in the stories it produces.”
Riedl said that, “In theory, a collected works of a society could be fed into an AI and the values extracted from the stories would become part of its goals, which is equivalent to writing down all the ‘rules’ of society.”
The researchers see the Quixote technique as best for robots with a limited purpose that need to interact with humanity.
The article is here.
Thursday, March 10, 2016
How Secular Are Secular Ethics?
By Jennifer Michael Hecht
The Chronicle of Higher Education
Originally published February 21, 2016
Here is an excerpt:
There’s some truth to all these claims, but they are just a fraction of a much richer story. The real roots of secular ethics in the 18th to 20th centuries are to be found in ancient Greek and Roman philosophy, Judaism, Christianity, Buddhism, and Star Trek. They come from Plato, Ecclesiastes, George Eliot, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Dr. Who. Furthermore, some element of personal ethics seems to be hard-wired in humans. When we think of passionate moral feeling as necessarily derived from Christianity, we do violence to reality. To think this way today is particularly galling because so many traditions of being good in the world now crowd our common culture.
But mostly it is just naïve. It makes me think of the schoolroom map of Siam in The King and I. Christianity is there, on the map of moral influences, but it is just not that big. As we move into the future, it is important to remember the myriad nonsupernatural models for dedicating oneself to being good. And, of course, the complexity of the real story is much richer than the simplistic one.
The article is here.
The Chronicle of Higher Education
Originally published February 21, 2016
Here is an excerpt:
There’s some truth to all these claims, but they are just a fraction of a much richer story. The real roots of secular ethics in the 18th to 20th centuries are to be found in ancient Greek and Roman philosophy, Judaism, Christianity, Buddhism, and Star Trek. They come from Plato, Ecclesiastes, George Eliot, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Dr. Who. Furthermore, some element of personal ethics seems to be hard-wired in humans. When we think of passionate moral feeling as necessarily derived from Christianity, we do violence to reality. To think this way today is particularly galling because so many traditions of being good in the world now crowd our common culture.
But mostly it is just naïve. It makes me think of the schoolroom map of Siam in The King and I. Christianity is there, on the map of moral influences, but it is just not that big. As we move into the future, it is important to remember the myriad nonsupernatural models for dedicating oneself to being good. And, of course, the complexity of the real story is much richer than the simplistic one.
The article is here.
Wednesday, March 9, 2016
People Feel Less Responsible For Their Actions When They're Following Orders
By Katrina Pascual
Tech Times
Originally posted February 19, 2016
Here is an excerpt:
Now, the modified experiment, conducted by University College London researchers, reflected the subjects' mental distance from their actions when obeying orders.
"We wanted to know what people actually felt about the action as they made it, and about the outcome. Time perception tells us something about the basic experiences people have when they act, not just about how they think they should have felt," said UCL professor and senior study author Patrick Haggard.
Results showed that when the subjects freely chose the action in coercive orders, there was a longer interval between the action and tone, which is produced when subjects gave their partner an electric shock by pressing a key.
The article is here.
Tech Times
Originally posted February 19, 2016
Here is an excerpt:
Now, the modified experiment, conducted by University College London researchers, reflected the subjects' mental distance from their actions when obeying orders.
"We wanted to know what people actually felt about the action as they made it, and about the outcome. Time perception tells us something about the basic experiences people have when they act, not just about how they think they should have felt," said UCL professor and senior study author Patrick Haggard.
Results showed that when the subjects freely chose the action in coercive orders, there was a longer interval between the action and tone, which is produced when subjects gave their partner an electric shock by pressing a key.
The article is here.
Engaging Patients Through OpenNotes: An Evaluation Using Mixed Methods
Tobias Esch, Roanne Mejilla1, M. Anselmo1, B. Podtschaske, T. Delbanco, J. Walker
BMJ Open, published online Jan. 29, 2016.
Abstract
Objectives
(A) To gain insights into the experiences of patients invited to view their doctors’ visit notes, with a focus on those who review multiple notes;
(B) to examine the relationships among fully transparent electronic medical records and quality of care, the patient-doctor relationship, patient engagement, self-care, self-management skills and clinical outcomes.
