Seminar period 4 2018/2019: Scientific, social and ethical aspects

Scientific, social and ethical aspects of computer science, reflection seminar in May 2019

The seminar will be either May 14 or 16, see the group schedule below. Before the seminar, you will also need to write a reflection document (before 9 May at 19:00) and read and comment on other group members' reflection documents (before 13 May at 8:00).

Preparations for the reflection

• The increased use of computer games, in particular among very young persons, has led to a lot of public debate. Please read the Wikipedia article on Video game controversies.
• A famous example of a successful engineer and scientist accused of a lack of ethical perspective is Fritz Haber (1868-1934). He received the Nobel Prize in 1918 for developing the process of making synthetic fertilisers, a finding which may have saved millions of people worldwide from starvation. On the other hand, his passion seems to have been centered around developing efficient poisonous gases used in the first world war; work which eventually led to the label "father of chemical warfare". His wife committed suicide; some claim due to her consistent failures to convince her husband to stop pursuing this kind of work. There are even claims that the synthetic fertilisers where only a by-product from his efforts to develop more efficient ammunition. Please read the Wikipedia article about Fritz Haber.

Fill in the evaluation questionnaire that will be emailed to you

In a few days you will get an email with a link to the questionnaire. The questions are about your perceptions of the program integrating course, your perceptions of the KTH classrooms, and, for second year students, an evaluation of your education. The questionnaire, which is mandatory and anonymous, should be filled in before May 16, at 23:59. 

Group schedule

Find your group number in the table below and look up when and where your seminar will be. The seminar is about 50 minutes, and it is important to be on time. Notice the starting times (10 minutes past)! Instructions on how to find the rooms can be found on the webpage Rooms for seminars on the course web.