Science & Technology

Ethics Quiz: That Apple IPad Pro Ad

/ Jack Marshall / 21 Comments

Filmmakers, musicians, writers and other artists began whining about that ad above for the Apple iPad Pro from almost the second it was released. As Sonny and Cher warble one of their lesser efforts, “All I Ever Need is You,” a hydraulic press crushes musical instruments, cameras, a framed picture, paint cans, record albums and other stuff in a colorful explosion of chaos.

“The destruction of the human experience. Courtesy of Silicon Valley,” tweeted actor Hugh Grant. “Who needs human life and everything that makes it worth living? Dive into this digital simulacrum and give us your soul. Sincerely, Apple,” added “Men in Black” screenwriter Ed Solomon. There were lots more metaphorical squeals of indignation and alarm on social media, as
“creative people” accused Apple of gloating over how Big Tech is co-opting the traditional tools of art and on the verge of eliminating the human creativity with artificial intelligence.

So, naturally, as is the norm these days, Apple “assumed the position” and groveled an apology. Pledging that Apple would never run the ad on TV again, Tor Myhren, the company’s vice president of marketing communications, said, “Creativity is in our DNA at Apple, and it’s incredibly important to us to design products that empower creatives all over the world.” The statement continued, “Our goal is to always celebrate the myriad of ways users express themselves and bring their ideas to life through iPad. We missed the mark with this video, and we’re sorry.”

Seriously?

Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz of the Day is…

Oh, lots of things: Is there anything unethical about that ad? Do its critics have a legitimate point? Should Apple have caved to their complaints? Was that apology sincere?

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Ethics Dunce: Scientific American

/ Jack Marshall / 13 Comments

The ethical principle at issue here shouldn’t be hard: “Do your job.” Unfortunately, it is apparently too hard for the scientists and researchers at Scientific American. Just as American journalism, sports teams, the entertainment industry–ethicists!— and others have been unable to resist the siren song of political activism, the once reliable and trustworthy general consumption science magazine so essential to my early education in the subject has capitulated to wokeness and now feels that its mission of exploring and explaining science to non-scientists includes political and partisan advocacy.

Will going woke mean, as the saying goes, that “S.A.” (as its friends call it) will “go broke”? Time will tell. This kind of beach of trust, integrity and mission, however, deserves to be fatal.

This week, the magazine unveiled its criticism of news media reporting on the campus pro-Hamas demonstrations. Science! In fact, the article is little more than a standard progressive rationalization of the protests. It is transparently presented with rhetoric that suggests legitimate scientific inquiry, (“For over a decade, my research has extensively explored…”) but the author isn’t a scientist. She’s a professor of journalism; more to the point, she’s a black community activist journalist clearly in the intersectionality and advocacy journalism camps:

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As the Biden Campaign Slaps Itself on Its Metaphorical Forehead For Not Thinking of This First…

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

We should have seen this coming. Maybe you did.

Pikesville High School’s athletic director Dazhon Darien was arrested yesterday after an investigation revealed that he used AI technology to created the fake audio clip above of the school’s principal, Eric Eiswert, ranting about black students and Jews. Darien, who is black, has been charged with disrupting school activities: of course the audio clip using the principal’s voice “went viral”and Eiswert, who is white, was widely condemned by the Baltimore County community. The school had to add police personnel for security and additional counselors. Here is a typical reaction to the clip:

Darien has also charged been charged with theft, retaliating against a witness and stalking. Good.

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Pick a Title: “Follow the Science!” or “Who Can You Trust?”

/ Jack Marshall / 13 Comments

Those stories both appeared on March 27. Both are still up, too. Apparently the earth is spinning both faster and more slowly at the same time!!!!

Dana? Dana! Ah, here she is…

The NBC story is here; CBS’s is here.

I wonder what NPR says? That should settle it. After all, it is a news organization built on a foundation of robust editorial standards and practices, well-constructed to withstand the hardest of gazes.

