2023 Interdisciplinary Ethics Competition
The Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative Collegiate Program at Colorado Law's seventh annual Interdisciplinary Ethics Tech Competition was held on February 4, 2023. Eight teams comprised of students from a range of academic disciplines collaborated to form a hypothetical task force testifying before a Congressional Committee to provide recommendations on how - if at all - the U.S. government should regulate deep fakes. They sought to answer the question:
As viewers can no longer tell the difference between real and faked content, how do we draw the line to harness the beneficial aspects of this technology while protecting against harm?
The top three teams won scholarship awards of $10,000, $4,000 and $2,000, respectively.
The three highest-scoring teams were as follows:
- 1st Place: Shayan Abtahi (Law), Lucia Jayne (Computer Science), Yamineesh Kanaparthy (Business Analytics) and Sarah Sorenson (Law)
- 2nd Place: Mariah Bowman (Law), Sean Harms (Law), Conor Rowan (Aerospace Engineering) and Britt Wirth (Law)
- 3rd Place: Xelef Botan (Law), Kailey Lauter (Law), Kylie Hunter (Engineering/Technology Cybersecurity and Policy) and Colton Marschik (Business)
The Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative Collegiate Program at Colorado Law is a partnership that allows us to make ethics a central part of every law student's education. Held annually, the Interdisciplinary Ethics Tech Competition gives students a chance to wrestle with a real-world ethics problem in collaboration with a diverse team of students studying law, business, communication, journalism, engineering, ITP, information science, or computer science. Past case problems have featured a tech company grappling with ethical obligations related to its facial expression recognition product, and an online platform's efforts to address the challenges presented by "fake news."
The competition provides students with the unique opportunity to work as part of an interdisciplinary team on a problem involving ethical, legal, business, technology, and privacy issues similar to what they are likely to encounter after graduation. This hands-on learning experience prepares students to collaborate effectively across disciplines in their careers, and positions students to be ethical members of business management teams.