[Air-l] CFP: IRIE Special Issue on Ubiquitous Computing

[David J. Phillips]

Call for Papers
IRIE: International Review of Information Ethics

Issue No. 008; Vol. 8; December 2007

Special Issue: Ethical Challenges of Ubiquitous Computing

Ubiquitous Computing (an idea introduced by Mark Weiser, and often 
bracketed with slight modifications under the concepts of Pervasive 
Computing or Ambient Intelligence) imagines, in the extreme case, the 
entire mesosphere saturated by ICT. In this fantasy, ICT will accompany 
all aspects of our life. Our everyday world will be made intelligent, 
and all our actions, at all times and everywhere, will undergo some kind 
of ICT support. We will be appropriately guided, monitored, and provided 
with our needs and desires.

More prosaically, Ubiquitous Computing systems generally consist of 
interlinked capacities for memory and data storage, for perception and 
environmental sensing, and for the interpretation of contexts and 
situations. These activities might be carried out using various kinds of 
technology. And indeed, a whole host of technical research fields are 
working toward this goal, from mechatronics to materials science, from 
network engineering to computing and AI research. And of course, 
ubiquity or omnipresence will never be total. For technical, economic, 
and other reasons, there will only be pockets where Ubiquitous Computing 
systems come into effect. Nevertheless, the present research scenarios 
entail applications which will have more or less impact on every domain 
of life, from leisure, jobs, and health care to domestic policing and war.

Any ethical discussion of Ubiquitous Computing is inherently problematic 
because we are dealing with emergent technology. We must take into 
account its potential, without knowing how far this potential can be 
realised in detail, and without knowing the fields in which pervasive 
ICT will find acceptance. Nevertheless, any research program that may so 
radically infiltrate our daily life requires some kind of ethical 
framework, to complement and counterbalance economic and militaristic 
motivations, and to provide direction with respect both to traditional 
values and to our hopes for the future.

The case of Ubiquitous Computing brings into sharper focus two key 
problems in theoretical ethics that have already attained a special 
position in applied media ethics: on the one hand, determining the 
reality which will be influenced with our acting, and on the other hand, 
determining the subject to whom these actions will be attributed and who 
will intervene in reality. In certain sense we may say that Ubiquitous 
Computing diminishes the confrontational character of reality. 
Ubiquitous Computing environments will necessarily perceive and act upon 
subjects as ideal types, or stereotypes. Situations may be reduced to 
typical moments. Ambivalence and ambiguity may be lost. Moreover, the 
more invisible, pervasive, and transparent these systems become, the 
more they disappear and are taken for granted, the harder they will be 
to confront. If the mechanisms by which these systems produce and 
ascribe identities, situations, and contexts are unavailable for 
engagement by the subjects of the system, then those subjects may lose 
the skills and resources necessary to negotiate the construction of 
these identities, situations, and contexts. It may simply become 
necessary to accept the system’s reification of the typical.

The experience of the world and the self will therefore undergo a 
transformation in intelligent environments. This gives rise to countless 
ethical issues whose analysis must go hand in hand with the development 
of such systems. The key questions just posed must be supplemented by 
additional specific problems, concerning, for instance, the anonymous 
generation of cognition, possible changes in the ethos of cognition, 
privacy and the formation of trust in intelligent worlds, and finally, 
the context sensitivity of the system and the related intrusion in our 
sphere of understanding.

The 7th issue of IRIE will tackle the ethical challenge of ubiquitous 
systems and therefore furnish a contribution to the establishment of an 
ethics of Ubiquitous Computing. This ethics is anchored in the field of 
media ethics, yet it may call into question the fundamental issues in 
this field, insofar as the entire mesosphere appears as disposed to such 
media. Thus, the boundaries between media and the what they mediate may 
be radically questioned.


Deadlines

Deadline for submission abstracts: June 15, 2007
Notification of acceptance to authors: August 15, 2007
Deadline for submission of full articles: November 15, 2007
Publication: December, 2007

Possible Topics

The production of reality (as concrete contents) and the production of 
Wirklichkeit (as opposed to the individual and an embedding of reality)
- Medialization of the physical world
- Interpretation of reality and environments using context sensitive and 
adaptive systems
- Modelling of acting and behaviour through context sensitive and 
adaptive systems

Privacy, Surveillance, Trust
- Privacy in intelligent interactive environments
- Surveillance, data protection and personal freedom
- Ubiquitous systems and trust

Manufacturing of the Acting Subject
- Identity formation in intelligent environments
- The Other in intelligent environments
- Self-perception in intelligent environments

Cognition in intelligent environments
- Generating cognition in intelligent environments
- Anonymous generation of cognition and cognitive acquisition
- Transformation of the cognitive ethos

Problems of Ubiquitous Computing in special fields of application
- Health Care
- Economy and work
- Living in a smart home (and other fields …)

Rules of the game
Potential authors must provide an extended abstract (max. 1500 words) by 
31/05/2007. The abstract can be written in the mother tongue of the 
author though an English translation of this abstract must be included 
if the chosen language is not English. IRIE will publish articles in 
English, French, German, Portuguese or Spanish. The author(s) of 
contributions in French, Portuguese, or Spanish must nominate at least 
two potential peer reviewers.

The abstracts will be selected by the guest editors. The authors will be 
informed of acceptance or rejection by 15/08/2007. Deadline for the 
final article (3.000 words or 20.000 characters including blanks) is 
15/11/2007. All submissions will be subject of a peer review. Therefore 
the acceptance of an extended abstract does not imply the publication of 
the final text unless the article passed the peer review.

For more information about the journal see: http://www.i-r-i-e.net

Contact
PD Dr. habil. Klaus Wiegerling (Universität Stuttgart, D), Prof. Ph. D. 
David Phillips (University of Toronto) manage the special issue as guest 
editors. Please send the extended abstracts by e-mail to both of them:

Prof. Dr. David Phillips, davidj.phillips at utoronto.ca

PD. Dr. habil. Klaus Wiegerling, wiegerlingklaus at aol.com




-- 
David J. Phillips
Associate Professor, Faculty of Information Studies
University of Toronto
140 St. George Street
Toronto, Ontario    M5S 3G6
CANADA
(+1) 416-978-7098 (voice) / 416-971-1399 (fax)