Natasha McCarthy: Philosophy and Engineering

Battle of Ideas

2010-09-14T02:45:00.000-07:00

After a long 'rest' while I had a baby, I am speaking at the forthcoming Battle of Ideas conference on "Innovative engineering: within limits?" on October 31st in London. Details here: http://www.battleofideas.org.uk/index.php/2010/session_detail/4113/

Autonomous Systems - Social, Legal and Ethical Issues

2009-09-13T14:05:00.000-07:00

A report on the social, legal and ethical issues generated by the design, development and use of autonomous systems was published by the Royal Academy of Engineering last month. I produced the report based on presentations and discussions at a workshop at the Academy, where a number of experts in fields likely to employ autonomous systems discussed the timescales for their introduction, their potential impacts and the wider issues that they might give rise to. Participants were from the fields of defence and aerospace, AI and IT, surgery and healthcare, and transport. The final report focusses on the use of autonomous systems in the form of driverless vehicles and smart homes - two areas where the deployment of autonomous systems is likely to be imminent and to have a significant effect on peoples' lives. It calls for debate into the acceptability of these technologies, and the best ways to garner their benefits while minimising risks.

There was a lot of press interest in the report, with stories from the BBC, The Daily Mail, The Guardian, The Telegraph, Reuters, The Engineer, New Scientist and the Economist.

Engineering: A Beginner's Guide

2009-08-02T14:07:00.000-07:00

My Book, Engineering: A Beginner's Guide, is published this month by Oneworld publications.

The book takes a broad look at engineering from a historical, social, cultural and philosophical point of view. It tells the story of how engineering has shaped and expanded our physical world, influenced the development of the social world and how we live and communicate, and expanded our knowledge of the natural world.

The book also sets out the ethical challenges faced by engineers and the tasks that engineers must address in the future, from mitigating global warming to developing infrastructure in the poorest parts of the world.

The book is intended for those intrigued by what engineering is all about and what a career in engineering means, and for those interested in how engineering has shaped our world - be they practising engineers or students of science and technology studies.

The book is available on Amazon now - click here.

Some quotes about the book:

"The best book of its kind. Bold and well informed. It works as an introduction to engineering for just about every conceivable audience." Steve Fuller, Professor of Sociology, University of Warwick

"A fantastic book. Full of stories that can be enjoyed by anybody who is interested in innovation and creativity." Dame Wendy Hall, Professor of Computer Science, Southampton University

"A beautifully considered outlook on what engineers think about and do." Igor Aleksander, Emeritus Profesor of Neural Systems Engineering, Imperial College London

"Deftly engineered. McCarthy challenges us all - not just engineers - to take responsibility for the ways in which we all increasingly engineer the world." Carl Mitcham, Professor of technology and Professor of Liberal Arts and International Studies at the Colorado School of Mines

Engineering in Context

2009-07-28T15:00:00.000-07:00

A new book of collected essays, 'Engineering in Context' was launched at Engineers Ireland on July 2 and 3 at a symposium with the same title. The full programme for the event is here.

I was invited to speak at the symposium, and chose the topic 'Making Fun: How Engineering Influences Leisure'. I wanted to look at the ways that engineering and society interrelate, looking both at how engineering shapes our wants, needs and desires and how our wants, needs and desires influence the path of engineering. I think this interplay is interesting, because it highlights just how sensitive engineering is to social context. In the philosophy of science, it is usually assumed that if science is taken to be sensitive to social context then it cannot succeed in describing the objective truth about reality - that is to say, assuming that science is formed in part by social factors leads to a kind of relativism. In engineering this is not so. Engineering is about making things that work, and whether or not an artifact works depends crucially on both the objective nature of reality and its laws, and the level of human interest and need for the artifact.

I am currently polishing up the paper, and hope to post a version here soon.

WPE 2008

2009-07-27T15:07:00.001-07:00

The second international Workshop on Philosophy and Engineering was held at The Royal Academy of Engineering in November 2008. I was co-host with Dave Goldberg.

A full set of abstracts from the workshop is accessible online here.

Interdisciplinary Science Reviews

2009-07-27T14:59:00.000-07:00

I edited a special edition of the journal Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, taken over last year by new editor Willard McCarty, which was published in September 2008. On the topic Philosophy of Engineering, the edition comprised mostly articles from the 2007 Workshop on Philosophy of Engineering. Also included were some invited pieces and an extended editorial by me, called 'Should Engineers Think?' Click here to download a pdf of the full editorial. A version of this paper was presented at the University of Leeds' seminar series on engineering ethics.

The table of contents is here.

Engines of Thought

2008-07-28T13:59:00.000-07:00

I have an article in Issue 41 of The Philosophers' Magazine, second quarter of 2008. It's all about how actually doing and making things, interacting with the world, is useful for understanding some of things philosophers find puzzling - eg, how we have knowledge of the external world; the nature of mind-body interaction; the link between theory and reality. These are all areas where scepticism creeps up as a philosophical position, but this paper argues that looking from an engineering point of view, where once can successfully engineer bits of the physical world (including making things like prosthetic limbs that function by exploiting the means by which mind and body interact) is hard to be a sceptic.

What Use is Philosophy of Engineering?

2008-07-18T05:44:00.000-07:00

The December 2007 Issue of Interdisciplinary Science Reviews (volume 32, number 4) includes a paper by me about The Royal Academy of Engineering's seminar series on philosophy of engineering. The paper, 'What Use is Philosophy of Engineering?' reviews the themes that were developed in the seminars, and argues that philosophy of engineering can bring new perspectives to existing philosophical problems. These problems fall into the areas of epistemology, philosophy of mind, and theories of meaning. The abstract is online here: http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/maney/isr/2007/00000032/00000004/art00003

A full version of the paper will be on this site soon.

Workshop on Philosophy and Engineering: 'A World of Things, Not Facts'

2008-07-17T15:19:00.000-07:00

In November 2007, the first international Workshop on Philosophy and Engineering was held at the Technical University of Delft. I was fortunate to be asked to speak at the conference, representing The Royal Academy of Engineering. My talk brought out the commonalities between the lessons that can be learned from philosophy of engineering and the lessons that Wittgenstein, in his later philosophy, felt should be drawn from philosophy. My paper will be published in a forthcoming collection of selected papers from the conference.

The second Workshop on Philosophy and Engineering will be held in London at The Royal Academy of Engineering. Information about the workshop and a call for papers is online here: http://www.illigal.uiuc.edu/web/wpe/about/

Philosophy in the Making - Ingenia Magazine

2008-07-17T14:59:00.000-07:00

In March 2006 I wrote a piece for The Royal Academy of Engineering's Ingenia magazine, title: "Philosophy in the Making". This article outlines the reasons for engaging in philosphy of engineering, even though engineering is a subject that has enjoyed considerably less attention form philosophers than its sister discipline, science. This piece makes the case that engineering provides significant contributions to knowledge, and thus should be in the sights of epistemologists and philosophers of science; that engineering provides insight on longstanding philosphical problems and that philosophy can actually have an impact on the success of engineering in practice. This article cites the work of Peter Simons at the University of Leeds, and the ideas of Ian Hacking.

A copy of this article is available online here:
http://www.ingenia.org.uk/ingenia/issues/issue26/mccarthy.pdf