Dept. of Computer Science, Portland State University. Fall 2012
26 September 2012 to 3 December 2012

Instructor: Andrew P. Black (black@cs.pdx.edu)

Office Hours: By appointment — ‘phone or send an email message.  I'm normally in my office Monday thru Thursday.  It's fine to drop by without an appointment, and mostly, I'll be able to see you immediately.  However, if I'm busy, please be prepared to come back.  I've also reserved Wednesdays from 13:00 to 14:00 as office hours.

Mailing List: Please sign up here

Time and Location. Wednesdays, 18:40–20:30 in FAB 150

Text.

Ethics for the Information Age (5th ed.), Michael Quinn. Pearson, 2012. ISBN-13: 9780132855532.

Course Objectives.

After the completion of this course you should be able to:

1. Identify the ethical issues that relate to computer science in real situations you may encounter.
2. Decide whether a given action is ethical with respect to the ethics of the computer science profession, and justify that decision.
3. Look up relevant ethical standards as developed by the ACM.
4. Prepare and deliver a short (8-10 minute) professional-quality talk on a topic relating to the ethical, legal, or social implications of computer science.
5. Research and write a professional-quality paper about a topic relating to the social, legal, and ethical implications of computer science.
6. Recognize situations in which there may be legal issues relevant to your work in computer science and information processing, such as intellectual property and privacy, and know some legal principles to apply.
7. State several important impacts of computer science and related fields on contemporary society.
8. State several examples of important ethical principles as they apply to situations in computer science.

Grading Policies and Procedures. 

Grades will be based on homework (25%), attendance and participation (15%), preliminary slides & abstract (5%), your presentation (20%), your evaluation of others’ presentations and papers (15%), and your paper (20%).  Because you will be graded on attendance, I will take attendance in class; if you have to be absent for an academic or health reason, please let me know by email, so that I can take this into account.  Written work will be graded according to a rubric that will be provided with the homework.  In evaluating others' work, I expect you  to discriminate between strong, weak and ineffective presentations and essays.

Academic Integrity.

You are expected to behave with integrity at all times. Cheating will result in a grade of zero on the assignment or exam on which the student cheats and the initiation of disciplinary action at the university level. Allowing another student to use your work as his/her own is also academic misconduct.