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While much of the scholarly work on ethics relating to academic authorship examines the fair distribution of authorship credit, none has yet examined situations where a researcher contributes significantly to the project, but whose contributions do not make it into the final manuscript. Such a scenario is commonplace in collaborative research settings in many disciplines and may occur for a number of reasons, such as excluding research in order to provide the paper with a clearer focus, tell a particular story, or exclude negative results that do not fit the hypothesis. Our concern in this paper is less about the reasons for including or excluding data from a paper and more about distributing credit in this type of scenario. In particular, we argue that the notion 'substantial contribution', which is part of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) authorship criteria, is ambiguous and that we should ask whether it concerns what ends up in the paper or what is a substantial contribution to the research process leading up to the paper. We then argue, based on the principles of fairness, due credit, and ensuring transparency and accountability in research, that the latter interpretation is more plausible from a research ethics point of view. We conclude that the ICMJE and other organizations interested in authorship and publication ethics should consider including guidance on authorship attribution in situations where researchers contribute significantly to the research process leading up to a specific paper, but where their contribution is finally omitted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In papers in areas such as engineering and the physical sciences, figures, tables and formulae are the basic elements to communicate the authors' core ideas, workings and results. As a computational text-matching tool, CrossCheck cannot work on these non-textual elements to detect plagiarism. Consequently, when comparing engineering or physical sciences papers, CrossCheck may return a low similarity index even when plagiarism has in fact taken place. A case of demonstrated plagiarism involving engineering papers with a low similarity index is discussed, and editor's experiences and suggestions are given on how to tackle this problem. The case shows a lack of understanding of plagiarism by some authors or editors, and illustrates the difficulty of getting some editors and publishers to take appropriate action. Consequently, authors, journal editors, and reviewers, as well as research institutions all are duty-bound not only to recognize the differences between ethical and unethical behavior in order to protect a healthy research environment, and also to maintain consistent ethical publishing standards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scientists of many countries in which English is not the primary language routinely use a variety of manuscript preparation, correction or editing services, a practice that is openly endorsed by many journals and scientific institutions. These services vary tremendously in their scope; at one end there is simple proof-reading, and at the other extreme there is in-depth and extensive peer-reviewing, proposal preparation, statistical analyses, re-writing and co-writing. In this paper, the various types of service are reviewed, along with authorship guidelines, and the question is raised of whether the high-end services surpass most guidelines' criteria for authorship. Three other factors are considered. First, the ease of collaboration possible in the internet era allows multiple iterations between the author(s) and the 'editing service', so essentially, papers can be co-written. Second, 'editing services' often offer subject-specific experts who comment not only on the language, but interpret and improve scientific content. Third, the trend towards heavily multi-authored papers implies that the threshold necessary to earn authorship is declining. The inevitable conclusion is that at some point the contributions by 'editing services' should be deemed sufficient to warrant authorship. Trying to enforce any guidelines would likely be futile, but nevertheless, it might be time to revisit the ethics of using some of the high-end 'editing services'. In an increasingly international job market, awareness of this problem might prove increasingly important in authorship disputes, the allocation of research grants, and hiring decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By following the recently published paper in Science titled 'Coercive Citation in Academic Publishing', in this paper, we aim to discuss the demand of some journals that request authors to cite recently published papers in that journal to increase the impact factor of that journal. It will be mentioned that some of these demands are not ethical and consequently will diminish the reputation of the journal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a recent paper in Science and Engineering Ethics (SEE) Elliott proposed an ethics of expertise, providing its theoretical foundation along with its application in a case study devoted to the topic of hormesis. The application is based on a commentary in the journal Nature, and it includes assertions of ethical breaches. Elliott concludes that the authors of the commentary failed to promote the informed consent of decision makers by not providing representative information about alternative frequency estimates of hormesis in the literature, thereby hindering the capacity of the scientific community to promote informed consent relating to chemical regulation. This paper argues that Elliott should have incorporated due process into his system of evaluation. His argument is also seriously deficient technically, in that it misinterprets the toxicological issues, misrepresents the scientific literature with respect to the frequency of hormesis, and incorrectly assesses the extent to which the Nature paper revealed opposing/alternative views on hormesis. Given the seriousness of assertions of noncompliance to ethical norms, there must be procedures to protect those whose ethics were called into question, to fairly evaluate the technical justification for an assertion, and to enable corrections in the event of errors. If a journal is willing to publish assertions that individuals acted in an ethically questionable way, it should be guided by a documented code of ethics and meet a standard of responsibility far greater than normal peer-review processes for papers that do not entail such ethical judgments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In health sciences, technical contributions may be undervalued and excluded in the author byline. In this paper, I demonstrate how authorship is a historical construct which perpetuates systemic injustices including technical undervaluation. I make use of Pierre Bourdieu's conceptual work to demonstrate how the power dynamics at play in academia make it very challenging to change the habitual state or "habitus". To counter this, I argue that we must reconceive technical contributions to not be a priori less important based on its nature when assigning roles and opportunities leading to authorship. I make this argument based on two premises. First, science has evolved due to major information and biotechnological innovation; this requires 'technicians' to acquire and exercise a commensurate high degree of both technical and intellectual expertise which in turn increases the value of their contribution. I will illustrate this by providing a brief historical view of work statisticians, computer programmers/data scientists and laboratory technicians. Second, excluding or undervaluing this type of work is contrary to norms of responsibility, fairness and trustworthiness of the individual researchers and of teams in science. Although such norms are continuously tested because of power dynamics, their importance is central to ethical authorship practice and research integrity. While it may be argued that detailed disclosure of contributions (known as contributorship) increases accountability by clearly identifying who did what in the publication, I contend that this may unintentionally legitimize undervaluation of technical roles and may decrease integrity of science. Finally, this paper offers recommendations to promote ethical inclusion of technical contributors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When a scientific paper, dissertation or thesis is published the author(s) have a duty to report who has contributed to the work. This recognition can take several forms such as authorship, relevant acknowledgments and by citing previous work. There is a growing industry where publication consultants will work with authors, research groups or even institutions to help get their work published, or help submit their dissertation/thesis. This help can range from proof reading, data collection, analysis (including statistics), helping with the literature review and identifying suitable journals/conferences. In this opinion article we question whether these external services are required, given that institutions should provide this support and that experienced researchers should be qualified to carry out these activities. If these services are used, we argue that their use should at least be made transparent either by the consultant being an author on the paper, or by being acknowledged on the paper, dissertation or thesis. We also argue that publication consultants should provide an annual return that details the papers, dissertations and thesis that they have consulted on. