in this issue we offer several viewpoints on the new College of Computing(below, page 6, page 9); an update on current campus construction (page 10); and commentary on MIT’s new web portal (page 14).

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MassachusettsInstitute ofTechnology

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Ethical Obligationsof Universities inTheir TransnationalEngagements

From The Faculty ChairThe MIT Stephen A.Schwarzman Collegeof Computing

continued on page 13

T H E M U R D E R O F J O U R N A L I S T

Jamal Khashoggi by agents of the Saudiruling family, as well as the role of theSaudi Arabian military in the loss of civil-ian life from their campaign againstYemeni groups, have been widelyreported. This has called attention to theMIT administration’s meetings and agree-ments made last spring with Mohammedbin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince,Deputy Prime Minister and Minister ofDefense, and now the de facto head of theSaudi state as well as Saudi entities such asAramco. Bin Salman launched the cam-paign in Yemen that has resulted in thedeath of tens of thousands from starva-tion, cholera, and collateral damage fromindiscriminate aerial bombing (New YorkTimes, 28 August, 2018). Even before these events we expressedgrave concern over MIT shoring up one

EditorialMIT Entanglementwith Saudi MonarchyRequires IndependentEvaluation

continued on page 3

Open Space Kendall Square (p. 10)

Susan S. Silbey

I N LIG HT OF TH E APPAR E NT savagemurder of Jamal Khashoggi, PresidentRafael Reif has called for a reassessmentof MIT’s engagement with Saudi Arabia.This is a highly welcome effort, and onethat echoes similar assessments beingconducted by many governments andleading businesses, with many concludingthat they will no longer engage with SaudiArabia as long as the current regime is inpower and there is no serious attempt toensure accountability. However, it did not have to take thegruesome murder of a journalist for thesereassessments to happen. Credible evi-dence of a growing crackdown againstdomestic dissidents and of war crimes inYemen committed by Saudi forces – withU.S. assistance – was publicly available,for example. Is it morally defensible for aprincipled university to engage with a

Balakrishnan Rajagopal

O N O CTO B E R 1 5 , 2 0 1 8 , MITannounced a gift from Stephen A.Schwarzman to create a college of com-puting. Eleven months earlier, inNovember 2017, President Rafael Reifbegan discussing with the faculty officersthe possibility and prospects for a Schoolof computing. He sought our adviceabout how the proposal from somemembers of the computer science facultymight be explored with the faculty atlarge. We recommended extensive con-versations across the Institute to gatherthe faculty’s collective wisdom and heartheir worries. In my role as Chair of the Faculty, Iaccompanied Rafael, Provost MartinSchmidt, and Engineering Dean AnanthaChandrakasan during the spring semester2018 to meetings with all School councilsand several large departments. I also

The discussion in the article and the Editorial (below), on MIT’s relationship withthe Saudi Monarchy, will be continued at a forum on Thursday, December 6:“Evaluating the Relationship Between MIT and the Saudi Monarchy," from 5:00 - 6:30 pm in Room 1-190.

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Vol. XXXI No. 2 November/December 2018

Aron BernsteinPhysics

Robert BerwickElectrical Engineering & Computer Science

Manduhai BuyandelgerAnthropology

*Nazli ChoucriPolitical Science

Christopher CumminsChemistry

Woodie FlowersMechanical Engineering

Ernst G. FrankelMechanical Engineering

*Jonathan King (Chair) Biology

Helen Elaine LeeWriting and Humanistic Studies

Seth LloydMechanical Engineering

Fred MoavenzadehCivil & Environmental Engineering/Engineering Systems

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Patrick Henry WinstonElectrical Engineering & Computer Science

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From The 01 The MIT Stephen A. Schwarzman Faculty Chair College of Computing Susan S. Silbey 01 Ethical Obligations of Universities in Their Transnational Engagements Balakrishnan Rajagopal

Editorial 01 MIT Entanglement with Saudi Monarchy Requires Independent Evaluation

06 Ethics and the Liberal Arts in the Schwarzman College of Computing Bernhardt L. Trout

09 MIC Haynes Miller

10 Update on Construction Across Campus Krystyn J. Van Vliet, Anthony P. Sharon

14 Lamenting MIT’s New Web Portal Eduardo Kausel, Philip M. Gschwend, John R. Williams

Letters 16 On The Transition to Retirement Thomas W. Eagar Letters 16 Hypothesizing About Stephen Hawking Ian Crossfield

Letters 16 Questioning the New MIT Website Arijit Mukherjee

17 Faculty Policy Committee

18 Committee on the Undergraduate Program

19 Committee on Campus Planning

M.I.T. Numbers 20 Most Popular Undergraduate Majors 2005-2018

contentsThe MIT FacultyNewsletterEditorial Board

Rendering/map credit: Page1: Courtesy byencore; Page 10: MIT Department of Facilities; Page 11: Perkins+Will;

Page 12: Elkus Manfredi Architects | Landworks Studio.

