ISAT 171 1st Quiz

Sociotechnical Imaginary

different kinds of narratives about these futures in technology and what is being described and prescribed, who is benefiting

Market Failure Rationales

Bais of creating regulatory process (creating a law, putting the law to work, and creating regulations)

Technocracy

Technological inventions are managed and controlled by human actions, but presumes that only those with specialist knowledge and skills can rise to the task (unintended consequences)

Executive Order

Not a law, but has a lot of weight and power, policy priority, not allowed to violate constitution or law, can order federal government within constitutional authority

Jasanoff’s Three thorny problems

Risk (environmental, health, economic), Inequality (benefits unevenly distributed), and nature (the value/meaning of it)

Executive Branch

President, Cabinet, Regulatory Angencies (executive orders and power over administrative agencies like EPA)

Legislative Branch

Congress (makes/passes laws)

Judicial

Court Systems (upholds and interpretates laws)

Progress

Changes in society toward certain goals; technological

Is ‘Progress’ Good for Humanity - The Atlantic Article

Effects of industrial revolution makes it difficult to dissent that growth within society is necessary; narratives are inevitably moralistic; technological advancements are ultimately beneficial for humanity; age of pollution

Sociotechnical system

A complex system that includes a dynamic interplay of social and technical elements, and multiple stakeholders; includes human and nonhuman “actors”

What is human and nonhuman “actors”?

a term often used to indicate some degree of agency, or power to have an impact on the system

Market Failure

failure to produce results that are considered to be in the ‘public interest’ (individual rights); opinions and conceptualizations about the public interest will inform debates therefore regulation (not always in public interest)

Market failure rationales

basis of creating regulatory processes (creating law, putting the law to work, and creating regulations around that law)

market absence

no naturally occurring market, so law and regulation may attempt to create an artificial market in order to produce desired behavior

Merton’s norms of science

communalism, universalism, organized skeptics, and disinterestedness

Administrative agency

agencies within the executive branch; interprets laws, creates regulations, and enforces; an example is the EPA

Democracy

a government with officials elected by the people; basis in being representative of the people and making laws that should be in favor of the people

Politicization

when an issue or a concept gets accelerated and ratcheted up (by political leaders, media, or different political parties) and then polarizes the political leaders and/or the people of the country

regulation

subtly controlling society and what the people can do or not do

Nation’s grid

Where all of the United States power comes from, made with transformers and very vulnerable outages and damage; to 3 different grid interconnections in USA (Western, Eastern, and Texas), GridPolicy, GOES (grain-oriented electrical steel)

What is GridEx?

war-games exercise; simulating how utilities and various local, state and federal governments would respond to a move limited outage

Data Centers

large buildings that run and store data for everything; never stops; and increase in a “need” for these centers since increase of use of AI

Merchants of Doubt

corporations and politicians selling doubt about climate crisis, smoking/tobacco, and flame-retardant furniture. Talks a lot about market failure and distrust in the large corporations that run our country and our politics

Counter-norms of science

particularism, individualism, interestedness, and organized dogmatism

Particularism

evaluate data, claims based on who is making them

Individualism

protect results through property rights

Interestedness

do it for one’s own interest (can lead to bad science)

organized dogmatism

adhere to one’s own claims regardless of valid critiques, counter-examples or opposing data

Interpretive Flexibility

everyone has different interpretations about different topics or things around the world

Volti’s questions for governing science/technology in a democracy

Does government regulation work to create better technology? Is government technology good for citizens; does it benefit our society? Does government intervention work?

Governance

“structures and processes that are designed to ensure accountability, transparency, responsiveness, rule of law, stability, equity and inclusiveness, empowerment, and broad-based participation” (not stable, dynamic) - related to everything in sociotechnical systems

Industrial revolution

The start of the technological era

Market failure rationales for regulation examples

monopoly, information, inadequacy, free rider, negative externality

Framing

mechanism for analyzing; what is included and not included, determines relevance (what matters), juxtaposition, word choice/repetition, context

What is juxtaposition?

the ways that meaning can be shifted depending on how two elements sit next to each other

AI

artificial intelligence; related to a lot in current sociotechnical systems; controversial

Myth of unintended consequences

The idea that if there are consequences, consequences that are good are claimed by the creator; and unintended consequences are not claimed by the creator (no foresight)

Public Interest

that is best for public and what the public wants

Jasanoff’s argument that technologies can ‘rule’ us as much as laws

phones/computers, transportation, debit/credit cards, even light telling us to go or stop in diving and walking