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Integrating artificial intelligence (AI) into critical domains such as healthcare holds immense promise. Nevertheless, significant challenges must be addressed to avoid harm, promote the well-being of individuals and societies, and ensure ethically sound and socially just technology development. Innovative approaches like Embedded Ethics, which refers to integrating ethics and social science into technology development based on interdisciplinary collaboration, are emerging to address issues of bias, transparency, misrepresentation, and more. This paper aims to develop this approach further to enable future projects to effectively deploy it. Based on the practical experience of using ethics and social science methodology in interdisciplinary AI-related healthcare consortia, this paper presents several methods that have proven helpful for embedding ethical and social science analysis and inquiry. They include (1) stakeholder analyses, (2) literature reviews, (3) ethnographic approaches, (4) peer-to-peer interviews, (5) focus groups, (6) interviews with affected groups and external stakeholders, (7) bias analyses, (8) workshops, and (9) interdisciplinary results dissemination. We believe that applying Embedded Ethics offers a pathway to stimulate reflexivity, proactively anticipate social and ethical concerns, and foster interdisciplinary inquiry into such concerns at every stage of technology development. This approach can help shape responsible, inclusive, and ethically aware technology innovation in healthcare and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Indications that corruption mitigation in infrastructure systems delivery can be effective are found in the literature. However, there is an untapped opportunity to further enhance the efficacy of existing corruption mitigation strategies by placing them explicitly within the larger context of engineering ethics, and relevant policy statements, guidelines, codes and manuals published by international organizations. An effective matching of these formal statements on ethics to infrastructure systems delivery facilitates the identification of potential corruption hotspots and thus help establish or strengthen institutional mechanisms that address corruption. This paper reviews professional codes of ethics, and relevant literature on corruption mitigation in the context of civil engineering infrastructure development, as a platform for building a structure that connects ethical tenets and the mitigation strategies. The paper assesses corruption mitigation strategies against the background of the fundamental canons of practice in civil engineering ethical codes. As such, the paper’s assessment is grounded in the civil engineer’s ethical responsibilities (to society, the profession, and peers) and principles (such as safety, health, welfare, respect, and honesty) that are common to professional codes of ethics in engineering practice. Addressing corruption in infrastructure development continues to be imperative for national economic and social development, and such exigency is underscored by the sheer scale of investments in infrastructure development in any country and the billions of dollars lost annually through corruption and fraud. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author discusses the ethics concerning the use of citation indices in evaluations. He cites approaches that can be used when evaluating the worth of a particular paper. He mentions reasons for research grants, journals, institutions and papers to be cited more extensively. He adds that personal prejudices play a role when looking at citations from the point of view of the citor.

Six planetary boundaries have already been exceeded, including climate change, loss of biodiversity, chemical pollution, and land-system change. The health research sector contributes to the environmental crisis we are facing, though to a lesser extent than healthcare or agriculture sectors. It could take steps to reduce its environmental impact but generally has not done so, even as the planetary emergency worsens. So far, the normative case for why the health research sector should rectify that failure has not been made. This paper argues strong philosophical grounds, derived from theories of health and social justice, exist to support the claim that the sector has a duty to avoid or minimise causing or contributing to ecological harms that threaten human health or worsen health inequity. The paper next develops ideas about the duty’s content, explaining why it should entail more than reducing carbon emissions, and considers what limits might be placed on the duty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To be intrinsically valuable means to be valuable for its own sake. Moral philosophy is often ethically anthropocentric, meaning that it locates intrinsic value within humans. This paper rejects ethical anthropocentrism and asks, in what ways might nonhumans be intrinsically valuable? The paper answers this question with a wide-ranging survey of theories of nonhuman intrinsic value. The survey includes both moral subjects and moral objects, and both natural and artificial nonhumans. Literatures from environmental ethics, philosophy of technology, philosophy of art, moral psychology, and related fields are reviewed, and gaps in these literatures are identified. Although the gaps are significant and much work remains to be done, the survey nonetheless demonstrates that those who reject ethical anthropocentrism have considerable resources available to develop their moral views. Given the many very high-stakes issues involving both natural and artificial nonhumans, and the sensitivity of these issues to how nonhumans are intrinsically valued, this is a vital project to pursue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to call attention to the potential of using film in engineering ethics education, which has not been thoroughly discussed as a pedagogical method in this field. A review of current approaches to teaching engineering ethics reveals that there are both learning outcomes that need more attention as well as additional pedagogical methods that could be adopted. Scholarship on teaching with film indicates that film can produce ethical experiences that go beyond those produced by both conventional methods of teaching engineering ethics and more arts-based methods such as fiction, as well as connect ethics learning outcomes and issues to the lifeworld of a person. The paper further illustrates the potential of using Miyazaki Hayao’s film The Wind Rises for highlighting a range of ethical issues pertaining to engineering. It also discusses the important role educators play in how film can be used effectively in the classroom. Synthesizing a range of sources from film theory to the use of film in business and medical education, the paper makes the case for using film in engineering ethics education and calls for more research on the use of this method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers the author's insights on the ethical aspects of scientific writing. The author discusses the work role of the author in ensuring the overall accountability of the paper, the advantages of collaborations and partnerships in scientific research, and the intense competition to acquire grants, promotions, and awards, are mentioned.