MIT Faculty NewsletterNovember/December 2018

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of the world’s last absolute monarchies, witha track record of suppression of rights ofwomen, human rights activists, and reli-gious minorities, as well as propagating anobscurantist and militant interpretation ofIslam (“MIT Should Not Be Supporting theSaud Monarchy,” MIT Faculty Newsletter,Vol. XXX No. 4, March/April 2018). Theethical and human rights implications ofsuch partnerships with Saudi Arabia andothers are explored in the article in this issueby Balakrishnan Rajagopal (page 1). Associate Provost Richard Lester hasreported that MIT will investigate theseagreements, certainly a necessary step,which should have been taken before theagreements were made. However, having acommittee constituted by the administra-tion, to investigate the administration’sactions, is clearly not adequate. We need acommittee that is independent of theadministration. Unfortunately, MIT has nofaculty senate or related governance body,and all standing committees are joint com-mittees of the faculty and administration. The agreements with bin Salman werenot broadly shared with faculty, and pro-ceeded without prior faculty input on suchinternational cooperation. MIT has anInternational Advisory Committee,(appointed by the President), which con-tributed to organized discussions of theRussian and Singapore initiatives beforethey were finalized. No open faculty engage-ment took place prior to the spring meetingswith Mohammed bin Salman. We suggest that the Secretary of theFaculty ask the faculty members of theFaculty Policy Committee to join with someof the faculty members of the InternationalAdvisory Committee to serve as an ad hoccommittee to investigate and report to thefaculty on the agreements made with binSalman, Saudi Arabian universities, agen-cies, and companies. As the Institute prepares to investigatethe agreements made with Saudi monarchbin Salman, it may be useful to reviewother cases where MIT dealings violatednorms and principles that ought to be heldby academia.

In 1975, MIT and the Nuclear Engin-eering Department arranged with the thenShah of Iran to provide graduate training innuclear engineering for a cadre of more than50 Iranian students sent by the Shah’s gov-ernment, for $1.4 million from the Shah’sgovernment. This was considerably differentfrom the Shah’s government providingfinancial support to students admittedaccording to MIT standards and processes.The issue was intensely debated at facultymeetings and among students, and an adhoc committee was established to look intothe issues raised. Though students votedagainst the program, the vote at a well-attended faculty meeting was in support,and the program went forward. In 1979,when the Shah’s absolutist regime was over-thrown, there were still a dozen Iranian stu-dents in the Nuclear Engineering program. During the apartheid regime in SouthAfrica, a group of MIT faculty, staff, and stu-dents formed the Coalition AgainstApartheid, calling for the divestment of theInstitute’s endowment investments in corpo-rations that did business with the brutalapartheid government. The energetic effort,including building a model shanty town onthe campus, was part of a national divest-ment campaign. Numerous other collegesand universities had divested, as well as statesand municipalities. President Paul Gray wasat the helm and steadfastly resisted thedivestment call, laying out the Corporation’sposition in an open letter (April 3, 1990).The decision, though debated in facultymeetings, was not referred to any committeeor group of the faculty, but was maintainedunder Corporation auspices. With the fall ofthe apartheid government in the early 1990sand election of Nelson Mandela in 1994, theissue became moot. In 1994, Prof. Nancy Hopkins organizedan ad hoc group of senior women who begandocumenting inequities in the treatment ofwomen faculty. As the evidence mounted,they were able to win the establishment of aformal Commission on the Status of Women,with the support of President Charles Vestand Dean Bob Birgenau. The report by theCommission was published in a special issueof this Faculty Newsletter, documenting thestructural inequities in the treatment of maleand female faculty. This led to significant

improvements in administration policiesresulting in increased equity between maleand female faculty. The report remains valu-able today. These past incidents show the wayforward but also caution us about the newchallenges in forming partnerships and col-laborations with increasingly authoritarian,violent, and opaque governments and enti-ties around the world. The track record ofMIT’s response to criticism of deals andcooperation agreements that ignored ethicaland human rights issues is spotty at best. Letus hope that the planned investigation,analysis, and evaluation of the agreementsreached with Mohammed bin Salman andhis regime, and other entities, as well as thesubsequent action taken will not be of theband-aid character, but will take the humanrights and ethical questions seriously and setdirections for future MIT engagements. For those interested in the issues raisedby the MIT/Saudi Monarchy connection,the discussions in this Newsletter as well as inThe Tech will be continued at a FacultyNewsletter Forum: "Evaluating theRelationship Between MIT and the SaudiMonarchy," on Thursday, December 6, from5:00 - 6:30 pm in Room 1-190. Panelistsinclude Sarah Leah Whitson of HumanRights Watch, MIT graduate students, MITFaculty Sally Haslanger and Jonathan King,and Tufts Prof. Sheldon Krimsky, hopefullyjoined by a representative of the MITadministration.

College of ComputingThe Institute recently announced the estab-lishment of the MIT Stephen A.Schwarzman College of Computing. The“College” aspect of this initiative implies asignificant change in the relations of the dif-ferent disciplines represented at MIT witheach other. Three articles in this issue, bySusan Silbey (page 1), Bernhardt Trout (page 6), and Haynes Miller (page 9), addressimportant aspects of the new College. We need to ensure that the College’sorganizational structure is such that it willreflect its mission and lift up all of MIT,rather than generating divisions and build-ing new walls.

