Slow Tech and ICT (eBook)

Norberto Patrignani is Associate Lecturer of Computer Ethics at Politecnico di Torino and of ICT & Information Society at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Italy, ethics expert to the European Commission, and Scientific Advisor to the Loccioni Group, Ancona, Italy. He is the Italian representative to IFIP’s Technical Committee on Computers and Society.Diane Whitehouse is a founding partner of The Castlegate Consultancy, which concentrates on research, policy, and deployment in digital health, and an eHealth policy consultant at European Health Telematics Association (EHTEL), Belgium. She is co-Chair of the International Federation for Information Processing’s (IFIP) domain committee on health informatics. In 2017, she was awarded HIMSS Europe’s eHealth Leadership Award.

1    Introduction2    Pneumatophores2.1    Carlo Petrini2.2    Alexander Langer2.3    René von Schomberg2.4    Joseph Weizenbaum3    Speed Limits in Cyberspace3.1    An Ecology for Cyberspace?3.1.1    Characteristics of the Knowledge Revolution3.1.2    Human beings and the concept of time3.1.3    Why human beings do not like limits3.2    The Myth of Speed4    Stories about Speed and Time4.1    The Length of Life Cycles: the Lotka-Volterra Model4.2    Dangers are Long-Lasting: Onkalo, Finland4.3    Eternally Saving Crops for Humanity: Svalbard, Norway4.4    Stimulating Long-Term Thinking: Van Horn, Texas4.5    Limiting the Speed of Machines: the New York Stock Exchange4.6    The Recovery of Control5    Information: Environmental and Human Limits5.1    The Characteristics of Information5.1.1    An initial focus on the time dimension5.1.2    Information sharing in space and time5.1.3    How information provision has developed over time5.2    Environmental Limits: Towards the End of Moore’s Law?5.2.1    Computers are not washing machines5.3    Human Limits: Individual and Collective Bandwidth5.3.1    Individual bandwidth5.3.2    Collective bandwidth6    The beginning of a new Renaissance in ICT6.1    Co-Shaping of Technology and Society6.1.1    The early days of computing6.1.2    Computing use in wartime6.1.3    Host computing6.1.4    Personal computing6.1.5    Cloud computing6.2    Towards a Proactive Computer Ethics6.2.1    The dawn of computer ethics6.2.2    A policy vacuum6.2.3    Further shifts in computer ethics6.2.4    Proactive computer ethics6.3    ICT as Complex Socio-Technical Systems6.3.1    Systemic design6.3.2    Importance of complex systems in computer science6.4    Innovation6.4.1    Innovation, ethics and Responsible Research and Innovation6.5    A Model for Responsible Research and Innovation7    Slow Tech: A Good, Clean, and Fair ICT7.1    Introducing a Slow Tech Compass7.2    Adapting the Principles of the Slow Food Movement to ICT7.3    Good ICT7.3.1    Good ICT as socially desirable ICT7.3.2    Good ICT as hospitable ICT7.3.3    Good ICT and a balance between leisure and working time7.3.4    Good ICT and slower life7.3.5    Good ICT and learning7.3.6    Good ICT and studies of the human mind7.4    Clean ICT7.4.1    Clean ICT and climate change7.4.2    Clean ICT and e-waste7.5    Fair ICT7.5.1    Fair ICT and ethics7.5.2    Being ethical: working with shared values7.5.3    Fair ICT and the rights of workers7.5.4    Fair ICT and the health of workers7.5.5    Fair ICT and its open spanning layers7.5.6    Fair ICT and war8    Applying Slow Tech in Real Life8.1    Moving towards an Understanding of Complex Human Beings8.2    Starting a Dialogue with Stakeholders8.2.1    Younger generations8.2.2    Users8.2.3    Computer professionals8.2.4    ICT companies8.3    Applying the Slow Tech Method8.3.1    Is this cloud computing good?8.3.2    Is this cloud computing clean?8.3.3    Is this cloud computing fair?8.4    Locating Existing Examples of Slow Tech Companies8.4.1    Olivetti8.4.2    Loccioni8.4.3    Fairphone9    Energy, time and information: A long-term view of ICT9.1    A Longer-Term View of Sustainable ICT over Time9.2    Spreng’s Triangle9.3    An Application of the Brakes with a Focus on Human Happiness