Stephen Downes

This set of guidelines came out earlier this summer and appeared at the top of today's newsletter. They draw direction from the 1979 Belmont Report which "laid out foundational ethical principles for conducting research involving human subjects." Each of the eight principles is defined, then its relevance to AI higher education is described. Applications of the principle in key areas are listed, and then a scenario is outlined. Concluding the article is a discussion of why the principles were developed, including key considerations (such as privacy, for example, or educational equity), why the principles matter, and application of the principles. The article as a whole for me raises the question of whether 'ethics in a context' can be a thing - the discussion in the article is clearly addressed to educational institutions and their 'stakeholders', and so ethical considerations outside that context are not discussed. For example, the only 'environment' considered is the academic or learning environment. Or while 'justice' is listed, there is no mention of 'social justice'.