Editorial Subcommittee

MIT Entanglement with Saudi Monarchycontinued from page 1

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joined conversations in Rafael’s officewith several department heads andprogram directors. The MIT SchwarzmanCollege of Computing has now beencreated; it has not yet been designed. A vision for the College evolved overthe course of these conversations. Mostimportantly, faculty beyond EECS wantedany new structure to be porous withunfettered collaborations across itsboundaries, so that faculty using the com-putational methods which have becomecommonplace within most disciplineswould be in more regular conversationwith the computer science facultyenabling adoption, and adaptation, ofnew methods. Equally, faculty across theInstitute wanted to engage computer sci-entists on the substantive disciplinaryproblems appropriate for computer ana-lytics, as has been the case, for example, incomputational biology. In addition,faculty across several departments offeredto share the burden of teaching somebasic courses in areas that involve com-puting and computational methods. Thesignificant increase in undergraduateenrollments in these courses are stretchingand diluting existing resources for makingfundamental advances at the frontiers ofcomputer science. Faculty consistentlysaid that, whatever was proposed, the planshould permit more flexible collabora-tions for teaching, degrees, and researchwhile providing increased manpower andmaterial resources. This semester, I have been accompany-ing Marty and Anantha on another tour ofSchool councils, departments, and labs asthey have been presenting a vision for theCollege, again seeking feedback and sug-gestions on how to enact this bold andchallenging concept of a new college forMIT. The Provost’s presentation ispresently a sketch of what might be put inplace after further consultation and design. The task before us now – to developand propose designs for the College – isdaunting because the College is envi-sioned to have the status of a School,

similar to the current five MIT Schools,but with a broader mandate: to be thenexus actively connecting across theInstitute those who advance computerscience, those who use computationaltools in specific subject fields, and thosewho observe, analyze, and write aboutdigital worlds. There are certainly observable tensionspulling and pushing the vision of theCollege in competing directions. Some

expect the College to be a bigger andbetter extension of the existingDepartment of Electrical Engineering andComputer Science with auxiliary researchlabs and centers. Others want the Collegeto be a different kind of organizationdevoted not only to advancing computa-tion and computer science but to fullyaccept – by making visible, rather thantacit – the inescapable human preferencesembedded within digital technologies,both the unintended as well as predictableconsequences of these technologies. To hiscredit, the Provost has publicly acknowl-edged these tensions that we must nowembrace and mediate. Facing this daunting mission, I amreminded of Admiral Rickover’s caution-ary advice concerning academic designers,if not specifically about designing aca-demic organizations: “The academic[nuclear reactor] designer is a dilettante. He[sic] has not had to assume any real respon-sibility in connection with his projects. He isfree to luxuriate in elegant ideas, the practicalshortcomings of which can be relegated to thecategory of ‘mere technical details.’ The prac-tical [reactor] designer must live with thesesame technical details. Although recalcitrantand awkward, they must be solved andcannot be put off until tomorrow. Their

solutions require manpower, time andmoney [1953 letter].” There is much that needs to beresearched and decided in a short period oftime if the College is to open in fall 2019,demanding manpower, time, and money.We have not specified what opening lookslike, other than perhaps a web page. Weshould investigate historical and contem-porary examples here and at other univer-sities with respect to, for example,

component units (shall there be depart-ments as well as labs and centers?); rolesand responsibilities (shall a member of thenew College sit on each of the existingSchool councils and in turn members ofthe five Schools sit on a governing councilof the new College?); distribution ofresources (how shall College funds be dis-tributed for computational teaching acrossthe Institute, for support staff, and forhardware?); decision-making processes forfaculty appointments and student degrees(how shall faculty be appointed, evaluated,and promoted if they sit in more than onedepartment or School; what degrees shallbe offered; how shall graduate students beadmitted and funded?). In active collaboration with the facultyofficers and the new Dean, the Provostplans to create a task force comprised ofmultiple working groups to generate rec-ommendations on the design of theSchwarzman College of Computing, aprocess successfully implemented duringthe 2008 financial crisis. Each workinggroup will have a charge designating thecentral topics for its inquiry to culminatein a set of proposals and recommenda-tions. The Provost has already created asearch committee with five School repre-sentation to identify candidates for Dean

The MIT College of ComputingSilbey, from page 1

There are certainly observable tensions pulling andpushing the vision of the College in competingdirections. Some expect the College to be a bigger andbetter extension of the existing Department of ElectricalEngineering and Computer Science with auxiliaryresearch labs and centers. Others want the College tobe a different kind of organization. . . .

MIT Faculty NewsletterNovember/December 2018

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of the new college; a second committeewill interview the identified candidates. We currently expect to stand upworking groups (in canonical MITfashion with representation from the fiveSchools) to consider and address the fol-lowing issues. The particular charges andcompositions are in process:

(1) Organizational structure: to exploreorganizational configurations or structurewith two tracks. One subcommittee willconsider what kind of organization willprovide agility while ensuring stewardshipof key elements such as degrees, graduatestudent supervision and mentoring, facultyhiring and promotion. Should there beproject-centered interdisciplinary labs?How will the internal structural elementsrelate to departments in the other Schools?A second subcommittee will explore thepreferences and expectations of the facultywho will reside within the College.

