Isabel Brieler, Author at Viterbi Conversations in Ethics

Spring 2022 Weekly News Profile

Wordle’s Rough Streak

With popular puzzle game Wordle’s transition to the New York Times, users have become frustrated with the once beloved game.

Spring 2022 Weekly News Profile

SpaceX and Amazon’s Starlink Spat

Isabel Brieler January 17, 2022 FCC Internet Satellites SpaceX

In the most recent update to SpaceX and Amazon’s ongoing conflict over the proposed Starlink Satellite Internet plan, Amazon has requested further delays to SpaceX’s launch schedule in order to “allow for more thorough analysis.”

Fall 2021 Weekly News Profile

Apple’s Control of the App Market

Isabel Brieler October 11, 2021 Apple Monopoly Video Games

Apple has faced a lawsuit over their in-app payment policies, and recently filed an appeal to delay the judge’s decree that they allow app developers to direct users to third-party payment platforms — but do they have an ethical justification for this?

Fall 2021 Weekly News Profile

Sacrificing the Innocent in the Battle Against Climate Change

Isabel Brieler August 30, 2021 Carbon Emissions Clean Energy Climate Change Sustainability

President Biden is pushing for the implementation of CO2 pipelines to help decrease emissions, but if they come at the cost of the disadvantaged communities they travel through, are they worth it?

Spring 2021 Weekly News Profile

A Responsible Rollout of the COVID-19 Vaccines

Isabel Brieler April 26, 2021 COVID-19 Johnson & Johnson Vaccinations

The CDC and FDA have recommended a pause in the use of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine over concerns about rare blood-clotting side effects, but given its wide-reaching consequences, was this an ethical decision?

Spring 2021 Weekly News Profile

The Implications of the Suez Canal Crisis

Isabel Brieler March 29, 2021 Globalization Shipping Suez Canal Transporation

A single ship has blocked a canal that handles 30% of the globe’s shipping traffic for days (and at the time of writing, is still stuck there). Does this have larger implications for the way the world currently approaches manufacturing and globalization?

Spring 2021 Weekly News Profile

Implications of Interplanetary Translocation

Isabel Brieler March 1, 2021 Mars Microbiology NASA Perseverance Space

The recent successful landing of NASA’s Perseverance rover on Mars gives us cause to consider the extent to which we are ethically obligated to prevent the “contamination” of other planets with earthly life.

Spring 2021 Weekly News Profile

How Apps are Influencing Reddit’s War with Wall Street

Isabel Brieler February 1, 2021 GameStop Hedge Funds Robinhood Stock Market

2/1/2021 While 2020 was undoubtedly a strange year for the stock market, with industries swinging unprecedentedly up and down due to the COVID-19 pandemic, January…

Fall 2020 Weekly News Profile

Tech Companies Accruing Monopolies that Harken Back to the Days of “Oil Barons and Railroad Tycoons”

Isabel Brieler October 26, 2020 Antitrust DOJ Google Monopoly

10/26/2020 A sixteen-month investigation into tech giants including Facebook, Amazon, Apple, and Google has finally been completed with the filing of a lawsuit against Google by the…

Podcast

Fall 2022 VCE Podcast

Predictive Policing

VCE October 31, 2022

In this episode, the Viterbi Conversations in Ethics team explores the ethics behind predictive policing.

Fall 2022 VCE Podcast

Clean Energy

VCE October 31, 2022

In this episode, the Viterbi Conversations in Ethics team explores the ethics behind clean energy.

Fall 2022 Featured VCE Podcast

Cryptocurrency

VCE October 24, 2022

In this episode, the Viterbi Conversations in Ethics team explores the ethics behind cryptocurrency.

Fall 2022 VCE Podcast

Autonomous Vehicles

VCE October 24, 2022

In this episode, the Viterbi Conversations in Ethics team explores the ethics behind autonomous vehicles.

