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Category Archives: surveillance
Ineffective but Accurate
Philosopher Jeremy Bentham introduced a design he called a panopticon (“all seeing”) to be used in prisons or institutions such that all inmates can be watched by a single guard. Although there aren’t any structures of this model in existence, the concept can be viewed as a symbol for modern government surveillance. Benjamin Walker argues […] Continue reading
Posted in behavior, Panopticon, Student Posts, surveillance
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The Panopticon as a Faulty Metaphor
Philosopher Jeremy Bentham came up with the idea of the Panopticon: a prison where a guard is located in a tower. He can see all the prisoners, but the prisoners can not see him. In addition, the prisoners are not aware if they are being watched or not. As a result, prisoners act on their […] Continue reading
Posted in Panopticon, podcast, Student Posts, surveillance
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We Don’t Care That We’re Being Watched
The principle problem of the Panopticon metaphor is rooted in Bentham’s original purpose for the structure: behavioral modification. As Walker puts it, Bentham believed that the mere act of being being watched constantly would alter a person’s behavior, adding a layer of accountability and therefore pushing the person in question towards a more moral or […] Continue reading
Posted in Jeremy Bentham, Panopticon, Student Posts, surveillance
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Too Many Eyes to Fit in the Panopticon’s Tower
I would agree with Walker’s claim that the Panopticon is not an accurate metaphor for the average human’s interaction with surveillance today. While it could be argued that the government does watch over us and large corporations do silently collect our data, most people are not aware of this and thus it does not enact […] Continue reading
Posted in Benjamen Walker, Panopticon, Student Posts, surveillance
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The Walls Are Very Porous
Jeremy Bentham’s great theory was the Panopticon: a hypothetical prison design in which all inmates could be seen and observed by those in charge, but the inmates themselves could not see the observers, nor could they see any other inmates. It’s an interesting concept to think about in theory, but it is not useful as […] Continue reading
Posted in Jeremy Bentham, Panopticon, Student Posts, surveillance
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We Live in a Panopticon, Here’s Why
The concept of the panopticon in a practical sense seems inefficient, as the whole idea of it builds of the power on the individuality of the worker. The idea that without collaboration, there is no workplace interference that would slow workers down. In principle, leading to increased productivity. However without workers collaborating on projects and […] Continue reading
Posted in Panopticon, podcast, Student Posts, surveillance
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Power of a Test
After the terrorist attack on San Francisco, the Department of Homeland Security ramps up security and surveillance in hopes of catching the people responsible, but instead only manage to inconvenience, detain, and even seriously harm innocent civilians. Marcus explains that the problem with the DHS system is that they’re looking for something too rare in […] Continue reading
Posted in little brother, security, Student Posts, surveillance
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Misleading Statistics
An interesting pint Cory Doctorow brought up in his novel, Little Brother, is the idea of the “false positive.” He writes, “Say you have a new disease, called SuperAIDS. Only one in a million people gets SuperAIDS. You develop a test for SuperAIDS that’s 99 percent accurate… You give the test to a million people. One […] Continue reading
Posted in Big Brother, statistics, Student Posts, surveillance
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Surveillance = Dehumanization
One of the topics most widely discussed throughout Little Brother by Cory Doctorow is government surveillance. Was it justifiable for the DHS to track the citizens of San Francisco’s every move in the name of national security? An instance where this ethical dilemma came into question occurred on pages 136-138, when Marcus and his father […] Continue reading
Posted in Data, dehumanization, little brother, Student Posts, surveillance
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Hindsight is 20/20
In his essay “Mining Student Data Could Save Lives”, Morris suggests that by analyzing students digital activities, we could catch the oft-ignored signs of a future attack and take action before any lives are lost. At first glance, this seems like a perfect method to deter violence on campus. Sure, the students privacy is somewhat […] Continue reading
Posted in data mining, privacy, Student Posts, surveillance
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