In the development of governmental policy for artificial intelligence (AI) that is informed by ethics, one avenue currently pursued is that of drawing on “AI Ethics Principles”. However, these AI Ethics Principles often fail to be actioned in governmental policy. This paper proposes a novel framework for the development of ‘Actionable Principles for AI’. The approach acknowledges the relevance of AI Ethics Principles and homes in on methodological elements to increase their practical implementability in policy processes. As a case study, elements are extracted from the development process of the Ethics Guidelines for Trustworthy AI of the European Commission’s “High Level Expert Group on AI”. Subsequently, these elements are expanded on and evaluated in light of their ability to contribute to a prototype framework for the development of 'Actionable Principles for AI'. The paper proposes the following three propositions for the formation of such a prototype framework: (1) preliminary landscape assessments; (2) multi-stakeholder participation and cross-sectoral feedback; and, (3) mechanisms to support implementation and operationalizability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many researchers have documented how AI and data driven technologies have the potential to have profound effects on our lives—in ways that make these technologies stand out from those that went before. Around the world, we are seeing a significant growth in interest and investment in AI in healthcare. This has been coupled with rising concerns about the ethical implications of these technologies and an array of ethical guidelines for the use of AI and data in healthcare has arisen. Nevertheless, the question of if and how AI and data technologies can be ethical remains open to debate. This paper aims to contribute to this debate by considering the wide range of implications that have been attributed to these technologies and asking whether current ethical guidelines take these factors into account. In particular, the paper argues that while current ethics guidelines for AI in healthcare effectively account for the four key issues identified in the ethics literature (transparency; fairness; responsibility and privacy), they have largely neglected wider issues relating to the way in which these technologies shape institutional and social arrangements. This, I argue, has given current ethics guidelines a strong focus on evaluating the impact of these technologies on the individual, while not accounting for the powerful social shaping effects of these technologies. To address this, the paper proposes a Multiscale Ethics Framework, which aims to help technology developers and ethical evaluations to consider the wider implications of these technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines a constellation of ethical and editorial issues that have arisen since philosophers started to conduct, submit and publish empirical research. These issues encompass concerns over responsible authorship, fair treatment of human subjects, ethicality of experimental procedures, availability of data, unselective reporting and publishability of research findings. This study aims to assess whether the philosophical community has as yet successfully addressed such issues. To do so, the instructions for authors, submission process and published research papers of 29 main journals in philosophy have been considered and analyzed. In light of the evidence reported here, it is argued that the philosophical community has as yet failed to properly tackle such issues. The paper also delivers some recommendations for authors, reviewers and editors in the field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The engineering profession has experienced some ethical cases that were rarely reported, scrutinized, or discussed because: they did not necessarily represent violations of existing codes even if they breached ethical principles; those within the organization were not prepared to take steps to address the issues or impose sanction; an/or some of the personnel associated with these cases resorted to silence to avoid being labeled as trouble-makers in their organizations and, perhaps, more broadly, in society. The goal of this paper is to heighten managerial awareness of ethical issues, interrelated ethical lapses, and appropriate responsive actions within professional engineering communities. As such, the authors reviewed recent well-known professional and organizational ethical cases including impact of leadership role and existing standards, and critically analyzed interrelated literature. The paper’s case studies exemplify that because ethical issues are complex, intricate, and nuanced; bylaws are insufficient for establishing the inclusive culture for handling potential ethical situations. In fact, through what is known as the codification of ethics, it is possible that someone’s conduct can totally fulfill all professional responsibilities but still be unethical. As such, ethical leadership is needed to provide the means for establishing appropriate norms so as to set the proper structures for addressing the diverse ethical matters. Perceptions about the responses of leaders to potential ethical lapses are a critical factor in formulating, changing, and maintaining ethical values at the individual and organizational levels. A leader’s passive attitude toward ethical issues can be the signal for the ignored lapses to become the norm at not only the organizational level but also the society. Guided by the new Code of Ethics by the American Society of Civil Engineers, this paper aims to trigger the proper ethical behavior and expectations for the welfare of the engineering profession both in the present and future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Safe-by-design (SBD) frameworks for the development of emerging technologies have become an ever more popular means by which scholars argue that transformative emerging technologies can safely incorporate human values. One such popular SBD methodology is called value sensitive design (VSD). A central tenet of this design methodology is to investigate stakeholder values and design those values into technologies during early stage research and development. To accomplish this, the VSD framework mandates that designers consult the philosophical and ethical literature to best determine how to weigh moral trade-offs. However, the VSD framework also concedes the universalism of moral values, particularly the values of freedom, autonomy, equality trust and privacy justice. This paper argues that the VSD methodology, particularly applied to nano-bio-info-cogno technologies, has an insufficient grounding for the determination of moral values. As such, an exploration of the value-investigations of VSD are deconstructed to illustrate both its strengths and weaknesses. This paper also provides possible modalities for the strengthening of the VSD methodology, particularly through the application of moral imagination and how moral imagination exceeds the boundaries of moral intuitions in the development of novel technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Moral bioenhancement, nudge-designed environments, and ambient persuasive technologies may help people behave more consistently with their deeply held moral convictions. Alternatively, they may aid people in overcoming cognitive and affective limitations that prevent them from appreciating a situation's moral dimensions. Or they may simply make it easier for them to make the morally right choice by helping them to overcome sources of weakness of will. This paper makes two assumptions. First, technologies to improve people's moral capacities are realizable. Second, such technologies will actually help people get morality right and behave more consistently with whatever the 'real' right thing to do turns out to be. The paper then considers whether or not humanity loses anything valuable, particularly opportunities for moral progress, when being moral is made much easier by eliminating difficult moral deliberation and internal moral struggle. Ultimately, the worry that moral struggle has value as a catalyst for moral progress is rejected. Moral progress is understood here as the discovery and application of new values or sensitization to new sources of harm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article deals with a modern disease of academic science that consists of an enormous increase in the number of scientific publications without a corresponding advance of knowledge. Findings are sliced