______________

Pointer: Not the Bee.

This Lawyer’s Incredible Ignorance Prompts Me to Propose a New Standard For Disbarment

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

That’s the outspoken, racist, Dunning-Kruger suffering lawyer on “The View,” Sunny Hostin, saying out loud and on national TV that climate change causes eclipses (yes, also earthquakes, but we’ve already heard public figures make fools of themselves on that topic, like here and here…). This was so bad that even Whoopie felt compelled to correct her: Whoopie’s problem is that she’s uneducated, but she’s still easily the smartest lady on “The View,” which admittedly is faint praise.

We could have an entertaining debate over whose statement is more idiotic, Rep. Jackson Lee’s claim that the moon is “mostly gas,” of this head-exploder from Hostin. But that’s not the point of this post.

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Incompetent Elected Official of the Month: Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Tx)

/ Jack Marshall / 28 Comments

When we last looked in on the astoundingly dim-witted, ignorant, unqualified Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee here at Ethics Alarms, she was setting out to violate the Constitution with her brain-dead on arrival (BDOA) Leading Against White Supremacy Act, which has to be read to be believed. A junior high school civics class could use the thing as a final exam: “Please explain why the U.S. Supreme Court would declare this proposed law unconstitutional.” In the same post in which I discussed that monstrosity, Lee’s invention, I wrote of her self-evident intellectual caliber,

She’s a fanatic supporter of reparations for slavery; she’s a knee-jerk race-baiter (any criticism of President Barack Obama, a serial bungler, was racist in her view). She’s one of those not very bright people who speak assertively and defiantly because they are laboring under the delusion that they are intelligent, thus fooling others who aren’t very smart either.

Lee once mixed up Wikileaks and Wikipedia in an interview. She has complained that the naming of storms is racist, because the names are “too white,” but we know that if we gave hurricanes names like “LaShonda” to hurricanes, she’d complain that blacks were being deliberately compared to destructive forces.

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A Popeye: I Just Have to Say This Regarding the Coverage of the Solar Eclipse

/ Jack Marshall / 25 Comments

I’ve been wrestling with myself over whether to post on this topic, especially after I obviously annoyed my very nice next-door neighbors by making my sentiments known yesterday while they were out on the front yard enthusing over Northern Virginia’s not-quite total eclipse view and offering me magic glasses. But as Popeye so eloquently said often, “It’s all I can stand, cuz I can’t stands no more!”

The ethical issue is a common one raised here: journalism is obligated to make the public better informed, not dumber. The media’s breathless, silly, pseudo-pagan coverage of the eclipse in Indiana yesterday on every news network was, in my view, insulting and horrifying, or should have been.

If you took their outbursts seriously, who knows what else you’ll believe?

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GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene Thoughtfully Provides Ethics Alarms With The Opportunity to Balance the Post About the NJ Green Party Candidate’s Earthquake Nonsense

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

Thanks, Congresswoman! And I actually think you lapped Christina Khalil in the complete science ignoramus race, though you both are tied in the “if the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail” competition.

I want to know who in Georgia voted for this silly, embarrassing woman. I want names and explanations. Maybe DNA. It’s my Congress too…

After that puny 4.8 magnitude earthquake tickled the tri-state area (no injuries, no damage) Greene sent out a tweet claiming that God had sent the earthquake has a “sign” for the United State to “repent.” She also claimed today’s eclipse is another sign from God that the country needs to ask for forgiveness. Greene seems to be in tune with primitive societies that were terrified during eclipses, believing that the moon was eating the sun, or something. People like her allowed Bing Crosby to be declared a wizard in “A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court.”

