Why an Ethic of Quantification?

24 Pages Posted: 18 Feb 2021 Last revised: 27 Apr 2021

See all articles by Monica Di Fiore

Monica Di Fiore

National Research Council (CNR) - Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies (ISTC)

Marta Kuc Czarnecka

Gdańsk University of Technology

Arnald Puy

University of Bergen

Andrea Saltelli

UPF Barcelona School of Management

Date Written: April 27, 2021

Abstract

Looking at present-day technoscience, where utopian ambitions and dystopian fears confront one another, quantification plays a fundamental role. Artificial intelligence, big data, statistical, mathematical, and metrical objects share important promises, as well as important pathologies. From finance to education, from the economy to the environment, we increasingly use numbers and algorithms to increase efficiency and profit, to measure the speed of achieving objectives, to classify and to decide. Without an awareness of the interconnectedness of this multiform universe, no diagnosis is possible. A critical movement is needed, to control a sociotechnical imaginary where number-based technologies provide the solution to the problems created by technology itself. Is time ripe for an ethics of quantification?

Keywords: sociology of quantification, ethics of quantification, metrics, rating, algorithms, mathematical modelling

JEL Classification: C18, O32, O33

Suggested Citation

Di Fiore, Monica and Kuc Czarnecka, Marta and Puy, Arnald and Saltelli, Andrea, Why an Ethic of Quantification? (April 27, 2021). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3772676 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3772676

Monica Di Fiore

National Research Council (CNR) - Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies (ISTC) ( email )

Roma, RM
Italy

Marta Kuc Czarnecka

Gdańsk University of Technology ( email )

Arnald Puy

University of Bergen ( email )

Muséplassen 1
N-5008 Bergen, +47 55 58
Norway

Andrea Saltelli (Contact Author)

UPF Barcelona School of Management ( email )

Carrer de Balmes
Carrer de Balmes, 132
Barcelona, Barcelona 08008
Spain

HOME PAGE: http://www.andreasaltelli.eu

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