(cut)
Results
Patient experiences indicate improved understanding (of health information), better relationships (with doctors), better quality (adherence and compliance; keeping track) and improved self-care (patient-centredness, empowerment). Patients want more doctors to offer access to their notes, and some wish to contribute to their generation. Those patients with repeated experience reviewing notes express fewer concerns and more perceived benefits.
Conclusions
As the use of fully transparent medical records spreads, it is important to gain a deeper understanding of possible benefits or harms, and to characterise target populations that may require varying modes of delivery. Patient desires for expansion of this practice extend to specialty care and settings beyond the physician's office. Patients are also interested in becoming involved actively in the generation of their medical records. The OpenNotes movement may increase patient activation and engagement in important ways.
The article is here.
BMJ Open, published online Jan. 29, 2016.
Abstract
Objectives
(A) To gain insights into the experiences of patients invited to view their doctors’ visit notes, with a focus on those who review multiple notes;
(B) to examine the relationships among fully transparent electronic medical records and quality of care, the patient-doctor relationship, patient engagement, self-care, self-management skills and clinical outcomes.
(cut)
Results
Patient experiences indicate improved understanding (of health information), better relationships (with doctors), better quality (adherence and compliance; keeping track) and improved self-care (patient-centredness, empowerment). Patients want more doctors to offer access to their notes, and some wish to contribute to their generation. Those patients with repeated experience reviewing notes express fewer concerns and more perceived benefits.
Conclusions
As the use of fully transparent medical records spreads, it is important to gain a deeper understanding of possible benefits or harms, and to characterise target populations that may require varying modes of delivery. Patient desires for expansion of this practice extend to specialty care and settings beyond the physician's office. Patients are also interested in becoming involved actively in the generation of their medical records. The OpenNotes movement may increase patient activation and engagement in important ways.
The article is here.
Tuesday, March 8, 2016
How to Become the Smartest Group in the Room
Minds for Business
Association for Psychological Science
Originally published January 28, 2016
Here are two excerpts:
You’re a manager tasked with putting together a team to tackle a new project. What qualities do you look for in creating such a crack team?
Research from psychological scientists Anita Williams Woolley (Carnegie Mellon University), Ishani Aggarwal (Fundação Getulio Vargas), and Thomas Malone (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) finds that the smartest groups don’t necessarily have the highest IQs – rather, what they do tend to have are excellent social skills.
(cut)
Instead, their studies revealed that social skills were much better than IQ at predicting a group’s collective intelligence. Social perceptiveness was measured by people’s ability to judge others’ emotions based on pictures of their eyes. Groups with members who were highly socially attuned — that is, good at reading emotions — were more collectively intelligent than other groups.
The results suggest that social perceptiveness allows group members to communicate more effectively, ultimately allowing the group to capitalize on each member’s skills and experience.
The article is here.
Association for Psychological Science
Originally published January 28, 2016
Here are two excerpts:
You’re a manager tasked with putting together a team to tackle a new project. What qualities do you look for in creating such a crack team?
Research from psychological scientists Anita Williams Woolley (Carnegie Mellon University), Ishani Aggarwal (Fundação Getulio Vargas), and Thomas Malone (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) finds that the smartest groups don’t necessarily have the highest IQs – rather, what they do tend to have are excellent social skills.
(cut)
Instead, their studies revealed that social skills were much better than IQ at predicting a group’s collective intelligence. Social perceptiveness was measured by people’s ability to judge others’ emotions based on pictures of their eyes. Groups with members who were highly socially attuned — that is, good at reading emotions — were more collectively intelligent than other groups.
The results suggest that social perceptiveness allows group members to communicate more effectively, ultimately allowing the group to capitalize on each member’s skills and experience.
The article is here.
When are Do-Gooders Treated Badly? Legitimate Power, Role Expectations, and Reactions to Moral Objection in Organizations.