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These People Are Passionate, Mean Well, Care Deeply About the Environment and Mother Earth, and Have No Idea What They Are Talking About…

/ Jack Marshall / 29 Comments

Sometimes, only Sidney Wang will do…

Christina Khalil is the Green Party candidate for U.S. Senator in New Jersey. Here is her campaign bio that sits on her website:

Christina Anna Khalil (she/her/hers) is a native of New Jersey, and she grew up in foster care where she overcame many trials and tribulations throughout her childhood and adult life. Christina has her B.A. in psychology and her Master’s in Social Work both from Ramapo College, which were both major accomplishments for her, and Christina believes that one of the true keys to freedom lies in education. In her free time Christina has avidly volunteered for community organizations doing important work, such as (BCLA) Bergen County LGBTQ+ Alliance. While obtaining her Master’s Degree, Christina worked on the front lines during the height of the pandemic at a medical detox facility and never quit school, while also volunteering at Hackensack High School. While working in the medical and substance abuse field, Christina noticed that our current elected leaders appeared detached from the reality of the current struggles that citizens of New Jersey face and made a vow to herself that when it was her time to step up and work towards change, she would do just that. 

Christina’s leadership and resiliency are unmatched, and she is the leader that New Jersey needs to fight to make the New Jersey citizens’ quality of life better.

Impressive! What a pity she’s an idiot. Here’s proof, her tweet yesterday:

Yes, the Green Party has nominated someone who thinks climate change causes earthquakes. Her biography claims that “our current elected leaders appeared detached from the reality.” One can’t get much more detached from reality than believing the movement of tectonic plates in the Earth’s crust are affected by the climate. This woman has a Master’s Degree, and has the critical thinking skills of a pangolin. Score another one for America education.

She exemplifies the people advising Joe Biden, arguing for the banning of gas stoves, air conditioning and gasoline-powered cars while wasting billions of dollars in the process. Some New Jersey residents will vote for her, maybe thousands. How such people get through the day without stabbing themselves in the eye with forks is a mystery.

Here’s Christina…

…she looks nice enough, though I think I see the sky shining through her eyes from the back of her head. She is truly a dolt, and it is unethical for dolts to run for elective office.

Note: WordPress says I should tag this post “art,” “poetry” and “music.” So apparently their bot is affected by climate change too…

Friday Open Forum: I’m a Moron, and You’ll Do Better

/ Jack Marshall / 21 Comments

Life competence lesson learned: Always bring your cell phone.

Resisting “progress” on principle is a self-defeating and futile exercise, not to mention stupid. I find the cultural influences of smart phones particularly, cell phones generally, toxic, deplorable and obvious, as I have noted periodically here before. Thus I only use the thing when I have to, eschewing doing business on it, keeping my email account off of it, and restricting its use to online research and actual phone calls and texts. (I have never used the camera). The remote guidance system has been useful several times too, and would have saved me an ordeal last night. Unfortunately for me, I didn’t take my phone to a performance by the Georgetown Gilbert and Sullivan Society, still producing shows after 51 years (which is how long ago I founded the group as a defiant first year law student), because I detest hearing phones sound during theatrical performances, especially mine.

Everything was going swimmingly by the end of the evening: the oroduction of the musical “Cinderella,” was really good, the student talent was exhilerating, boding well for the group’s future, the audience was large and enthusiastic, and it was nice to have positive thoughts about the Law Center for a change. Then, a bit fatigued at 11:15 pm, I took the wrong exit on the way home (on a route I have navigated literally hundreds of times without incident) and ended up completely lost in the bowels of D.C.

Trust me, you don’t want to be in the bowels of D.C.

Even using the Capitol as a visual guide, it took me 45 extra minutes to find my way home, by which time I was furious at myself, hoarse from screaming epithets at the stop lights ( must have hit 20 of them), and worried about Spuds, who had already been traumatized by Grace’s disappearance and who had never been alone so long since we adopted him.

No, I do not have a good sense of direction (an understatement), and I have never been able to see street signs clearly at night. Obviously my phone’s GPS would have saved me time and terror.

I’m a moron.

Now please start discussing ethics while I continue to flagellate myself…