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ECE 5864 - Critical Engineering Approaches to Innovative and Emerging Technologies

Course Description

  • Complex sociotechnical systems and unintended consequences
  •  Engineering profession and society 
  • Frameworks for critical engineering practice
  • Spread of innovative ideas
  • Risk, precaution, and innovation constraints
  • Definitions, mechanisms, and case studies of the governance of existing technologies, such as cybersecurity, Internet, and information technology
  • Characteristics and examples of emerging technologies
  • Emerging technology governance frameworks and tools
  • Hype, expectations, and technology assessment
  • Governance case studies of specific emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, quantum computing, autonomous vehicles, and neurotechnology
  • Technologies of democracy and public interest technologies
  • Governing technology into the future.

Master of Information Technology (MIT) students only.

Why take this course?

Any engineering and business professional developing innovative and emerging technologies should understand the issues unique to those technologies as well as be able to critically evaluate and apply appropriate governance mechanisms when warranted. Emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, quantum computing, and neurotechnology, due to their very nature of being incomplete and under development, have the potential for far reaching societal benefits as well as unintended and severe negative consequences.

Engineers and business leaders should balance constraints of risk, precaution, and innovation while developing technologies with such uncertain characteristics and potentials, yet traditional engineering education lacks awareness of the potential impacts of engineering designs in and on society and the world. Moreover, needed governance interventions to mitigate risk and societal harms are more easily and economically done during a technology's upstream development rather than after the downstream implementation and release into society. Thus, this course is meant to fill those knowledge and skill gaps in engineering and business students.

Learning Objectives

  • Examine complex sociotechnical systems, unintended consequences, and their impacts on society
  • Analyze the strengths and limitations of the engineering profession in identifying and solving problems in the world
  • Distinguish modern frameworks for engineering practice
  • Evaluate technology development constraints of risk, precaution, and innovation
  • Compare governance mechanisms of already existing technologies
  • Distinguish properties of emerging technologies
  • Examine expectations of emerging technologies and methods of technology assessment
  • Evaluate emerging technology governance frameworks and tools
  • Analyze governance case studies of specific emerging technologies
  • Develop perspectives for technologies of democracy, public interest technologies, and governing technology into the future