Wellman, Ned; Mayer, David M.; Ong, Madeline; DeRue, D. Scott
Journal of Applied Psychology, Feb 15 , 2016
Abstract
Organization members who engage in “moral objection” by taking a principled stand against ethically questionable activities help to prevent such activities from persisting. Unfortunately, research suggests that they also may be perceived as less warm (i.e., pleasant, nice) than members who comply with ethically questionable procedures. In this article, we draw on role theory to explore how legitimate power influences observers’ responses to moral objection. We argue that individuals expect those high in legitimate power to engage in moral objection, but expect those low in legitimate power to comply with ethically questionable practices. We further propose that these contrasting role expectations influence the extent to which moral objectors are perceived as warm and subjected to social sanctions (i.e., insults, pressure, unfriendly behavior). We test our predictions with 3 experiments. Study 1, which draws on participants’ prior workplace experiences, supports the first section of our mediated moderation model in which the negative association between an actor’s moral objection (vs. compliance) and observers’ warmth perceptions is weaker when the actor is high rather than low in legitimate power and this effect is mediated by observers’ met role expectations. Study 2, an online experiment featuring a biased hiring task, reveals that the warmth perceptions fostered by the Behavior × Legitimate Power interaction influence observers’ social sanctioning intentions. Finally, Study 3, a laboratory experiment which exposes participants to unethical behavior in a virtual team task, replicates Study 2’s findings and extends the results to actual as well as intended social sanctions.
The article is here.
Journal of Applied Psychology, Feb 15 , 2016
Abstract
Organization members who engage in “moral objection” by taking a principled stand against ethically questionable activities help to prevent such activities from persisting. Unfortunately, research suggests that they also may be perceived as less warm (i.e., pleasant, nice) than members who comply with ethically questionable procedures. In this article, we draw on role theory to explore how legitimate power influences observers’ responses to moral objection. We argue that individuals expect those high in legitimate power to engage in moral objection, but expect those low in legitimate power to comply with ethically questionable practices. We further propose that these contrasting role expectations influence the extent to which moral objectors are perceived as warm and subjected to social sanctions (i.e., insults, pressure, unfriendly behavior). We test our predictions with 3 experiments. Study 1, which draws on participants’ prior workplace experiences, supports the first section of our mediated moderation model in which the negative association between an actor’s moral objection (vs. compliance) and observers’ warmth perceptions is weaker when the actor is high rather than low in legitimate power and this effect is mediated by observers’ met role expectations. Study 2, an online experiment featuring a biased hiring task, reveals that the warmth perceptions fostered by the Behavior × Legitimate Power interaction influence observers’ social sanctioning intentions. Finally, Study 3, a laboratory experiment which exposes participants to unethical behavior in a virtual team task, replicates Study 2’s findings and extends the results to actual as well as intended social sanctions.
The article is here.
Monday, March 7, 2016
The Data Against Kant
By Vlad Chituc and Paul Henne
The New York Times
Originally published February 19, 2016
Here are two excerpts:
This principle — that “ought” implies “can,” that our moral obligations can’t exceed our abilities — played a central role in the work of Immanuel Kant and has been widely accepted since. Indeed, the idea seems self-evidently true, much as “bachelor” implies “man.”
But is it actually true? In 1984, the philosopher Walter Sinnott-Armstrong outlined a series of thought experiments that, he contended, demonstrated that “ought” does not always imply “can.” Though his argument found some adherents, most philosophers were not convinced. We think that the consensus view that “ought” implies “can” is mistaken.
(cut)
While this one study alone doesn’t refute Kant, our research joins a recent salvo of experimental work targeting the principle that “ought” implies “can.” At the very least, philosophers can no longer treat this principle as obviously true.
The article is here.
The New York Times
Originally published February 19, 2016
Here are two excerpts:
This principle — that “ought” implies “can,” that our moral obligations can’t exceed our abilities — played a central role in the work of Immanuel Kant and has been widely accepted since. Indeed, the idea seems self-evidently true, much as “bachelor” implies “man.”
But is it actually true? In 1984, the philosopher Walter Sinnott-Armstrong outlined a series of thought experiments that, he contended, demonstrated that “ought” does not always imply “can.” Though his argument found some adherents, most philosophers were not convinced. We think that the consensus view that “ought” implies “can” is mistaken.
(cut)
While this one study alone doesn’t refute Kant, our research joins a recent salvo of experimental work targeting the principle that “ought” implies “can.” At the very least, philosophers can no longer treat this principle as obviously true.
The article is here.
