Ethics | HFT Stuttgart

Ethics in teaching, research and transfer

We are in a year of disruptive change. Since the beginning of the Corona crisis, private, social and economic life has been changed in a short period of time, in some cases profoundly, in an unexpected way. It is unclear how the pandemic will develop and what consequences it will have. The complex challenges that already existed before the Corona crisis have thus continued to grow. Many feel overwhelmed. The desire for orientation is growing.The aim of the ethics courses offered at the HFT Stuttgartis to provide students, staff and lecturers of the university with formats for reflection and discourse on current issues in line with their needs. It is also intended to provide impulses for the social discourse of current trends and developments.

Why?

The aim of training events should not only be to impart specialist knowledge, but also to prepare future graduates for the requirements of the current time. In our time, these include trends and challenges such as digitalization, artificial intelligence and climate change, which will influence the actions of all people sooner or later. Graduates are not only part of a university or a company, but also part of society. Ethical and social questions have to be asked in this society, for which there is often too little room in specialist events.

For whom?

We offer a discussion platform for all interested parties, i.e. for students and lecturers of all disciplines, for all employees*n of the HFT Stuttgart and for the university public.

What are we asking for?

Ethically and socially relevant questions are not only found in teaching, but also in research and transfer. Some topics and questions with great topicality are in this context:

What influence does digitisation have on citizens, on employees and employers, on the economy, on the social structure, on interpersonal and human-machine communication?
Which forms of artificial intelligence are used how and where? What are the implications of this?
What does Work 4.0 mean in concrete terms?
How are studies and teaching currently changing?
How is the political situation to be located? Is there a shift to the right in society and what can be done about it?
How can diversity be lived in society and at the HFT Stuttgart?
Under what conditions does research take place? What guidelines does scientific work need?
Perspective: What are the effects of the corona crisis and how can we (also) see them from an ethical perspective?

All these 'big questions' are primarily related to the HFT Stuttgart in our work, so that the possible answers do not remain abstract.

Wie?

We offer a platform at the HFT Stuttgart in the sense of a source of impulses and inspiration for the members of the HFT Stuttgart, which at the same time provides a forum for active and constructive dialogue. You are cordially invited to bring in topics and questions that are of interest to you. All ethics formats are conceived as platforms which should enable an open and transdisciplinary discourse on how ethical and socially relevant topics can be incorporated into the three pillars of the HFT Stuttgart (teaching, research and transfer).

In addition to the Corona Crisis, ethics offerings currently focus on the impact of artificial intelligence and digitization, such as:

What does it mean when large parts of our living environment are digitalized and influenced by artificial intelligence? Both developments have a great influence on...:

how we integrate devices into our lives as 'intelligent little helpers' (e.g. Alexa).
how machines interact with each other in companies or at home (internet of things).
how and where we work (agile working, home office, co-working spaces).
how we perceive the world (augmented reality, virtual reality).
how we are mobile and how we live (infrastructure, autonomous driving, SmartCity, SmartGrid).
as we think ("Google knows what you want before you do").
how we learn, study and research.
how decisions are made (based on algorithms).
how we share our private life with companies (facebook, fitness trackers, twitter, Snapchat, Amazon, WhatsApp)
how disruptive companies create new markets and displace classic companies (YouTube, Uber, Amazon).

Our target groups

Students
Teaching staff
HFT employees
University of Applied Sciences public

Our formats

Workshops and seminars for students & HFT employees
Service Learning: social commitment during studies
Lectures & Conferences
Certificate "Ethics"
Smart Lunch & Ethics Lunch.
Advice for specialist courses of study

Ethics can make a significant contribution to orientation by providing - in the sense of a compass or as a guard rail - criteria for (morally) good or bad actions and the corresponding motives or resulting consequences. For this purpose, it provides various theories, models, methods and concepts. Ethics can contribute to the development of a foundation of values or to its consolidation.

Orientation

Critical reflection can help to question habits and patterns of thought, to put things in order, to clarify some things, to try out new things. It raises the question of meaning and the creation of meaning. Critical reflection enables "out-of-the-box thinking". It can also contribute to orientation.