Fall 2022 VCE Podcast

Digital Voice Assistants

VCE October 19, 2022

In this episode, the Viterbi Conversations in Ethics team explores the ethics behind digital voice assistants such as Siri and Alexa.

Current Issue

Spring 2022 Volume 6 Issue 1

The Costs of Megaprojects: An Analysis of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge

Helen Situ May 4, 2022

Megaprojects are large scale investment projects, many of which are internationally famous, such as Australia’s Sydney Opera House, SpaceX’s program to colonize Mars, and the Panama Canal. Megaprojects garner a high level of excitement — and justly so, as they hold cultural, economic, and social significance. However, the questionable ethics of megaprojects needs to be examined as they increasingly become the dominant mode of infrastructure construction.

Spring 2022 Volume 6 Issue 1

A Credit Card a Week: The Environmental Ethics of Plastics

Kaylee Tseng May 4, 2022

In an industrialized world, it seems impossible to live without plastics. From food storage to aircrafts, plastics provide benefits that make them an irreplaceable material. However, a consistent increase in plastic production and use has led to a massive plastic pollution crisis. Plastics are produced from non-renewable resources and can never fully decompose. They end up in our oceans, our environment, and even our stomachs (a credit card’s worth per week). Additionally, the massive amount of plastic waste has created a global plastic trade that unfairly places the burden of waste processing on less developed countries that may not be able to support even their own waste. The effects of plastic pollution are reaching a critical stage, and engineers must find solutions to relieve the growing pressure.

Spring 2022 Volume 6 Issue 1

The Ethics of Stockpiling Zero-Day Vulnerabilities

Matthew Wilson May 4, 2022

The development of new technology has allowed the evolution of new methods of warfare. The use of zero-days has propelled this exploration and empowered governments to remotely attack the software systems of their adversaries. Despite the potential military benefits of this weapon, government officials are still questioning whether they should stockpile zero-days, especially when the vulnerability is found in software that everyday citizens use. Analyses of previous zero-day attacks and the US government’s overpowering national security stance reveals that the consequences of stockpiling zero-days outweigh the benefits and are a clear violation of the rights of citizens.

Weekly News Profile

Fall 2022 Featured Weekly News Profile

The Impact of STEM From Childhood Toys to Adult Careers

Jennah Saqib November 28, 2022

In recent years there has been an increased interest in toys that are designed to enhance children’s cognitive development. The goal of these toys is to encourage scientific curiosity outside of the classroom; however, the benefits of STEM toys over other forms of play are debatable. Additionally, the increased pressure from parents to push their children into STEM fields may do them more harm than good in the long run.

Fall 2022 Weekly News Profile

Running Low on Gas: Technologies Affected by the Helium Shortage

Kaylee Tseng November 14, 2022

Advanced technologies such as MRI scans and quantum computing are at risk of losing one of their most important elements: liquid helium. The unique properties of helium lend it to a wide array of scientific uses, but these properties also make helium difficult to capture and reuse. The ongoing shortage of helium has prompted researchers to find ways to recycle or replace helium to conserve this dwindling resource.

Fall 2022 Weekly News Profile

FDA Advisory Panel Asks for Improvements in Pulse Oximeters

Sabrina Sy November 7, 2022

An FDA Anesthesiology and Respiratory Therapy Devices advisory panel met this week to discuss racial and skin-pigmentation bias in pulse oximeter devices. This comes in the wake of research demonstrating that inaccurate blood oxygen readings may have contributed to the greater number of Covid-19 deaths in minority patients compared to white patients.

Fall 2022 Weekly News Profile

War and Progress: The Invasion of Ukraine and Its Impact on Renewable Energy

Jennah Saqib October 31, 2022

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has led to an energy crisis in much of the world. As a result, Western leaders are pushing for increased interest and investment in renewable energy. This introduces an ethical dilemma of the impacts of war on technological progress, and what it says about humanity that such motivations are required for change to be made.