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Facebook Struggles to Quell Uproar over Instagram’s Effect on Teens
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Re: Facebook Struggles to Quell Uproar over Instagram’s Effect on Teens
#32Good thread here that provides a counter-balance. https://twitter.com/nireyal/status/1443882540868063241?s=21
> Good thread here that provides a counter-balance. https://twitter.com/nireyal/status/1443882540868063241?s=21 By the author of Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nir_Eyal : > In 2014 Eyal published his first book, Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products, which became a Wall Street Journal best seller.[12][13] The title reflects Eyal's idea of the "hooked model", which ai…
Is there something specific about Eyals take that you disagree with?
Re: Facebook Struggles to Quell Uproar over Instagram’s Effect on Teens
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
Those other engineering professions some harmful things too. Didn't engineers design prisons, casinos, nuclear weapons, land mines, plants that manufacture harmful chemicals, etc..? The only way to believe that these oaths make a difference is to ignore all those things. Anyway, at my university (CS/computer eng. major) everyone in the engineering school goes through the same induction ceremony that I think had a sim…
All of the things you've listed aren't universally bad. Prisons keep bad people out of society (and yes, I'm aware that some folks shouldn't be in prison, and I wish that'd change, but majority are in the clink for violent crime). Nuclear weapons ensure superpowers can't attack each other - that's why we haven't had a world war in the past 76 years in spite of some pretty crazy tensions. Land mines make land invasion…
The fact you can justify land mines says it all about the ability of some oath to ensure anything about the behaviour of large groups of people.
Re: Facebook Struggles to Quell Uproar over Instagram’s Effect on Teens
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's possible that United States engineers still do this... but software "engineering" is famously (and self-deprecating-ly) not really "real engineering". I say this as someone who programs, teaches programming/computer science, and has worked professionally as a software development engineer - the comment isn't made to denigrate anyone, but because software "engineering" doesn't have any certification / professiona…
I agree that 99% of software developers are not engineers, not because software engineering isn't engineering, but because they are not doing software engineering. You can, and should, apply the principles of engineering to your development process, but hardly anyone does. Generous planning and foresight, objective measures of performance, an intimate understanding of the system you're deploying, etc. A software deve…
Engineering isn’t about building the perfect widget. (Otherwise, the Juicero would have done better.) It’s about building things that meet requirements, given a set of inputs. A credit card is certainly one of those inputs, and perfectly precise scaling may not be one of those requirements.
Re: Facebook Struggles to Quell Uproar over Instagram’s Effect on Teens
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
Engineers used to be offered an "Iron Ring" (or other similar token) to symbolize their responsibility to human welfare, even at the cost of personal achievement/merit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Ring Maybe we have to teach some of these upstarts about Therac-25 and depress another generation just to keep the harm from spreading :(
It's possible that United States engineers still do this... but software "engineering" is famously (and self-deprecating-ly) not really "real engineering". I say this as someone who programs, teaches programming/computer science, and has worked professionally as a software development engineer - the comment isn't made to denigrate anyone, but because software "engineering" doesn't have any certification / professiona…
> software "engineering" doesn't have any certification / professional credentialing that "real" engineering (e.g., civil engineering) apparently does have
Yeah and I hope it stays that way. Imagine needing a license to write software. It would mean the end of free and open source software as we know it.
> Does anyone have any information about how effective such training / indoctrination is in preventing bad situations from happening?
It's not about training or indoctrination. It's about legal responsibility and liability. Make professional programmers directly responsible for the code they get paid to write. If society finds they're causing harm, it will hold them accountable for it.
We must increase the risk associated with building unethical technology. Programmers need to think twice before they build the next surveillance capitalism nightmare.
Re: Facebook Struggles to Quell Uproar over Instagram’s Effect on Teens
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
All of the things you've listed aren't universally bad. Prisons keep bad people out of society (and yes, I'm aware that some folks shouldn't be in prison, and I wish that'd change, but majority are in the clink for violent crime). Nuclear weapons ensure superpowers can't attack each other - that's why we haven't had a world war in the past 76 years in spite of some pretty crazy tensions. Land mines make land invasion…
The fact you can justify land mines says it all about the ability of some oath to ensure anything about the behaviour of large groups of people.
Yes, soldiers on the battlefield are very thankful for the land mines, assuming they're the ones who installed them. With any luck a dude from the other side might not be able to cross the field and slit their throats in the dead of the night. Just as pilots are thankful for fighter jets not crapping out in mid-air, and nuclear submarine sailors are thankful for the engineering that went into the hull, and a gunner is thankful for the shells which don't explode in the barrel of a howitzer. War is hell, but if you're going to win it (or even deter it), you'll need engineers who know how to design weapons. And this is not the kind of game that you can just decline to participate in unless you'd like to learn a foreign language in a concentration camp.