(2) Faculty appointments: to specificallyconsider how bridge appointments will bestructured, hired, mentored, promoted.What are the categories of appointmentsin the College, and how are these the sameor different from appointments in thecurrent Schools? What are the rights andresponsibilities of faculty appointed inmore than one unit? How are they hired,mentored, promoted? How are transitionsmanaged as faculty may move from oneunit to another within the College and inother Schools? Might we consider someappointments with limited terms?

(3) Landscape of available models: togather intelligence about similar collegesand schools around the nation and globe.What has been tried elsewhere and how isit working? What might we envision asdistinct for MIT?

(4) Social Implications: to explore thesocial implications of computing. TheCollege aspires to integrate thinking,research, and teaching about the socialimplications of computing into every-thing it does, in education and in research.How might this be instituted?

(5) Curriculum and degrees: to conduct acensus of all courses offered on or aboutcomputation. What degrees will beoffered by units in the College? How willthe courses be coordinated within theCollege and with the existing departmentsand Schools?

(6) Computing infrastructure: to identifybest practices with respect to sharingcommon resources. How does the Collegeensure that everyone has access to hard-ware and professional staff?

Clearly, the topics of these workinggroups intersect. The multiple groups willprovide greater opportunity for faculty,staff, and student participation and feed-back than would a smaller set. The chairsof the working groups will meet to coor-dinate and communicate across thegroups and with the new Dean (or ActingDean) and Provost. We expect theworking groups to be in place byDecember 2018 with recommendationsin June 2019, following interim reportsduring the spring semester. From the many conversations overthese two semesters, we have generated aset of questions that seem to represent thecentral concerns and multiple goals wehave heard. In developing proposals andrecommendations, we hope that theworking groups will be guided by theircharge and these questions, which canfunction as a kind of “catechism” for thedesign of the College.

• Will the recommendation facilitate col-laboration and promote integrationacross MIT departments and other unitsin curricular planning and research?

• Will the recommendation acknowledgeand maintain respect for the demon-strated expertise of colleagues with regardto computing arts and sciences?

• Will the recommendation ensure thatfaculty with appointments in morethan one unit have clearly definedresponsibilities that do not impede thenormal progression of an academiccareer?

• Will the recommendation create anunusual burden on any unit, benefit onegroup at expense of others, or disenfran-chise anyone?

• Will the recommendation increase MITcompetitiveness with regard to facultyand student recruiting and retention?

• Will the recommended administrativestructure sustain these principles for fairand appropriate allocation of resources(space and funding), appointments,teaching and related assignments withinthe College and with respect to the fiveMIT Schools?

• Will the recommended design of theCollege incorporate flexibility to accom-modate the possibility that some currenttrends (e.g., in enrollments) might shiftdramatically so that changes will beappropriate?

We are eager to take up this challengeand enthusiastically support the Provost’scommitment that the MIT SchwarzmanCollege of Computing be our next steptoward a better world through moresocially responsible and yet even moreadventuresome computing. We commitourselves to the work of realizing this boldvision.

Susan S. Silbey is Leon and Anne GoldbergProfessor of Humanities, Professor of Sociologyand Anthropology, and Professor of Behavioraland Policy Sciences, and Chair of the Faculty(ssilbey@mit.edu).

The Provost has already created a search committeewith five School representation to identify candidates forDean of the new college. . . .

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Bernhardt L. TroutEthics and the Liberal Arts in theSchwarzman College of Computing

ALL OF CAM PUS I S EXCITE D at theannouncement of the new Stephen A.Schwarzman College of Computing.Everyone is trying to figure out how theymight best participate, and no doubt theadministration is trying to process anoverwhelming barrage of ideas, sugges-tions, critiques, and just plain lobbying. Abillion dollar academic initiative is indeedbold, and the administration should beapplauded for developing it and havingalready raised a good part of the funds. Ofcourse, this scale of investment intoArtificial Intelligence (AI) pales in com-parison to that of Silicon Valley, not tomention to the initiatives of companiesworldwide across just about every sector.In my area, pharmaceuticals, companieshave been implementing AI methods foryears, and our lab has played a small partin AI. Nevertheless, despite the massive effortin AI outside of MIT, given the Institute’stechnical expertise and creativity, we willno doubt figure out how to have a majortechnical impact. However, our seniorleaders have correctly stated that the tech-nical aspects are only a part of the initia-tive for AI. The ethical and societalimplications are intimately linked withthe technical development of AI and needto be addressed hand in hand with thetechnical. Below is a vision of how theethical and societal implications of AIcould be addressed so that we are able toachieve the potential of the SchwarzmanCollege envisioned by Mr. Schwarzmanand MIT’s leaders. As President Reif writes in his October15 announcement, “In this pivotal AImoment, society has never needed the

liberal arts – the path to wise, responsiblecitizenship – more than it does now. It istime to educate a new generation of tech-nologists in the public interest.” In theMIT News article released that day and theaccompanying Q&A, “ethics” and itsderivatives are used 25 times. Key state-ments include, “The College will . . . trans-

