In technology-is-ideology, there was a discussion on the path-dependence of technology. That the technology itself, carries with it the agency and the will of the technologist. Naturally, that extends that the role of the technologist is beyond solving problems, to considering which ends are worth solving for.
However, it also means that Silicon Valley, for all its counterculture-inspired talk about radically reimagining the future, has not shored up the strong ethical grounds requisite for principled construction.
The instrumentalizing mentality, strips morality away from conversations on problems. It views every entity as a resources to be used to optimize for some solution. It tends to seek quantifiability, and ignores non-quantifiable externalities (which is many cases are the truly desired outcome).
This is the mentality that many technologists use, but it’s not necessarily the mentality that leads us to the outcomes we intrinsically want. Life is more complicated than churn metrics. There are interdependent outcomes to our technology that are hard to foresee. The social impacts of technology on others are just as important as the actual solution to the problem.
The general public must begin to think of technologists as doing deeply human and value-laden work. Technologists intervene in our present realities and forge the future, and in doing so, choose how best to model the world and impress their will upon it.
This means that it is kind of upon us, to criticize, view and weigh our morality. To experiment with our moral frameworks and bring that into the work we do as technologists.
Related Links: Technology and the virtues