as thin as salami and submitted to different journals to produce more papers. If we consider academic papers as a kind of scientific 'currency' that is backed by gold bullion in the central bank of 'true' science, then we are witnessing an article-inflation phenomenon, a scientometric bubble that is most harmful for science and promotes an unethical and antiscientific culture among researchers. The main problem behind the scenes is that the impact factor is used as a proxy for quality. Therefore, not only for convenience, but also based on ethical principles of scientific research, we adhere to the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment when it emphasizes 'the need to eliminate the use of journal-based metrics in funding, appointment and promotion considerations; and the need to assess research on its own merits rather on the journal in which the research is published'. Our message is mainly addressed to the funding agencies and universities that award tenures or grants and manage research programmes, especially in developing countries. The message is also addressed to well-established scientists who have the power to change things when they participate in committees for grants and jobs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this editorial to the Topical Collection “Innovation under Fire: The Rise of Ethics in Tech”, we provide an overview of the papers gathered in the collection, reflect on similarities and differences in their analytical angles and methodological approaches, and carve out some of the cross-cutting themes that emerge from research on the production of ‘Tech Ethics’. We identify two recurring ways through which ‘Tech Ethics’ are studied and forms of critique towards them developed, which we argue diverge primarily in their a priori commitments towards what ethical tech is and how it should best be pursued. Beyond these differences, we observe how current research on ‘Tech Ethics’ evidences a close relationship between public controversies about technological innovation and the rise of ethics discourses and instruments for their settlement, producing legitimacy crises for ‘Tech Ethics’ in and of itself. ‘Tech Ethics’ is not only instrumental for governing technoscientific projects in the present but is equally instrumental for the construction of socio-technical imaginaries and the essentialization of technological futures. We suggest that efforts to reach beyond single case-studies are needed and call for collective reflection on joint issues and challenges to advance the critical project of ‘Tech Ethics’. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ethics is central to scientific and engineering research and practice, but a key challenge for promoting students’ ethical formation involves enhancing faculty members’ ability and confidence in embedding positive ethical learning experiences into their curriculums. To this end, this paper explores changes in faculty members’ approaches to and perceptions of ethics education following their participation in a multi-year interdisciplinary faculty learning community (FLC). We conducted and thematically analyzed semi-structured interviews with 11 participants following the second year of the FLC. Qualitative themes suggested that, following two years of FLC participation, faculty members (1) were better able to articulate their conceptualizations of ethics; (2) became cognizant of how personal experiences, views, and beliefs informed how they introduced ethics into their curriculum; and (3) developed and lived instructional principles that guided their ethics teaching. Results thus suggested that faculty members benefitted from exploring, discussing, and teaching ethics, which (in turn) enabled them to see new opportunities and become confident in integrating ethics into their courses in meaningful ways that aligned with their scholarly identities. Taken together, these data suggest faculty became agents of change for designing, implementing, and refining ethics-related instructional efforts in STEM. This work can guide others interested in designing faculty learning communities to promote instructional skill development, faculty members’ awareness of their ethical values, and their ability and agency to design and integrate ethics learning activities alongside departmental peers in an intentional and continuous manner. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is the introduction to a topical collection on “Changing Values and Energy Systems” that consists of six contributions that examine instances of value change regarding the design, use and operation of energy systems. This introduction discusses the need to consider values in the energy transition. It examines conceptions of value and value change and how values can be addressed in the design of energy systems. Value change in the context of energy and energy systems is a topic that has recently gained traction. Current, and past, energy transitions often focus on a limited range of values, such as sustainability, while leaving other salient values, such as energy democracy, or energy justice, out of the picture. Furthermore, these values become entrenched in the design of these systems: it is hard for stakeholders to address new concerns and values in the use and operation of these systems, leading to further costly transitions and systems’ overhaul. To remedy this issue, value change in the context of energy systems needs to be better understood. We also need to think about further requirements for the governance, institutional and engineering design of energy systems to accommodate future value change. Openness, transparency, adaptiveness, flexibility and modularity emerge as new requirements within the current energy transition that need further exploration and scrutiny. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Professor Sir Joseph Rotblat made significant contributions to nuclear physics and worked on the development of the atomic bomb. He walked out of the Manhattan Project after working there for less than a year, the only scientist to do so. Rotblat gave a comprehensive account of his time at Los Alamos. His Archive is now becoming available and papers contained therein are inconsistent with some aspects of his account. The reasons as to how such anomalies and contradictions could occur are considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The concept of dual-use encapsulates the potential for well-intentioned, beneficial scientific research to also be misused by a third party for malicious ends. The concept of dual-use challenges scientists to look beyond the immediate outcomes of their research and to develop an awareness of possible future (mis)uses of scientific research. Since 2001 much attention has been paid to the possible need to regulate the dual-use potential of the life sciences. Regulation initiatives fall under two broad categories-those that develop the ethical education of scientists and foster an awareness and responsibility of dual-use issues, and those which assess the regulation of information being generated by current research. Both types of initiatives are premised on a cautious, risk-adverse philosophy which advocates careful examination of all future endpoints of research endeavors. This caution advocated within initiatives such as pre-publication review of journal articles contrasts to the obligation to share underpinning data sharing discussions. As the dual-use debate has yet to make a significant impact on data sharing discussions (and vice versa) it is possible that these two areas of knowledge control may present areas of ethical conflict for scientists, and thus need to be more closely examined. This paper examines the tension between the obligation to share exemplified by data sharing principles and the concerns raised by the risk-cautious culture of the dual-use debates. The paper concludes by reflecting on the issues of responsibility as raised by dual-use as relating to data sharing, such as the chain of custody for shared data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The quality and authenticity of images is essential for data presentation, especially in the life sciences. Questionable images may often be a first indicator for questionable results, too. Therefore, a tool that uses mathematical methods to detect suspicious images in large image archives can be a helpful instrument to improve quality assurance in publications. As a first step towards a systematic screening tool, especially for journal editors and other staff members who are responsible for quality assurance, such as laboratory supervisors, we propose a basic classification of image manipulation. Based on this classification, we developed and explored some simple algorithms to detect copied areas in images. Using an artificial image and two examples of previously published modified images, we apply quantitative methods such as pixel-wise comparison, a nearest neighbor and a variance algorithm to detect copied-and-pasted areas or duplicated images. We show that our algorithms are able to detect some simple types of image alteration, such as copying and pasting background areas. The variance algorithm detects not only identical, but also very similar areas that differ only by brightness. Further types could, in principle, be implemented in a standardized scanning routine. We detected the copied areas in a proven case of image manipulation in Germany and showed the similarity of two images in a retracted paper from the Kato labs, which has been widely discussed on sites such as pubpeer and retraction watch. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A retraction notice is an essential scientific historical document because it should outline the reason(s) why a scientific manuscript was retracted, culpability (if any) and any other factors that have given reason for the authors, editors, or publisher, to remove a piece of the literature from science's history books. Unlike an expression of concern (EoC), erratum or corrigendum, a retraction will usually result in a rudimentary vestige of the work. Thus, any retraction notice that does not fully indicate a set of elements related to the reason and background for the retraction serves as a poor historical document. Moreover, poorly or incompletely worded retraction notices in fact do not serve their intended purpose, i.e., to hold all parties accountable, and to inform the scientific and wider public of the problem and reason for the paper's demise. This paper takes a look at the definitions and the policies of clauses for retractions, EoCs, errata and corrigenda in place by 15 leading science, technology and medicine (STM) publishers and four publishing-related bodies that we believe have the greatest influence on the current fields of science, technology and medicine. The primary purpose was to assess whether there is a consistency among these entities and publishers. Using an arbitrary 5-scale classification system, and evaluating the different categories of policies separately, we discovered that in almost all cases (88.9 %), the wording used to define these four categories of polices differs from that of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), which is generally considered to be the guiding set of definitions in science publishing. In addition, as much as 61 % deviation in policies (wording and meaning), relative to COPE guidelines, was discovered. When considering the average pooled deviation across all categories of policies, we discovered that there was either no deviation or a small deviation, only in the wording, in the definition of policies when compared to the COPE guidelines in 1 out of 3 ethical bodies, and in 40 % (6 out of 15) STM publishers. Moderate deviation from the COPE guidelines was detected in 26.7 % of STM publishers and one ethical body but a large deviation in one ethical body and 20 % of STM publishers was observed. Two STM publishers (13.3 %) did not report any information about these policies. Even though in practice, editors and publishers may deviate from these written definitions when dealing with case-by-case issues, we believe that it is essential, to serve as a consistent guide for authors and editors, that the wording be standardized across these entities. COPE and these entities also have the responsibility of making it clear that these definitions are merely suggestions and that their application may be subjected to subjective interpretation and application. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I make a novel case for an expansive approach to engineering ethics education, one that regards micro-ethics and macro-ethics as essentially complementary. Although others have voiced support for including macro-ethical reflection within engineering ethics education, I advance a stronger claim, arguing that isolating engineering ethics from macro-level issues risks rendering even micro-ethical inquiry morally meaningless. I divide my proposal into four parts. First, I clarify the distinction between micro-ethics and macro-ethics as I am construing it, defending my characterization against a potential worry. Second, I consider but reject some arguments for a restrictive approach, one that excludes macro-ethical reflection from engineering ethics education. Third, I offer my central argument for an expansive approach. Finally, I suggest that macro-ethics education can learn something valuable from micro-ethics pedagogy. On my proposal, students consider both micro- and macro-ethical problems from the deliberative perspective, situating micro-ethical problems within a broader social framework but also situating macro-ethical problems within an engaged, practical framework. By emphasizing the value of the deliberative perspective, my proposal contributes to a growing call to broaden the scope of engineering ethics education while maintaining its practical relevance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Authors endure considerable hardship carrying out biomedical research, from generating ideas to completing their manuscripts and submitting their findings and data (as is increasingly required) to a journal. When researchers submit to journals, they entrust their findings and ideas to editors and peer reviewers who are expected to respect the confidentiality of peer review. Inherent trust in peer review is built on the ethical conduct of authors, editors and reviewers, and on the respect of this confidentiality. If such confidentiality is breached by unethical reviewers who might steal or plagiarize the authors' ideas, researchers will lose trust in peer review and may resist submitting their findings to that journal. Science loses as a result, scientific and medical advances slow down, knowledge may become scarce, and it is unlikely that increasing bias in the literature will be detected or eliminated. In such a climate, society will ultimately be deprived from scientific and medical advances. Despite a rise in documented cases of abused peer review, there is still a relative lack of qualitative and quantitative studies on reviewer-related misconduct, most likely because evidence is difficult to come by. Our paper presents an assessment of editors' and reviewers' responsibilities in preserving the confidentiality of manuscripts during the peer review process, in response to a 2016 case of intellectual property theft by a reviewer. Our main objectives are to propose additional measures that would offer protection of authors' intellectual ideas from predatory reviewers, and increase researchers' awareness of the responsible reviewing of journal articles and reporting of biomedical research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What training should engineering students receive to enable them to contribute to reducing bias, discrimination and the persistent lack of diversity in engineering? Collaboration is central to professional engineering work and, consequently, teamwork and group projects are increasingly present in engineering curricula. However, the influence of unconscious bias on interactions within teams can negatively affect women and underrepresented groups and is now recognised as an important engineering ethics issue. This paper describes a workshop designed to enable engineering students to work equitably in diverse teams. Key features of the workshop include (1) the emotionally safe, empowering and warm environment created, (2) the creation of opportunities for students to discuss and apply the issues raised to their own engineering projects, and (3) the opportunities to practice the use of both proactive and reactive strategies to address bias and discrimination in teams. The evaluation of the workshop suggests that engineering students regarded both onsite and online formats as providing useful skills that they intended to apply in practice. Follow-up evaluations suggest that the workshop leads to behavioural change, especially the use of proactive teamwork strategies intended to reduce the impact of unconscious bias. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multiple authorship is the universal solution to multi-tasking in the sciences. Without a team, each with their own set of expertise, and each involved mostly in complementary ways, a research project will likely not advance quickly, or effectively. Consequently, there is a risk that research goals will not be met within a desired timeframe. Research teams that strictly scrutinize their modus operandi select and include a set of authors that have participated substantially in the physical undertaking of the research, in its planning, or who have contributed intellectually to the ideas or the development of the manuscript. Authorship is not an issue that is taken lightly, and save for dishonest authors, it is an issue that is decided collectively by the authors, usually in sync with codes of conduct established by their research institutes or national ministries of education. Science, technology and medicine (STM) publishers have, through independent, or sometimes coordinated efforts, also established their own sets of guidelines regarding what constitutes valid authorship. However, these are, for the greater part, merely guidelines. A previous and recent analysis of authorship definitions indicates that the definitions in place regarding authorship and its validity by many leading STM publishers is neither uniform, nor standard, despite several of them claiming to follow the guidelines as set forward by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors or ICMJE. This disparity extends itself to ghost and guest authorship, two key authorship-related issues that are examined in this paper to assess the extent of discrepancies among the same set of STM publishers and what possible influence they might have on publishing ethics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A growing body of literature has identified potential problems that can compromise the quality, fairness, and integrity of journal peer review, including inadequate review, inconsistent reviewer reports, reviewer biases, and ethical transgressions by reviewers. We examine the evidence concerning these problems and discuss proposed reforms, including double-blind and open review. Regardless of the outcome of additional research or attempts at reforming the system, it is clear that editors are the linchpin of peer review, since they make decisions that have a significant impact on the process and its outcome. We consider some of the steps editors should take to promote quality, fairness and integrity in different stages of the peer review process and make some recommendations for editorial conduct and decision-making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Schön misconduct case has been widely publicized in the media and has sparked intense discussions within and outside the scientific community about general issues of science ethics. This paper analyses the Report of the official Committee charged with the investigation in order to show that what at first seems to be a quite uncontroversial case, turns out to be an accumulation of many interesting and non-trivial questions (of both ethical and philosophical interest). In particular, the paper intends to show that daily scientific practices are structurally permeated by chronic problems; this has serious consequences for how practicing scientists assess their work in general, and scientific misconduct in particular. A philosophical approach is proposed that sees scientific method and scientific ethics as inextricably interwoven. Furthermore, the paper intends to show that the definition of co-authorship that the members of the Committee use, although perhaps clear in theory, proves highly problematic in practice and raises more questions that it answers. A final plea is made for a more self-reflecting attitude of scientists as far as the moral and methodological profile of science is concerned as a key element for improving not only their scientific achievements, but also their assessment of problematic cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What happens when the scientific tradition of openness clashes with potential societal risks? The work of American toxic-exposure epidemiologists can attract media coverage and lead the public to change health practices, initiate lawsuits, or take other steps a study's authors might consider unwarranted. This paper, reporting data from 61 semi-structured interviews with U.S. toxic-exposure epidemiologists, examines whether such possibilities shaped epidemiologists' selection of journals for potentially sensitive papers. Respondents manifested strong support for the norm of scientific openness, but a significant minority had or would/might, given the right circumstances, publish sensitive data in less visible journals, so as to prevent unwanted media or public attention. Often, even those advocating such limited "burial" upheld openness, claiming that less visible publication allowed them to avoid totally withholding the data from publication. However, 15% of the sample had or would, for the most sensitive types of data, withhold publication altogether. Rather than respondents explaining their actions in terms of an expected split between "pure science" and "social advocacy" models, even those publishing in the more visible journals often described their actions in terms of their "responsibility". Several practical limitations (particularly involving broader access to scientific literature via the Internet) of the strategy of burial are discussed, and some recommendations are offered for scientists, the media, and the public. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the ethical use of Big Data and Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies (BD + AI)—using an empirical approach. The paper categorises the current literature and presents a multi-case study of 'on-the-ground' ethical issues that uses qualitative tools to analyse findings from ten targeted case-studies from a range of domains. The analysis coalesces identified singular ethical issues, (from the literature), into clusters to offer a comparison with the proposed classification in the literature. The results show that despite the variety of different social domains, fields, and applications of AI, there is overlap and correlation between the organisations' ethical concerns. This more detailed understanding of ethics in AI + BD is required to ensure that the multitude of suggested ways of addressing them can be targeted and succeed in mitigating the pertinent ethical issues that are often discussed in the literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Critics frequently argue that nudges are more covert, less transparent, and more difficult to monitor than traditional regulatory tools. Edward Glaeser, for example, argues that “[p]ublic monitoring of soft paternalism is much more difficult than public monitoring of hard paternalism”. As one of the leading proponents of soft paternalism, Cass Sunstein, acknowledges, while “[m]andates and commands are highly visible”, soft paternalism, “and some nudges in particular[,] may be invisible”. In response to this challenge, proponents of nudging argue that invisibility for any given individual in a particular choice environment is compatible with “careful public scrutiny” of the nudge. This paper offers the first of its kind experimental evidence that tests whether nudges are, in fact, compatible with “careful public scrutiny”. Using three sets of experiments, the paper argues that, even when entirely visible, nudges attract less scrutiny than their “hard law” counterparts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Even though public awareness about privacy risks in the Internet is increasing, in the evolution of the Internet to the Internet of Things (IoT) these risks are likely to become more relevant due to the large amount of data collected and processed by the “Things”. The business drivers for exploring ways to monetize such data are one of the challenges identified in this paper for the protection of Privacy in the IoT. Beyond the protection of privacy, this paper highlights the need for new approaches, which grant a more active role to the users of the IoT and which address other potential issues such as the Digital Divide or safety risks. A key facet in ethical design is the transparency of the technology and services in how that technology handles data, as well as providing choice for the user. This paper presents a new approach for users’ interaction with the IoT, which is based on