form education and research in publicpolicy and ethical considerations relevantto computing and AI.” “The College willequip students and researchers in any dis-cipline to use computing and AI toadvance their disciplines and vice-versa, aswell as to think critically about the humanimpact of their work.” President Reif isalso quoted, “ ‘We must make sure that theleaders we graduate offer the world notonly technological wizardry but alsohuman wisdom – the cultural, ethical, andhistorical consciousness to use technologyfor the common good.’” StephenSchwarzman himself makes it clear thatethics and society are of major concern,“‘The College’s attention to ethics mattersenormously to me, because we will neverrealize the full potential of these advance-ments unless they are guided by a sharedunderstanding of their moral implica-tions for society.’ ” In his announcement ofthe same day, Provost Schmidt writes, “Acentral idea behind the College is that a

new, shared structure can help deliver thepower of computing, and especially AI, toall disciplines at MIT, lead to the develop-ment of new disciplines, and provideevery discipline with an active channel tohelp shape the work of computing itself.” The administration’s focus on inter-twining ethics and policy with technical

advances is laudable. In thinking abouthow to make this vision a reality, we mightwish to consider the following questions:Are disciplines the right way to thinkabout ethics and human wisdom? Canethics be advanced or transformed? Howcan the liberal arts best be the path towise, responsible citizenship? Let’s takethese questions in turn. Understanding the ethical and societalimplications of AI necessitates an under-standing of both the artificial and intelli-gence. Understanding the artificialnecessitates understanding together theartificial and the natural. Understandingintelligence, or what might better bereferred to as mind, necessitates under-standing together mind and material.Furthermore, understanding all of thesemust incorporate the understanding ofhow human beings fit with them. Such anunderstanding both connects and divideseach of these elements. Thus, understand-ing artificial intelligence together with its

Understanding the ethical and societal implications of AInecessitates an understanding of both the artificial andintelligence. Understanding the artificial necessitatesunderstanding together the artificial and the natural.Understanding intelligence, or what might better bereferred to as mind, necessitates understanding togethermind and material.

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connections to ethics and society necessi-tates understanding the whole in whicheach of these parts fit. A reductionistapproach may be convenient for somepurposes, but as one cannot understand ahuman being by studying only the chemi-cal elements that compose that humanbeing, one cannot understand the fullimplications of AI from separating thoseimplications into parts. Achieving the fullpotential of the Schwarzman Collegenecessitates developing an understandingof the whole and therein, the place inwhich AI fits within that whole. Such anunderstanding cannot be gained throughany one discipline, or even through inter-disciplinary studies, which itself presumesthat the whole is divided into disciplineswhich can interact but not be put togetherinto something greater than themselves. Whether or not ethics can be advancedor transformed is questionable. We mustbe careful not to impose the methods thathave been enormously successful inmodern science on realms in which theyare not applicable. Ethics and society maynot be amenable to the modern scientificmethod. Certainly, society has been trans-formed by science, but it is unlikely thathuman nature itself has changed. Thefundamental questions that are innate tohumans as humans have not changed:What is our relationship with nature?What is the best political regime? What isjustice? What is a good human being?What is the best life? Certainly, opinionsregarding the answers to these questionscan be affected by the particulars of agiven society, but there is nothing to indi-cate that society alters or advances theanswers to those questions. Aristotle istaught today both in the School ofEngineering and in our PhilosophyDepartment not for historical or senti-mental reasons, but because of thewisdom he can bring to bear on thesequestions. President Reif makes explicit the con-nection between the liberal arts and civiceducation. This is no doubt an invitation toexplore this connection and also the diver-gence. While it would be a challenge tomake the case that studying Bach,

Botticelli, or Browning makes one a moreresponsible citizen, studying them maymake one a wiser citizen. Perhaps in addi-tion to the liberal arts broadly, we shouldthink about how to educate towards aninformed citizen. This should includeteaching about political institutions andabout the regimes in which they exist, inparticular democracy. Perhaps it would beimportant to include the best analyst ofAmerican democracy, Tocqueville, anauthor with penetrating insight, who at thesame time students find most appealing. A more specific idea to be consideredfor the Schwarzman College, would beincluding our Society, Ethics, andEngineering (SEE) Program, which ishoused in the School of Engineering. Wehave educated over 1000 engineering stu-dents in ethics and engineering and in the

past few years, over 10 percent of eachMIT class. We include in our classes theethical issues behind AI and have devel-oped many bespoke versions of our Ethicsfor Engineers courses to meet the needs ofvarious departments and programs. Sevenof the eight SOE Departments in additionto GEL (Bernard M. Gordon-MITEngineering Leadership Program) havepartnered with us, and these departments(and GEL) together with their studentsseem to love our courses, and as they arenot required, students take them becausethey wish to engage in the material. Alarge part of our success stems from ourcourses viewing both ethics and engineer-ing as part of a larger whole. Not as twoseparate disciplines that are meldedtogether, but as two parts, each of whichpoints both inward to itself and outwardto something greater. In our Ethics for Engineers course, westart with four fundamental theories ofethics (utilitarianism, duty ethics, rights

