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![Sebastian Weydner-Volkmann](https://news.rub.de/sites/default/files/styles/nepo_teaser/public/2020_10_15_km_wanka_weydner-volkmann-3.jpg?itok=En6nu_I2)
When values no longer seem to fit
If digitalisation continues at the current rate, the need for intellectual tools for ethical navigation will continue to grow at a rapid pace. The fact that technical innovations confront people with completely new situations in all areas of life is, of course, not unique to digitalisation. Time and again, individuals, but also entire societies, have been asked to account for their actions in a new way, because established moral values no longer fit well with the changed realities.
Today, digital methods such as artificial intelligence and digital technologies – from smart video surveillance to Wikipedia – are revolutionising the central conditions of human activity; they also require new concepts of how we want to live ideas like autonomy, freedom, security and equality under new conditions. One of the central challenges of ethics in the digital age is to justify such orientational approaches in a secular and science-based manner, while at the same time meeting the demands of a pluralistic democracy.
Sebastian Weydner-Volkmann was appointed Junior Professor for Ethics of Digital Methods and Technologies as of 1 February 2020. He studied philosophy, English literature and linguistics as well as political science at the University of Freiburg, where he also completed his PhD at the Centre for Security and Society and the Husserl Archive at the intersection of technology ethics, moral pragmatism and security research. His current roles include Principle Investigator in the SecHuman Forschungskolleg on the topic of cybersecurity.
Convenience, flexibility, flood of data, risk: junior professors from various disciplines assess where digitization is heading.
More articles:
- The downside of digitalization – Tatjana Scheffler
- 100% reliabe networks – Steffen Bondorf
- Better understand robots – Laura Hoffmann
- Brave new digital world – Andreas Rienow
- Digital freedom and cybercrime – Sebastian Golla
- When learning environments and content adapt to us – Maren Scheffel
- The intuition of algorithms – Markus Stricker
- Writing contemporary history – Florian Sprenger
- Conceptual analysis and the world wide web – Kristina Liefke
Further articles will be published weekly.
11 February 2021
9.09 AM