The aim of technology ethics is to contribute to better technology for a better world. This certainly involves reflecting on existing technologies, but the focus often is on new and emerging technologies – both because these are often more malleable, and because they can disrupt existing practical routines and, in doing so, create ethical questions. Not only these technologies themselves, but certainly also their impacts, are largely in the future. Like technology design and development, technology ethics cannot avoid being to some extent speculative. The way to avoid empty speculation is by grounding expectations on what we learned from previous technology-society interactions. One major lesson is that technologies not only have ‘hard’ impacts, but also ‘soft’ impacts: changes in how people relate to the natural world, to other people, and even to themselves. One particularly interesting type of soft impact, and one that is often overlooked, is that technologies can disrupt prevalent morality. In my presentation I will explore the distinction between hard and soft impacts and draw attention to some mechanisms of TechnoMoral Change that allow us to imagine how a new technology may disrupt and change existing ideas about right and wrong, good and bad.

Prof.Tsj. Swierstra is professor of philosophy at the Faculty of Arts and Social Science, Maastricht University.