ethics, and virtue ethics). Our studentsread excerpts from the authors who devel-oped these theories, including Bentham,Kant, Locke, and Aristotle – we think thatthinkers who have stood the test of timeare the best introduction to their own the-ories. We then turn to the political andsocial context in which ethical (and other)decisions are made, with readings inTocqueville and others (includingSutherland, who was highlighted by ourFaculty Chair, Susan Silbey, in her articleon teaching ethics in the previous FacultyNewsletter). We then look at the modernengineering project, with readings fromBacon and others, and we address funda-mental ethical challenges faced by engi-neers in our time, especially inbiotechnology and AI. For each class weread case studies about real situations

faced by real engineers, from the notori-ous Ford memo of the 1970s to the recentVolkswagen scandal, from the seminal1966 Beecher article which led to therequirement of consent in medical studiesto recent ethical quandaries at Google,Facebook, Theranos, and elsewhere. Theenthusiastic student reviews that we havereceived over many years, tell us that weare on the right track in our approach toteaching ethics to future engineers. In the Schwarzman College, we can gomuch deeper. For in order to address wellthe ethical and societal implications of AI,we must think directly about technologywithin the whole. That human endeavorwhich best approaches the study of thewhole is philosophy, the architectonicscience that has rightly been called “thequeen of the sciences.” It would betremendously beneficial if the faculty ofthe Department of Philosophy and those

continued on next page

Whether or not ethics can be advanced or transformedis questionable. We must be careful not to impose themethods that have been enormously successful inmodern science on realms in which they are notapplicable. Ethics and society may not be amenable tothe modern scientific method.

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in diverse disciplines across the Institutecould work together to create a vision forthe future of AI that we could teach ourstudents. My own efforts to achieve this inour grassroots SEE program have notbeen successful, but I hope that the visionfor the Schwarzman College can promotesuch broad thinking and bring togetherscholars from philosophy, science, andengineering to think and teach subjectstogether in ways that have not been possi-ble before. Those who work in AI or related engi-neering and science fields (and all engi-neering and science fields are related toAI, as our leaders argue) need to grapplewith the profound ethical questionsthemselves. Are science and technologyultimately utopian or dystopian, and whatcriteria do we use to decide? Are therethings that we best not do in the name ofscience? How do politics play a role, andhow do we promote a healthy politics thatmaintains freedom while not losing sightof equality and dignity? Without a doubt,those who consider themselves profes-sional ethicists could have a role to play,but the questions ultimately come downto basic human judgements informed byexperience, study, and technical knowl-edge of the subject. Our science and engineering col-leagues, as I have found both through indi-vidual discussions and talks that I havegiven (including one on the ethics of AI),are open to and interested in discussingfoundational issues of ethics. Many ofthem have a mechanistic view of nature,consonant with the Baconian science thatthey pursue, but they are open-mindedenough to realize that the world may belarger than just their opinions. Of course, examining opinions is onlythe beginning of addressing these founda-tional questions that advances in AI forceus to address. We need to go beyond thoseopinions with serious study to questionthe prevailing views. We need to studyseriously ethics, but also need to makeethical choices that are informed by an in-

depth understanding of technology.Without both of these, we will not be ableto judge what our technologies can do andtherein decide what we should do. Ourleaders need to discourage the narrow andultimately false concept that ethics is a dis-cipline that only licensed members of theguild can practice. The ethics of AI needsto start first and foremost with those prac-ticing AI and be informed by those inter-ested in the whole.

In fact, there is a long tradition at MITof scientists and engineers interested inthe whole. Two luminaries of the Institutewhose far-ranging investigations aredirectly relevant to ethics and society inthe Schwarzman College are NorbertWiener and Marvin Minsky. Anotherpart of this tradition at MIT can be foundin the Lewis Report of 1949. Warren K.Lewis, “Doc” Lewis as he was affection-ately known, was formerly head of theDepartment of Chemical Engineeringbefore he led the Committee onEducational Survey which, among otherthings, led to the establishment of whathas now become SHASS. Despite found-ing this School, his report made clear, “Inpractice the professional and the generalelements should not be isolated; theyshould not be assigned to separate sub-jects or to separate teachers. All parts ofan educational program should con-tribute to both ends.” (p.19) That visionhas regrettably disappeared from themainstream of MIT. Perhaps theSchwarzman College is an opportunity toget it back, but it will not happen organi-cally. It will need, as is often said aboutdifficult things, leadership. Thinking about those who considerthat science has a governing impact onsociety might turn us to seek out thewisdom in the founders of modernscience and their views of ethics. As we didwith Aristotle, we might suspect that these

founders have something to teach us thatwe would otherwise be hard pressed tolearn. For example, in Part 5 of Descartes’Discourse on Method, the founder of ana-lytic geometry makes the claim thatmachines can never fully mimic humans.Given the work of Turing and those whofollowed him, we might suspect thatDescartes simply got it wrong. However, ifDescartes was anything, he was notsimple, and we should recall that in Part 1

