Postgraduate Module Descriptor


PHLM011: Data Governance and Ethics

This module descriptor refers to the 2021/2 academic year.

Indicative Reading List

This reading list is indicative - i.e. it provides an idea of texts that may be useful to you on this module, but it is not considered to be a confirmed or compulsory reading list for this module.

Chris Anderson, “The end of theory: The data deluge makes the scientific method obsolete,” Wired, 23 June 2008, http://archive.wired.com/science/discoveries/magazine/16-07/pb_theory

David Beer, Metric Power. 2016.

Paul N. Edwards, A vast machine: Computer models, climate data, and the politics of global warming (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2010).

Paul N. Edwards, Matthew S. Mayernik, Archer L. Batcheller, Geoffrey C. Bowker, and Christine L.

Borgman, “Science friction: Data, metadata, and collaboration,” Social studies of science 41 (2011): 667-690. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0306312711413314

Ford, Martin. 2018. Architects of Intelligence: The Truth about AI and the People Building It.

Julia Lane, Victoria Stodden, Stefan Bender, and Helen Nissenbaum, ed., Privacy, big data, and the public good: Frameworks for engagement. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014

Mittlestadt, B.D. and Floridi, L. (eds.) 2016. The Ethics of Biomedical Big Data. Springer.

Joanne Yates, Structuring the information age: Life insurance and technology in the twentieth century (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008).

Leonelli, S. (2017) Biomedical Knowledge Production in the Age of Big Data. Report for the Swiss Science and Innovation Council, published online November 2017: http://www.swir.ch/images/stories/pdf/en/Exploratory_study_2_2017_Big_Data_SSIC_EN.pdf

Science International (2015). Big Data in an Open Data World. https://www.icsu.org/publications/open-data-in-a-big-data-world

Vayena, Effy, and John Tasioulas. 2016. “The Dynamics of Big Data and Human Rights: The Case of Scientific Research.” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences 374 (2083): 20160129. doi:10.1098/rsta.2016.0129.

Zook, Matthew, Solon Barocas, danah boyd, Kate Crawford, Emily Keller, Seeta Peña Gangadharan, Alyssa Goodman, et al. 2017. “Ten Simple Rules for Responsible Big Data Research.” PLOS Computational Biology 13 (3): e1005399. doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.1005399.

Borgman, Christine L. 2015. Big Data, Little Data, No Data. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press

Leonelli, S. (2016) Data-centric Biology: A Philosophical Study. Chicago University Press.

Gitelman, L. 2013. “Raw data” is an Oximoron. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Hey, T., Tansley, S., & Tolle, K. 2009. The fourth paradigm: Data-intensive scientific discovery. Redmond, WA: Microsoft Research.

Marr, B. 2015. Big Data: Using smart big data, analytics and metrics to take better decisions and improve performance.  John Wiley & Sons.

Mayer-Schönberger, V., & Cukier, K. 2013. Big data: A revolution that will transform how we live, work, and think. New York: Eamon Dolan/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Floridi L. 2014 The fourth revolution: how the infosphere is reshaping human reality. Oxford, UK:

Eubanks, Virginia. 2018. Automating Inequality: How High-Tech Tools Profile, Police and Punish the Poor.

O’Neill, C. 2016. Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy.

Julia Lane, Victoria Stodden, Stefan Bender, and Helen Nissenbaum, ed., Privacy, big data, and the public good: Frameworks for engagement. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014

Ebeling, Mary F.E. 2016. Healthcare and Big Data: Digital Specters and Phantom Objects.

Leonelli, S. (2016) Locating Ethics in Data Science: Responsibility and Accountability in Global and Distributed Knowledge Production. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society: Part A. 374: 20160122.  http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsta.2016.0122

Levin, N. and Leonelli, S. (2016) How Does One “Open” Science? Questions of Value in Biological Research. Science, Technology and Human Values 42 (2): 280-305. DOI: 10.1177/0162243916672071

Viktor Mayer-Schönberger and Kenneth Cukier, Big data (New York: Houghton-Mifflin, 2013).

Leonelli, S. (2014) What Difference Does Quantity Make? On the Epistemology of Big Data in Biology. Big Data and Society 1: 1-11. http://bds.sagepub.com/content/spbds/1/1/2053951714534395.full.pdf

O’Neill and Shutt. 2017. Doing Data Science.

Harris, A., Kelly, S., Wyatt, S., 2016. CyberGenetics. Routledge, London.

Gina Neff, Venture labor: Work and the burden of risk in innovative industries (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2012)

Srnicek, Nick. 2016. Platform Capitalism.

Thrift, Nigel. 2014. Knowing Capitalism. SAGE.

Zuboff, S. 2017. The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for the Future at the New Frontier of Power.