Ethics
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Conversation
How should we treat a social robot?
Abusing it won't hurt it, but it could make you a crueller person
Set in a dystopian 2019, the sci-fi classic Blade Runner explores how artificial humans could impact our humanity. Ha...
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Animals, science, behaviour and ethics
Exploring an important emerging topic for society.
The moral status of animals has a long and fraught history in the West, much of it reflecting poorly on our ethical u...
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Conversation
Can we be immortal digitally?
The idea of ‘Virternity’ may be in the future.
Immortality has been a topic of discussion since the legend of the Holy Grail. Some people have gone as far as cryog...
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Conversation
A Hippocratic Oath for data science?
A little more data literacy might be enough.
I swear by the Hypatia, by Lovelace, by Turing, by Fisher (and/or Bayes), and by all the statisticians and data scien...
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Can you know too much about yourself?
Researchers concerned about trips down the genetic pathway.
Modern technology gives us ready access to our genetic blueprint, and that’s appealing to a great many people if the ...
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Lack of proof no bar to patent applications
Concerns about the influence of so-called 'prophetic patents'.
Fake news extends to patent applications, it seems, although that in itself is not technically news. It’s legal and ...
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Research organisation slammed
‘Independent’ non-profit funded by food and beverage giants.
An apparently independent non-profit research organisation is in fact funded by major food and beverage multinational...
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Biggest danger of an asteroid strike? Lawyers
Blasting away at incoming space rock raises risks of nuclear war.
Governments and space agencies seeking to protect the Earth by changing the courses of potentially hazardous asteroid...
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Conversation
Is having a pet a bad thing?
Keeping a companion animal is a fundamentally unjust act.
According to the UK veterinary charity The People’s Dispensary for Sick Animals (PDSA), half of Britons own a pet. Ma...
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Exploring the dangers of gene-edited babies
Two papers unite in the condemnation of poor science.
In November 2018 Chinese biophysicist He Jiankui announced to the world the advent of the first genetically edited hu...
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Health apps send data without disclosure
Many health apps operate under dodgy privacy regimes.
Health-care professionals should reasonably assume that data from behaviour-changing apps will be “shared with commer...
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Conversation
What we risk if we allow gene-edited babies
Concerns extend beyond health and medical grounds.
A second woman is said to be pregnant with a gene-edited baby in China, according to reports this year. It follows re...