Although all the courses I’ve covered this semester have been interesting, the course ‘Ethics of Robotics and Autonomous Systems’ has proved very beneficial in influencing my thinking about the direction the provisional research project could take. This is because the assignment topic I chose for that course focused on automation and the future of work, in which I explored how upcoming waves of automation could lead to a collaborative relationship between human agents and autonomous systems, creating opportunities for the upskilling of the workforce, only if the future of automation is actively steered towards labour-augmenting innovations to prevent large levels of technological unemployment, which some academics – like Khan (2018) – would consider as a market failure.  

As part of my argument, I investigated Korinek & Stiglitz (2021) stance, which discusses our (humans’) ability to steer the direction of technological developments into labour-augmenting vs capital-augmenting innovations. I also looked into Zerilli et al’s (2019) stance on ‘complementary coupling’ which describes how human agents could work alongside highly proficient algorithmic tools where a typical work role would be broken up (through task decomposition) and shared between the human agents and the algorithmic tools. I believe this concept of ‘complementary coupling’ is aligned with my initial conceptual intention for my research which revolves around using technology in a way that enhances a worker through a value creating lens. Interestingly, I also read up on Nyholm & Smids (2020) argument that ‘technological complementarity’ should not only be conceived as uniformly good as it may have more complicated and mixed impacts on the well-being of workers. This made me think that I could build on their argument by proposing that this is where a change of work ethic/ social value system would make the most impact as steering technological development towards labour-augmenting innovations would not be enough to mitigate the effects that Nyholm & Smids (2020) put forward.  

In regard to feedback, I have received several inputs at slightly different stages of the ideation process. Early on, after this post – in which I outlined a very rough plan – I sought out some feedback from two of the lecturers to investigate whether the research area I proposed was even valid and to see their reaction to what I was proposing, specifically in relation to the master-slave dialectic, as it is ‘an original approach’. Their feedback helped me to begin to narrow down my provisional project idea. Throughout the semester I’ve also asked some PHD students for recommendations on academic articles that could be relevant to my idea and influence the direction I wish to take.  

After some development – following this post – I sought out some feedback from another lecturer who seemed to like the idea but stated that it was perhaps too ambitious and that if I wanted to contribute to the academic subject, I’d have to bite off a bit less. They suggested focusing on a narrower aspect of the idea, for example, focusing on the master-slave nature of the traditional employment relationship and how AI would change it.  

So, that’s where I’m at, once deadlines calm down a bit, I’ll shift my focus back to my provisional project and to the long reading list that has been beckoning me. After which, I’ll seek to explore a narrower focus that still aligns with my initial conceptual intention for my project  

References

Khan, S. R. (2018) ‘Reinventing capitalism to address automation: Sharing work to secure employment and income’, Competition & Change, 22(4), pp. 343-362.  

Korinek, A., Stiglitz, J. E. (2021) ‘Steering Technological Progress’, Research Centre for Economic Analysis. pp. 1-29. Available at: http://rcea.org/wp- content/uploads/2021/04/Future- of-growth/Korinek.pdf (Accessed: 20 October 2023) 

Nyholm, S., Smids, J. (2019) ‘Can a Robot Be a Good Colleague?’, Science and Engineering Ethics, 26, pp. 2169-2188.  

Zerilli, J., Knott, A., Maclaurin, J., Gavaghan, C. (2019) ‘Algorithmic Decision-Making and the Control Problem’, Minds and Machines, 29. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11023-019-09513-7  

‘How has your learning, and/or feedback influenced your thinking about the direction your project is taking? How are you integrating the literature into the plan? / Dana’s Blogs by is licensed under a