of the same work, Descartes had told us, “. . . I offer this writing only as a story, or ifyou prefer, as a fable . . .”. Thus, perhaps,Descartes is not proffering simple conclu-sions as facts, nor is he simply presentingthe blueprint for a project. On the con-trary, Descartes is helping to inform us ofhuman possibilities that we have ignoredin the slumber of our present thinking. Given the tremendous ethical andsocietal challenges that AI promises for us,we might also recall that modern scienceby design planted at the very beginningthe seeds of forgetting of its own assump-tions. Warnings about the consequencesof cultivating those seeds are in, forexample, Bacon’s New Atlantis, whichdescribes a futuristic scientific institution,and this literary description actually influ-enced the formation of the Royal Society,through it Benjamin Franklin’s AmericanPhilosophical Society, and by inspirationthat of MIT itself. Bacon’s ideas led to thecreation of disciplines, which after sometime forgot their origins and the warningsthat Bacon gave against staking too muchon disciplines. I urge our leaders to seek out the stilland small voices of those in their midst andthose far away who can help them to realizethe true potential of AI for the bettermentof human beings.

Ethics and Liberal Arts in SchwarzmanTrout, from preceding page

We need to study seriously ethics, but also need tomake ethical choices that are informed by an in-depthunderstanding of technology. Without both of these, wewill not be able to judge what our technologies can doand therein decide what we should do.

Bernhardt L. Trout is a Professor in theDepartment of Chemical Engineering(trout@mit.edu).

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Haynes MillerMIC

TH E R E CE NTLY U NVE I LE D PLAN S

for a College of Computing (CoC) marksby far the largest reorientation of theInstitute in the 32 years I have been on thefaculty. I think the change will be muchbroader than is generally acknowledged. To put it succinctly, it is likely thatgoing forward we will be known as the:

Massachusetts Institute of Computingor

MIC The image of the organizational struc-ture displayed by the administration inrecent presentations has the “College” atthe bottom, with the Schools riding ontop of it. This is a perfect reversal of thetraditional image, in which engineeringsubjects are regarded as resting on soundscientific and humanistic foundations. This image replaces an earlier one, thatseveral people independently havereported to me. In this image the Instituteis viewed as a donut, made up of the exist-ing Schools, with the CoC in the center.Perhaps a more flattering version of thisimage would be a flower, with the CoC inthe middle, the focus and germinal center,and the five Schools arrayed around theperiphery as petals, playing supportingroles. This probably accurately reflects theenvisioned future. Images are important. Traditionally,the five Schools have been carefully givenequal status in any representation of theInstitute. We all have equal responsibilityfor the education of our undergraduatesand the promotion of scientific and tech-nological research. I have treasured thecharacterization of the Schools as fivenodes in a complete graph. In the forth-coming new order, we have a hub andspokes model. The important connec-tions are declared to be between the center

and the periphery; other potential rela-tionships are secondary. The use of a novel noun for the newentity – “College” – is a further indicationthat the symmetry of the past order willbe broken. Second-class citizenship willinevitably be reflected in many ways, start-ing with allocation of resources. We cansee this happening already. It’s excellentnews that the new MIC will have fivepercent more faculty than the old and dis-credited MIT. But rather than allow themany different parts of the Institute to

grow organically, responding to the devel-opment of the many disciplines tradition-ally represented here, the plan is to add 25“computing” faculty and earmark 25more as “bridge appointments” betweenthe College and other entities. The discussion of the meaning of a“bridge appointment” has only justbegun. A deep concern is that the bridgewill be thought of as a one-way street:Techniques from machine learning or thelike will be exported to other depart-ments. To the extent that this model isrealized, we will be missing the chance toenhance the vigor of our development ofcomputer science by challenging its prac-titioners to move beyond theory, andimport into their practice responses to thevast array of real and specialized questionsabout real data sets. A primary rationale for this radicalredistribution of wealth and power is theascendancy of EECS as a choice of majorfor our undergraduates. A responsiblereaction to this might have been to put

resources and infrastructure in place toassure students that they do not have totrim their choice of major to what appar-ently seems to them to be the only path tocareer security. But instead, the Institutehas set its course in a direction that puts itin danger of being regarded (again!) as atechnical training school. I would expectthat the new organization will have adeep impact on the pool of undergradu-ate applicants, dramatically narrowingthe range of interest of our undergradu-ate body.

The concerns I have given voice tohere can be mitigated by abandoning the“bridge” imagery, and returning thepower of appointment to the variousSchools and departments. The bridgeconcept represents an unprecedentedappropriation by the administration – orof a select group of the faculty – ofauthority that has traditionally beenvested in departments. The question ofexactly how it will work has been raisedrepeatedly and the administration hasavoided responding. The best solution isto abandon the idea entirely. If computerscience has penetrated the whole of theInstitute as fully as is claimed, then manyof these new faculty members will natu-rally be well versed in its methodology.Moreover, devolving this authority todepartments may be the only way toavoid the kind of corruption that followswindfalls.

Haynes Miller is a Professor in theDepartment of Mathematics (hrm@mit.edu).

