Rmpp Unit 1
Published:
Learning Outcomes Achieved
- Appraise the professional, legal, social, cultural and ethical issues that affect computing professionals
- Appraise the principles of academic investigation, applying them to a research topic in the applicable computing field
Reasoning Quiz
The quiz was useful- it helped me fully understand the concepts of inductive and deductive reasoning. The concepts made sense when reading them, but when completing the quiz questions, I couldn’t tell the difference between an idea and an observation- sometimes they appeared to be the same thing. I found another resource which stated that the aim of inductive reasoning is to reach a general conclusion or theory (Scribbr, 2022), and this resolved my confusion. As I understand it, “general” in this context means that the conclusion cannot be fully proven based on the initial assertions. A good example of why this definition is important is because of this example in the worksheet:
Since all squares are rectangles, and all rectangles have four sides, so all squares have four sides.
This is deductive reasoning- the conclusion can hold for all squares. However,
All cars in this town drive on the right side of the street. Therefore, all cars in all towns drive on the right side of the street.
is inductive, because the conclusion can’t hold true for all towns- the inital assertion is only for one town.
The key difference, as I understand it, is that when your conclusion is broader in scope than your initial statement, then your reasoning is inductive. When your conclusion is the same or narrower in scope than your initial assertion, then your reasoning is deductive.
By completing this activity, I achieved learning outcome 2, because I have learned about academic reasoning tools. This will help me shape my literature review- literature reviews can be inductive, deductive, or a mix of both (Bandara et al., 2015), meaning that I could make general observations, or validate existing theories based on what I find. This gives some much needed direction.
Collaborative Discussion 1
This week, a discussion was started on how ACM (and BCS) ethical computing principles would be applied to some hypothetical scenarios. Legislation also had to be taken into account in this discussion. My discussion focused on a scenario which involved the use of malicious techniques for ethical reasons. It was interesting to see that existing law is being updated to cater for such scenarios- discussions are ongoing and its entirely possible to have a say in the matter as a result. I feel that this made me take the writing of the topic more seriously- being a software engineer that is trying to climb the career ladder, I need to understand these issues and steer discussions on the topic. This is something that I’ll likely discuss and encounter in my working life, and this post helped me to prepare for it.
By completing this activity, I achieved learning outcome 1, because I learned how to use different perspectives (legislative and ethical ones) to critically analyse (and navigate) an issue that affects those in the field of computing.
Artefacts
References
Bandara, W., Furtmueller, E., Gorbacheva, E., Miskon, S., & Beekhuyzen, J. (2015) Achieving Rigor in Literature Reviews: Insights from Qualitative Data Analysis and Tool-Support. Communications of the Association for Information Systems 34: 154-204. DOI: https://doi.org/10.17705/1CAIS.03708 Scribbr. (2022) Inductive vs Deductive Reasoning | Difference & Examples. Available from: https://www.scribbr.co.uk/research-methods/inductive-vs-deductive-reasoning/ [Accessed 18 June 2022].