the concept of Ethical Design implemented through a policy-based framework. In the proposed framework, users are provided with wider controls over personal data or the IoT services by selecting specific sets of policies, which can be tailored according to users’ capabilities and to the contexts where they operate. The potential deployment of the framework in a typical IoT context is described with the identification of the main stakeholders and the processes that should be put in place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In spite of the acknowledged importance of professional ethics, technical students often show little enthusiasm for studying the subject. This paper considers how such engagement might be improved. Four guiding principles for promoting engagement are identified: (1) aligning teaching content with student interests; (2) taking a pragmatic rather than a philosophical approach to issue resolution; (3) addressing the full complexity of real-world case studies; and (4) covering content in a way that students find entertaining. The use of these principles is then discussed with respect to the specific experience of developing and presenting a master’s module in Ethical and Legal Issues in Cyber Security at Queens University Belfast. One significant aspect of the resulting design is that it encourages students to see ethical issues in systemic terms rather than from an individual perspective, with issues emerging from a conflict between different groups with different vested interests. Case studies are used to examine how personal and business priorities create conflicts that can lead to negative press, fines and punitive legal action. The module explores the reasons why organisations may be unaware of the risks associated with their actions and how an inappropriate response to an ethical issue can significantly aggravate a situation. The module has been delivered in three successive years since 2014 and been well received on each occasion. The paper describes the design of the module and the experience of delivering it, concluding with a discussion of the effectiveness of the approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Business performance is traditionally viewed from the one-dimensional financial angle. This paper develops a new approach that links performance to the ethical vision of Islam based on maqasid al- shari'ah (i.e., the objectives of Islamic law). The approach involves a Pentagon-shaped performance scheme structure via five pillars, namely wealth, posterity, intellect, faith, and human self. Such a scheme ensures that any firm or organization can ethically contribute to the promotion of human welfare, prevent corruption, and enhance social and economic stability and not merely maximize its own performance in terms of its financial return. A quantitative measure of ethical performance is developed. It surprisingly shows that a firm or organization following only the financial aspect at the expense of the others performs poorly. This paper discusses further the practical instances of the quantitative measurement of the ethical aspects of the system taken at an aggregate level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Geoengineering as a technological intervention to avert the dangerous climate change has been on the table at least since 2006. The global outreach of the technology exercised in a non-encapsulated system, the concerns with unprecedented levels and scales of impact and the overarching interdisciplinarity of the project make the geoengineering debate ethically quite relevant and complex. This paper explores the ethical desirability of geoengineering from an overall review of the existing literature on the ethics of geoengineering. It identifies the relevant literature on the ethics of geoengineering by employing a standard methodology. Based on various framing of the major ethical arguments and their subsets, the results section presents the opportunities and challenges at stake in geoengineering from an ethical point of view. The discussion section takes a keen interest in identifying the evolving dynamics of the debate, the grey areas of the debate, with underdeveloped arguments being brought to the foreground and in highlighting the arguments that are likely to emerge in the future as key contenders. It observes the semantic diversity and ethical ambiguity, the academic lop-sidedness of the debate, missing contextual setting, need for interdisciplinary approaches, public engagement, and region-specific assessment of ethical issues. Recommendations are made to provide a useful platform for the second generation of geoengineering ethicists to help advance the debate to more decisive domains with the required clarity and caution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper surveys the state-of-the-art in machine ethics, that is, considerations of how to implement ethical behaviour in robots, unmanned autonomous vehicles, or software systems. The emphasis is on covering the breadth of ethical theories being considered by implementors, as well as the implementation techniques being used. There is no consensus on which ethical theory is best suited for any particular domain, nor is there any agreement on which technique is best placed to implement a particular theory. Another unresolved problem in these implementations of ethical theories is how to objectively validate the implementations. The paper discusses the dilemmas being used as validating 'whetstones' and whether any alternative validation mechanism exists. Finally, it speculates that an intermediate step of creating domain-specific ethics might be a possible stepping stone towards creating machines that exhibit ethical behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fundamental questions in value sensitive design include whether and how high-tech products/artefacts could embody values and ethical ideals, and how plural and incommensurable values of ethical and social importance could be chosen rationally and objectively at a collective level. By using a humanitarian cargo drone study as a starting point, this paper tackles the challenges that VSD's lack of commitment to a specific ethical theory generates in practical applications. Besides, it highlights how mainstream ethical approaches usually related to VSD are incapable of solving main ethical dilemmas raised by technological design for well-being in democratic settings. Accordingly, it is argued that VSD's ethical-democratic import would substantially be enhanced by the espousal of a procedural ethics stance and the deliberative approach to value and welfare entailed by Amartya Sen's capability approach. Differently from rival ethical–political theories, its normative and meta-ethical foundations better handle human diversity, value-goal pluralism, conflicting vested interests as well as the epistemic-moral disagreements typical of contemporary complex democracies. Particularly, Sen's capability approach procedural-deliberative tenets result in an "objective-impartial" choice procedure selecting a "hierarchy" of plural incommensurable values and rational goals thus, suitable to validate an applied science such as welfare-oriented technological design in concrete social environments. Conclusions suggest that refining VSD with a capability-based procedural approach to ethics fosters the concern for democracy and social justice while preserving vital scientific-technical standards. Major advantages are at an applied level to delivering ethically and socially justified, but yet highly functional technologies and high-tech products/artefacts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Authorship is commonly used as the basis for the measurement of research productivity. It influences career progression and rewards, making it a valued commodity in a competitive scientific environment. To better understand authorship practices amongst collaborative teams, this study surveyed authors on collaborative journal articles published between 2011 and 2015. Of the 8364 respondents, 1408 responded to the final open-ended question, which solicited additional comments or remarks regarding the fair distribution of authorship in research teams. This paper presents the analysis of these comments, categorized into four main themes: (1) disagreements, (2) questionable behavior, (3) external influences regarding authorship, and (4) values promoted by researchers. Results suggest that some respondents find ways to effectively manage disagreements in a collegial