Honesty and Dishonesty Don’t Move Together: Trait Content Information Influences Behavioral Synchrony
Marco Brambilla, Simona Sacchi , Michela Menegatti, Silvia Moscatelli
Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, pp 1-16
Abstract
Emerging evidence revealed that honesty and trustworthiness are important drivers of the impression-formation process. Questions remain, however, regarding the role of these moral attributes in guiding real and concrete behaviors. Filling this gap, the present study investigated the influence of honesty on a nonverbal behavior that regulates social interactions: behavioral synchrony. Movements were recorded while participants interacted with a partner who was depicted as honest (versus dishonest) or as friendly (versus unfriendly). Results showed that synchrony was affected only by the honesty of the partner. Specifically, the more the interaction partner lacked honesty, the lower the perceived similarity between the self and the interaction partner, which in turn diminished the promptness to engage in behavioral synchrony. Our findings connected the literature on behavioral synchrony with that on the implication of morality for social perception, revealing the key role of the honesty facet of moral character in shaping nonverbal behaviors.
The article is here.
Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, pp 1-16
Abstract
Emerging evidence revealed that honesty and trustworthiness are important drivers of the impression-formation process. Questions remain, however, regarding the role of these moral attributes in guiding real and concrete behaviors. Filling this gap, the present study investigated the influence of honesty on a nonverbal behavior that regulates social interactions: behavioral synchrony. Movements were recorded while participants interacted with a partner who was depicted as honest (versus dishonest) or as friendly (versus unfriendly). Results showed that synchrony was affected only by the honesty of the partner. Specifically, the more the interaction partner lacked honesty, the lower the perceived similarity between the self and the interaction partner, which in turn diminished the promptness to engage in behavioral synchrony. Our findings connected the literature on behavioral synchrony with that on the implication of morality for social perception, revealing the key role of the honesty facet of moral character in shaping nonverbal behaviors.
The article is here.
Sunday, March 6, 2016
The Unbearable Asymmetry of Bullshit
By Brian Earp
BMJ Blogs
Originally posted February 16, 2016
Introduction
Science and medicine have done a lot for the world. Diseases have been eradicated, rockets have been sent to the moon, and convincing, causal explanations have been given for a whole range of formerly inscrutable phenomena. Notwithstanding recent concerns about sloppy research, small sample sizes, and challenges in replicating major findings—concerns I share and which I have written about at length — I still believe that the scientific method is the best available tool for getting at empirical truth. Or to put it a slightly different way (if I may paraphrase Winston Churchill’s famous remark about democracy): it is perhaps the worst tool, except for all the rest.
Scientists are people too
In other words, science is flawed. And scientists are people too. While it is true that most scientists — at least the ones I know and work with — are hell-bent on getting things right, they are not therefore immune from human foibles. If they want to keep their jobs, at least, they must contend with a perverse “publish or perish” incentive structure that tends to reward flashy findings and high-volume “productivity” over painstaking, reliable research. On top of that, they have reputations to defend, egos to protect, and grants to pursue. They get tired. They get overwhelmed. They don’t always check their references, or even read what they cite. They have cognitive and emotional limitations, not to mention biases, like everyone else.
The blog post is here.
BMJ Blogs
Originally posted February 16, 2016
Introduction
Science and medicine have done a lot for the world. Diseases have been eradicated, rockets have been sent to the moon, and convincing, causal explanations have been given for a whole range of formerly inscrutable phenomena. Notwithstanding recent concerns about sloppy research, small sample sizes, and challenges in replicating major findings—concerns I share and which I have written about at length — I still believe that the scientific method is the best available tool for getting at empirical truth. Or to put it a slightly different way (if I may paraphrase Winston Churchill’s famous remark about democracy): it is perhaps the worst tool, except for all the rest.
Scientists are people too
In other words, science is flawed. And scientists are people too. While it is true that most scientists — at least the ones I know and work with — are hell-bent on getting things right, they are not therefore immune from human foibles. If they want to keep their jobs, at least, they must contend with a perverse “publish or perish” incentive structure that tends to reward flashy findings and high-volume “productivity” over painstaking, reliable research. On top of that, they have reputations to defend, egos to protect, and grants to pursue. They get tired. They get overwhelmed. They don’t always check their references, or even read what they cite. They have cognitive and emotional limitations, not to mention biases, like everyone else.
The blog post is here.
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