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Jacob Furer
Jason Levine
Ben Turner
Our technology team faced many ethical dilemmas when thinking of inventions for the people of SIM City. Although we came up with safe and helpful products, we found many of them to have unethical, and possibly even harmful, potential towards the people of the city. Three of the inventions we thought of are: Indestructible “Iron Man” Suits and 3 Dimensional Printers. While each of these three can help make our city a better place, they also have the potential to malfunction, or be used wrongly; and in doing so cause chaos to the city and its people.
By creating Indestructible Suits, similar to the fictional superhero Iron Man, we are unlocking endless possibilities for the people of our city. These Suits have the potential to enhance travel, construction, and protection. They can make peoples daily lives more efficient and organized, as well as fun and educational for children. 1With these exoskeleton suits, paraplegics will once again be able to feel themselves walking, something they would’ve never imagined to be possible. In terms of protection in war, anyone from a young 18 year old to an old 65 year old can power and use the suit, as long as they do not have a heart condition. 2This will give women the same increased strength and agile ability that it gives men. As seen in “Iron Man 3”, people can remote operate the suites, sending them off overseas to fight battles and lessen casualties. This suit can save and change people’s lives and really make a positive impact on our city.
The 3-D Printers can reshape SIM City into the ideal society our class is aiming for. Anyone in the city can print something off their computer and make a physical duplicate of that item, making dreams into realities. 3Current research has suggested that 3D printers will soon be able to help build a lunar base on the moon. To take the technology one step further, people can even make an exact duplicate of anything with the photocopy option; which includes cloning. 4From missing bones or organs, to entire arms or legs, these machines will be able change the world of medicine and cure people’s physically impaired body parts. 5For women who are infertile, it will now be possible for them to be able to have children through cloning technology. The amazing things 3D printers can do are endless; they’ll be able to enhance people’s lives and are a major breakthrough in technology, medicine, and society.
1.http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/ironman-suit-could-help-paraplegics-walk-1C6435842. 2.http://www.forbes.com/sites/carriesheffield/2013/11/07/top-5-reasons-to-help-the-military-develop-a-real-life-iron-man-suit/ 3.http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Technology/Building_a_lunar_base_with_3D_printing 4.http://www.dezeen.com/2013/12/23/3d-printing-biopen-draws-bone-repairs-with-stem-cells/ 5.http://www.nytimes.com/1997/06/07/us/for-some-infertility-experts-human-cloning-is-a-dream.html
What we saw to be unethical about the Iron Man suit was it had the potential to harm people and cause destruction. It transforms people from human to “super”-human and can be used as 1“an army of man-shaped drones.” Financially, the suit can be detrimental to society, besides from the dangers it can cause. 2The Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has spent millions of dollars trying to perfect an exoskeleton suit for soldiers over the last ten years. This money could have saved people’s jobs in the 2008 stock market crash, helped people in poverty, or lighten our debt with foreign countries. But instead, the money is being used on other weapons for war. 2The suite can very well be used as a WMD (weapon of mass destruction), and in the wrong hands can hurt many people in the long run.
By giving our 3-D Printers the ability to copy and print anything, even living beings, we are starting a chain of events that can hurt our society. Earlier in the year we learned how cloning is unethical in the science fiction novel Never Let Me Go, by Kazuo Ishiguro. Cloning isn’t only immoral it can be dangerous too. 3When we clone, we are copying people’s genes and in doing so, allowing people to get infected by the same types of pathogens. Overtime, this can potentially make peoples genes so similar that if there were to be an outbreak it can kill off the human race. 3Clones also may not be able to have the same emotions people have, or be able to have a sense of empathy: which can be dangerous if clones are to communicate with people. 4“We learn about only the few attempts that worked. What we don't see are the many, many cloning experiments that failed.” 4In multiple cases, animals that were cloned began to face problems later in their life during the development into adulthood. Taking away the option of cloning animate objects from the printer is not enough. The printer can still be used to make copies of weapons, drugs, and money. All of which can be used for unethical and dangerous use.
1.http://blogs.indiewire.com/pressplay/the-dangers-of-an-empty-suit-marvel-comics-war-on-war-continues 2.http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2008-04/building-real-iron-man 3.http://library.thinkquest.org/C0122429/ethics/disadvantages.htm 4.http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/cloning/cloningrisks/
Ethical Dilemma
Pro
Con
With Pros, Cons, and ethical dilemmas, each and every invention we come up with will have the same flaw: that flaw is lack of control. Not having total safety over our products causes ethical dilemmas for the people who use them. So too, people have the freedom to do what they want with these inventions, which can cause a number of dangers for the people of our city. As a safety precaution to our people, we, the Technology Sector, ask that before our inventions and technologies are purchased and used by other people and groups of the city, all participants who wish to use any of our products sign a waiver. The waiver states that we have override control to stop people and other sectors in the city from doing what we believe to be threats and we have the ability to monitor all products activity if it seems there is reason to. In the event a person has clearly violated the contract signed we will self destruct/power down that product and take it back.