Student Research and Travel

Jacob Watson, an undergraduate PHIL major, attended the Rocky Mountain Ethics (RoME) Congress from August 9-13 along with Ryan Jenkins, Assistant Professor. The RoME Congress is a North American philosophy conference that has been held at University of Colorado Boulder for the past 11 summers.

Jacob Watson and Ryan Jenkins presented their co-authored paper, “The Three Faces of Technological Oppression”, which examines the restricting characteristics of technology “through the lens of oppression, a powerful framework in more and political thought” (Jenkins). Watson and Jenkins presented this paper August 8, 2018. Jenkins and Watson are in the process of having their paper published in a professional philosophy journal.

Their travel and expenses were sponsored in part by the Philosophy Department and other part by WhiteFox Defense. See giving tab to see how you can help.

ABSTRACT: This paper discusses the intersections between technology and oppression. First, we observe the many ways that technology acts as an accomplice to existing practices of oppression. Second, we discuss some ways that technology leads to sui generis forms of oppression. We do not defend a novel theory of oppression, which would be outside the scope of this paper. However, it is incumbent upon us to defend the claims (1) that a technology’s very structure can be oppressive and (2) that there is some social group that is oppressed by the techno-social system. We suggest the technologically illiterate constitute such a group. We end by briefly suggesting broader democratic participation in the design and direction of technology as a response to technological oppression.