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Computer Ethics (3rd Edition)
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Author: Deborah G. Johnson
List Price: $37.33
Our Price: Click to see the latest and low price
ISBN: 0130836990
Publisher: Prentice Hall (15 December, 2000)
Edition: Paperback
Sales Rank: 97,806
Average Customer Rating: 3.38 out of 5
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Customer ReviewsRating: 1 out of 5
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This book is painful to read. The writing is clear, but it is so boring and repetitive that I can barely bring myself to pick it up. It seems like a majority of the time she rambles on about issues that aren't even specific to technology, and are, as another reader suggested, common sense. Unfortunately I have to read this book, since I am yet another CS major taking a required course in ethics related to technology. The subject isn't bad, the book is.
Rating: 4 out of 5
Insightful, but expensive!
There aren't a whole lot of books on computer ethics yet, and this is one of the better ones. It's definitely a topic of study that needs more focus in today's world, and if you're interested at all, this is the text to pick up. Johnson does a good job of explaining philosophical theory (no surprise, as she is a philosophy professor) and analyzes many interesting case examples. If you intend to be a computer professional someday, it could be useful to know what you might be getting yourself into. This book will give you some food for thought in the ethics of cutting-edge technology. It is quite well organized and not boring, which is better than I can say for about 95% of the textbooks I've had to read. Johnson takes a strong position on some points of debate that could actually go either way, so you might not always agree with her, but she does provide good reasoning to back up the claims. The big downside of this book is its price- it's ridiculous. This is a short paperback with an intimidatingly small typeset, and no illustrations of any sort. I really don't see why it has to cost so much. Someone is certainly making a killing off it! Is that ethical?
Rating: 2 out of 5
Repetitive, Not for Techies
As another student who was made to read this book for a university, I also found the text to quite repetitive. The points the author is making is spread over 10 pages or more, which makes it hard to focus on the substantive parts. This book is better suited for a philosophy major interested in technology, not a computer scientist interested in philosophy. The book tends to get "muddled" itself by introducing broad topics relating to technology which lead to seemingly off-topic tangents. Much of this book isn't noticably insightful either, falling under the "common sense" category of philosophical reasoning. The writing is clear, I'll give the author that, but by the end, you felt like you took this extremely long journey without getting anywhere. Seek enlightenment elsewhere.
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