Please with only a brief response to each.

Respond to Peers:Review each classmate's posts and respond to each response, provide comments on your classmate's topic idea, and ask a question that prompts your classmate to think more critically about how to explore the research topic in more detail.

(Peer 1) Brenda Walker

Globalization, the integration of economies around the world including trade, production, and financial flows (Bhargava, 2006), has both positive and negative implications. For example, if a U.S. based company decided to move their manufacturing to a foreign country. Some positive implications would be saving the company costs, improving profitability, growing job opportunities and income for the new country, and lower prices to the consumer. Some negative implications would be loss of jobs available to those who are laid off from the US plant, pollution in the foreign country that does not have environmental standards, and low wages or poor working conditions to the foreign workers.

The growth of artificial intelligence or AI raises concerns over ethical issues such as loss of jobs to automation, wealth inequalities, and protecting from rogue machines (Bossmann, 2016). Since we are still figuring out how extensive the intelligence could artificially grow to, there are endless ethical issues that could be realized. A machine that behaves and learns like a human may be far more concerning than simply taking jobs away from humans, they might have the capability of lying, cheating, stealing, or even killing.

Instituting ethical practices for the use of AI will be the responsibility of the developers, companies who use the technology, and individuals themselves. Jobs that were once lost to foreign countries, might be lost to AI technology which could lead to more harm than good. It will be up to the companies to decide how much they utilize AI in replacement of humans. As we have seen with consumer data protection, companies will have to disclose how they will use consumer information and provide protection of private information such as bank accounts. Lastly, it will be up to everyone to educate themselves on how to protect their data from potential exploitation.

Artificial Intelligence is the new frontier that offers endless possibilities but will require all to consider how its usage will keep to ethical standards. As the systems become more complex, we will have to keep up to make sure they do not get out of control.

(Peer 2) Trever Snyder

Hello classmates,

Explain the implications of globalization. Much of the debate regarding globalization rests in the ethical prism through which an action or circumstance is engaged. Whether subscribed to the categorical imperative, utilitarianism, or relativism ethics theorems, influences from the normative environment shape the lens used to dictate action and offer perspectives (Anis, 2013). Globalization has opponents and advocates based on observations from antecedents and consequences. Proponents cite the free-flowing transference of ideas, capital, culture, and technology. Additionally, advocates claim that the compression of the world through globalization is increasing production efficiency, ultimately benefiting the consumer. Conversely, opponents cite the attack on employment opportunities from companies offshoring to cheap labor markets, the propagation of unjust working conditions in developing countries, and the impacts associated with manufacturing facilities operating in countries with lower environmental standards.

Identify at least two ethical issues that go along with the global societal topic you have chosen for your final essay. Explain how globalization contributes to or affects these ethical dilemmas. For my chosen topic of international drug trafficking, the implications of globalization are illustrated through several ethical concerns, two of which are identified below.

1. Increased corruption: Globalization stresses lowering barriers to entry for economic growth. International drug traffickers operate with the same tenacity and structure as a multinational enterprise, with infrastructure, logistics, and financing established under the guise of a legitimate business. These organizations possess vast supplies of untraceable cash used to influence dock workers, political figures, and law enforcement, creating pathways across international borders and continuing the distribution pipelines. As more boundaries lower, increases in goods passing through will continue to flood the market and include an unhealthy number of illegal drugs.
2. Cultural diversity conflict: Referencing the normative environment again identifies the clash of cultures conflict as an ethical issue. For some regions in the Golden Crescent, poppy growth is an essential income stream for some farmers. The growers know what the product is grown for and willfully do so to provide for their families. In some economically challenged regions, drug trafficking provides employment where little can be found. It raises the moral dilemma often used in academic settings: If a person steals a loaf of bread to feed their family, is it wrong to have done it? For some parts of the world, drug trafficking is the normative environment and will be defended vehemently, if not violently, to be preserved.

Propose financially, socially, and culturally feasible solutions to these ethical dilemmas. Solutions to the international drug trade are challenging. The established culture of violence and shadow realm operations make eradicating this nearly impossible. However, through increased efforts in education and societal support, it may become harder to recruit the labor necessary to sustain the trade. Empowering developing generations to think freely and escape the influence of these organizations removes the seductive and often forceful entry into the business.