fashion. Conversely, others explain how distribution of authorship can become a "blood sport" or a "horror story" which can negatively affect researchers' wellbeing, scientific productivity and integrity. Researchers fear authorship discussions and often try to avoid openly discussing the situation which can strain team interactions. Unethical conduct is more likely to result from deceit, favoritism, and questionable mentorship and may become more egregious when there is constant bullying and discrimination. Although values of collegiality, transparency and fairness were promoted by researchers, rank and need for success often overpowered ethical decision-making. This research provides new insight into contextual specificities related to fair authorship distribution that can be instrumental in developing applicable training tools to identify, prevent, and mitigate authorship disagreement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the ethical pitfalls and challenges that non-ethicists, such as researchers and programmers in the fields of computer science, artificial intelligence and robotics, face when building moral machines. Whether ethics is "computable" depends on how programmers understand ethics in the first place and on the adequacy of their understanding of the ethical problems and methodological challenges in these fields. Researchers and programmers face at least two types of problems due to their general lack of ethical knowledge or expertise. The first type is so-called rookie mistakes, which could be addressed by providing these people with the necessary ethical knowledge. The second, more difficult methodological issue concerns areas of peer disagreement in ethics, where no easy solutions are currently available. This paper examines several existing approaches to highlight the ethical pitfalls and challenges involved. Familiarity with these and similar problems can help programmers to avoid pitfalls and build better moral machines. The paper concludes that ethical decisions regarding moral robots should be based on avoiding what is immoral (i.e. prohibiting certain immoral actions) in combination with a pluralistic ethical method of solving moral problems, rather than relying on a particular ethical approach, so as to avoid a normative bias. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prior research on engineering students’ understandings of ethics and social responsibility has produced mixed and sometimes conflicting results. Seeking greater clarity in this area of investigation, we conducted an exploratory, longitudinal study at four universities in the United States to better understand how engineering undergraduate students perceive ethics and social responsibility and how those perceptions change over time. Undergraduate engineering students at four U.S. universities were surveyed three times: during their 1st (Fall 2015), 5th (Fall 2017), and 8th semesters (Spring 2019). The students who completed all three surveys (n = 226) comprise the sample that was analyzed in this paper for changes in their scores on five instruments: Fundamentals of Engineering/Situational Judgment, Moral Disengagement, ABET Engineering Work and Practice Considerations, Macroethics, and Political and Social Involvement Scale. We found that students modestly increased their knowledge of ethics and ability to apply that knowledge in situations calling for them to exercise judgment. In addition, they consistently indicated that health and safety considerations in engineering were of highest importance. They also showed steady levels of social consciousness over time, in contrast to other studies which detected a culture of increasing disengagement in engineering students throughout the four years of their undergraduate studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) refers to technologies that track daily activities of persons in need of care to enhance their autonomy and minimise their need for assistance. New technological developments show an increasing effort to integrate automated emotion recognition and regulation (ERR) into AAL systems. These technologies aim to recognise emotions via different sensors and, eventually, to regulate emotions defined as “negative” via different forms of intervention. Although these technologies are already implemented in other areas, AAL stands out by its tendency to enable an inconspicuous 24-hour surveillance in the private living space of users who rely on the technology to maintain a certain degree of independence in their daily activities. The combination of both technologies represents a new dimension of emotion recognition in a potentially vulnerable group of users. Our paper aims to provide an ethical contextualisation of the novel combination of both technologies. We discuss different concepts of emotions, namely Basic Emotion Theory (BET) and the Circumplex Model of Affect (CMA), that form the basis of ERR and provide an overview over the current technological developments in AAL. We highlight four ethical issues that specifically arise in the context of ERR in AAL systems, namely concerns regarding (1) the reductionist view of emotions, (2) solutionism as an underlying assumption of these technologies, (3) the privacy and autonomy of users and their emotions, (4) the tendency of machine learning techniques to normalise and generalise human behaviour and emotional reactions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social categorizations regarding gender or age have proven to be relevant in human-robot interaction. Their stereotypical application in the development and implementation of robotics in eldercare is even discussed as a strategy to enhance the acceptance, well-being, and quality of life of older people. This raises serious ethical concerns, e.g., regarding autonomy of and discrimination against users. In this paper, we examine how relevant professional stakeholders perceive and evaluate the use of social categorizations and stereotypes regarding gender and age in robotics for eldercare. Based on 16 semi-structured interviews with representatives from technology development, industry, and nursing science as well as practice, we explore the subjects’ awareness, evaluations, and lines of argument regarding the corresponding moral challenges. Six different approaches of dealing with categorizations and stereotypes regarding gender and age in care robotics for older people are identified: negation, functionalistic relativization, explanation, neutralization, stereotyping, and queering. We discuss the ethical implications of these approaches with regard to professional responsibility and draw conclusions for responsible age tech in pluralistic societies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Innovations permeate healthcare settings on an ever-increasing scale. Health technology innovations (HTIs) impact our perceptions and experiences of health, care, disease, etc. Because of the fast pace these HTIs are being introduced in different healthcare settings, there is a growing societal consensus that these HTIs need to be governed by ethical reflection. This paper reports a systematic review of argument-based literature which focused on articles reporting on ethical frameworks to screen or evaluate HTIs. To do this a four step methodology was followed: (1) Literature search conducted in five electronic literature databases; (2) Identification of relevant articles; (3) Development of data-extraction tool to analyze the included articles; (4) Analysis, synthesis of data and reporting of results. Fifty-seven articles were included, each reporting on a specific ethical framework. These ethical frameworks existed out of characteristics which were grouped into five common ones: (1) Motivations for development and use of frameworks; (2) Objectives of using frameworks; (3) Specific characteristics of frameworks (background context, scope, and focus); (4) Ethical approaches and concepts used in the frameworks; (5) Methods to use the frameworks. Although this multiplicity of ethical frameworks shows an increasing importance of ethically analyzing HTIs, it remains unclear what the specific role is of these analyses. An ethics of caution, on which ethical frameworks rely, guides HTIs in their design, development, implementation, without questioning their technological paradigm. An ethics of desirability questions this paradigm, without guiding HTIs. In the end, a place needs to be found in-between, to critically assess HTIs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]