RSA Oceania presents "Ethics in Action", hosted by CoLabs

RSA Oceania presents "Ethics in Action", a free monthly workshop series hosted by CoLabs. Learn practical, hands-on tools and approaches for applying ethics in everyday situations with sociotechnological ethicist, Nathan (Nate) Kinch.

Events details:

Given the deeply problematic trajectory humanity is on, ethics (the process through which we make decisions about what is most 'good' and 'right' to do) ought to be more important than ever. Unfortunately, there is often a huge gap between organisation's values (or ethical principles) and the way they operate. This is referred to as the ethical intention to action gap.
To help close this gap, and hopefully support humanity to transition to more preferable futures, RSA Oceania is teaming up with Colabs and Nathan (Nate) Kinch to bring you a practical, monthly workshop that will help you with easily implementable tools and approaches for practicing ethics.
To start with, Nate will guide you through a Principles Alignment Session. In this session, we will explore questions like:

Is my work:

• Net beneficial (utilitarian approach)
• Respecting of people’s rights and freedoms (rights approach)
• Equity enhancing (justice approach)
• In service of the common good (common good approach), and
• Leading me to act as the sort of person I would most like to be (virtue approach)
• Caring, responsible and relationally enriching?
  

Nate will show you how to use this type of approach in any organisational setting and also how to implement it in a rapid, real-time manner, which can be helpful for decisions that need to be made under stress and strict time constraints
Following this, Nate will guide you through a systems-informed approach to Consequence Scanning. In this approach you will learn how to:

• Map possible consequences along a spectrum (from most negative to most positive)
• Tag each consequence with intended or unintended, as well as the order of the effect (1st, 2nd, 3rd or nth)
• Add qualitative information to support the mapping, such as who might benefit or suffer most
• Describe tactics that can help you mitigate the 'negative' consequences' and increase the likelihood of the 'positive' ones
  

Taken together, these approaches can support more coherent, coordinated efforts towards doing real good out in the world. And, if done consistently, there's a chance that these approaches can support the organisations we work for and rely on in closing the ethical intent to action gap.

We can't wait to see you there!

About the facilitator

Nathan (Nate) Kinch is a sociotechnology ethicist, organisational designer and action researcher. His work centres around the question; how might we best design trustworthy organisations, technologies and 'systems' that contribute to a healthy and dignified life for all, within planetary boundaries? To do this he draws on many branches of philosophy, systems science, the cognitive sciences and related disciplines.

Throughout his career Nate has worked with organisations like CSIRO, The Australian Government, The UK Government, Microsoft, Facebook’s TTC Labs, Autodesk, The Ethics Centre, Visa, Telefonica, and TELUS.

Currently he is the Ethicist in Residence at CoLabs, as well as a guest lecturer for institutions such as Monash University, University of Melbourne, Arizona State University and the University of Wollongong.

He’s also an urban rewilder and community convener, bringing regenerative thinking, practice and culture into the heart of his little corner of Melbourne.
Listen to Nate on .

If you have any questions about this event, please get in touch with RSA Oceania Director, Philipa Duthie at [email protected].

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Host or Publisher RSA Oceania