Re: Facebook Struggles to Quell Uproar over Instagram’s Effect on Teens
#37Good thread here that provides a counter-balance. https://twitter.com/nireyal/status/1443882540868063241?s=21
> Good thread here that provides a counter-balance. https://twitter.com/nireyal/status/1443882540868063241?s=21 By the author of Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nir_Eyal : > In 2014 Eyal published his first book, Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products, which became a Wall Street Journal best seller.[12][13] The title reflects Eyal's idea of the "hooked model", which ai…
Someone actually including links to the raw information (transcripts, slides, etc) is to me the more trustworthy source. I've been misled a hundred times by mainstream media orgs when they don't actually include the raw data (links to studies, transcripts, links to a place the person they are writing about could respond) even if they definitely could, I've been mislead maybe twice by individuals who actually cite their sources in a manner I can look up.
Edit: and indeed it seems that a media organisation has mislead me yet again, declining to mention things like the 11 other metrics which Instagram was said to improve.
Re: Facebook Struggles to Quell Uproar over Instagram’s Effect on Teens
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
I know an American civil engineer who has one of these rings: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engineer%27s_Ring Wikipedia says the oath that goes with it is: I am an Engineer. In my profession I take deep pride. To it I owe solemn obligations. As an engineer, I, (full name), pledge to practice Integrity and Fair Dealing, Tolerance, and Respect, and to uphold devotion to the standards and dignity of my profession, consc…
Those other engineering professions some harmful things too. Didn't engineers design prisons, casinos, nuclear weapons, land mines, plants that manufacture harmful chemicals, etc..? The only way to believe that these oaths make a difference is to ignore all those things. Anyway, at my university (CS/computer eng. major) everyone in the engineering school goes through the same induction ceremony that I think had a sim…
Our faculty (Masaryk University Faculty of Informatics) definitely has such an oath & everyone has to take it - here in Czech: Section 33 (5): https://is.muni.cz/do/mu/Uredni_deska/Predpisy_MU/Fakulta_in...
Machine translated to English (FI MUNI is heavy into NLP anyway ;-) ) it looks like this:
a) at the bachelor's degree: “I solemnly promise to dedicate my life to the service of humanity; I will keep Masaryk University, where I obtained a bachelor's degree, and its teacher in the memory and respect that belong to them; I will be faithful to my profession and I will be fair and accommodating to his colleagues; I will develop the projects I participate in to the best of my ability so as to serve man; I will not tolerate evil, bad practices or bribery; I will not allow that issues of religion, nationality, race, party politics or social status my professional decisions; I will not abuse my professional knowledge and skills even under duress. So I promise to my honor, freely and of my own free will. "
b) at the master's degree: “I solemnly promise to dedicate my life to the service of humanity; I will maintain my love and gratitude for Masaryk University, where I obtained a master's degree; I will responsibly perform all my professional duties and consider the ethical implications of my professional activity; I will not allow my activity to be in conflict with the rights of individuals, groups or organizations to respect their privacy and integrity and will not allow their knowledge to be misused and the ability to enable their violation; I will not abuse the properties of the processing systems information or knowledge of them for their personal benefit; I will be in my professional career to act with awareness of the limits of my professional competence and the field in which I work; I will help deepening awareness of the nature and possibilities of their discipline in society. So I promise myself honor, freely and of one's own free will. "
c) at the doctoral degree “I solemnly promise to dedicate my life to the service of humanity; I will preserve love and gratitude to Masaryk University, where I obtained a doctorate; I will carry out all their professional duties responsibly and consider the ethical implications of their actions in their profession and scientific field; I will expand and develop knowledge in my discipline; I will work in this direction to deepen / deepen the awareness of ethical responsibility for the consequences application and use of procedures and knowledge of informatics in society; I will respect protection intellectual property rights and to weigh it responsibly in relation to the free flow of the open scientific knowledge in international public ownership. So I promise to my honor, freely and of their own free will. "
I strive to respect this oath but I'm not sure if all the other absolvents do or even remember taking it. :P
Re: Facebook Struggles to Quell Uproar over Instagram’s Effect on Teens
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
I agree that 99% of software developers are not engineers, not because software engineering isn't engineering, but because they are not doing software engineering. You can, and should, apply the principles of engineering to your development process, but hardly anyone does. Generous planning and foresight, objective measures of performance, an intimate understanding of the system you're deploying, etc. A software deve…
Engineering isn’t about building the perfect widget. (Otherwise, the Juicero would have done better.) It’s about building things that meet requirements, given a set of inputs. A credit card is certainly one of those inputs, and perfectly precise scaling may not be one of those requirements.
You don't need perfect, but some actual planning and application of the scientific method is called for.
Re: Facebook Struggles to Quell Uproar over Instagram’s Effect on Teens
#40Quell uproar? What uproar? Has the usage of instagram taken a dive? Or is this just the usual fake outrage pushed by the media that hates Facebook?