The concerns I have given voice to here can bemitigated by abandoning the “bridge” imagery, andreturning the power of appointment to the variousSchools and departments.

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Krystyn J. Van VlietAnthony P. Sharon

Update on Construction Across Campus

O U R B U I LT E N V I R O N M E N T I S

changing at MIT, as evidenced by thecranes and construction crews aroundcampus. This phase of intensive renewaland selective new construction will con-tinue to bring noticeable changes as theInstitute restores its infrastructure andestablishes new facilities that will help theMIT community learn and thrive. As wetake note of current progress, we sharewith you the following updates aboutconstruction and planning activities oncampus. MIT’s 2030 capital planning frame-work is unusual among universities for itsemphasis on capital renewal projects,including comprehensive buildingupgrades. Most of the recent projects –capitalized through significant fundrais-ing partnered with low-interest debt –

represent MIT’s decision to preserve andinvest in its existing buildings. Since the implementation of MIT2030, MIT has completed nearly 480renewal projects, reaching almost everybuilding on campus to improve buildingsafety, bring older facilities up to code, andimplement changes that support teachingand research. Currently, we have 120smaller-scale renewal projects activelyunderway. A larger-scale renewal project, theCentral Utilities Plant upgrade – a com-ponent of MIT’s Climate Action Plan –will add a second turbine to the plant andinstall highly efficient equipment andcontrols designed to reduce on-campusemissions, enhance campus resiliency, andrespond to increasing research demands.Having completed the installation of util-

ities and foundations, crews are nowerecting the steel superstructure, installingequipment, and constructing the façade.This phase is expected to continue intothe spring of 2019. New construction on campus, includ-ing MIT.nano (Building 12) and the inno-vative new undergraduate residence onVassar Street, reflect MIT’s commitmentto LEED Gold construction. The new res-idence will add 450 beds in rooms clus-tered around shared community spacessuch as lounges and study rooms. Withfoundation and underground utilitieswork completed, construction will beginthis winter on the concrete frame with theassistance of two cranes on site. Whencompleted, this frame will be enclosed byprefabricated exterior panels creating abrick-and-mortar façade.

Projects Underway On Campus

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In Kendall Square, the excavation isnow giving rise to several buildings, as theInstitute continues its work to transformsix MIT-owned parking lots into a vibrant,multi-use community for students, faculty,employees, and residents. These locationsare currently referred to as Sites 1-6.

• Current construction activities includeutility work that touches virtually everysystem in the area. Sections ofWadsworth, Amherst, and HaywardStreets are experiencing full and partialclosures to accommodate excavations andmachinery as utilities are relocated orupgraded. This infrastructure work isexpected to be complete by January 2019.

• Concurrently, a parking garage is beingconstructed below ground at Sites 3, 4, and5. This activity will continue for the nexttwo years as the buildings take shape above.

• Foundations are underway at the Site 1residential building, and initial work hasstarted on the street-level space that – inresponse to community input – will beoccupied by a new Brothers Marketplace

grocery store (expected to be completedin the summer of 2019).

• At Site 3, slated for retail use as well asresearch and development activities, thebuilding foundation is finished and con-crete core construction is ongoing.

• A range of uses are planned for Site 4,including graduate student housing,admissions, retail, child care, a WelcomeCenter, and the Forum. Currently, theconcrete framework of the residence hallis going up (the building will be 30 floorsin total), and it will soon be enclosed by afaçade of metal panels.

• At Site 5 – which recently hosted a cere-monial groundbreaking for the new MITMuseum – construction of the building’ssteel structure has begun. Boeing plans toestablish the Boeing Aerospace andAutonomy Center at the site, to be oper-ated by Boeing subsidiary and MITspinout Aurora Flight Sciences.

• Related infrastructure work includes theWest Campus Stormwater Improvement

Project, which involves the constructionof a 1200-foot underground drainagestructure from Waverly Street to theCharles River via Amherst Alley. Theproject was identified by the City ofCambridge and enables MIT to meet ourEPA regulations relating to the KendallSquare Initiative. Expected to continueuntil the summer of 2019, the project willimpact Amherst Street from Next House(W71) to Vassar Street alongside theWestgate apartments and parking lot.

At the John A. Volpe NationalTransportation Systems Center site, MIT iscollaborating with state and federal agen-cies to design the federal government’snew transportation center headquarters.Once this federal building is in place, MITwill proceed with the City of Cambridge-governed process to advance the develop-ment of the remaining 10 acres at that site.Site preparation for the federal building isexpected to begin this winter.

Completed Capital Renewal Projects Smaller-scale capital renewal projects oncampus have focused on infrastructure –including roof replacements, buildingenvelope restorations, and upgrades tomechanical systems – and on supportingspecific academic programs. For example,a renewal project at the Grainger EnergyMachines (GEM) Facility in the basementof Building 10 rejuvenated faculty andstudent offices, lab areas, and machineshops. Spaces were reconfigured toaddress programming needs, and newwork station fixtures were installed. Larger-scale capital renewal projects,primarily comprehensive buildingupgrades, have safeguarded and renewedcampus icons like the MIT Chapel (W15),Kresge Auditorium (W16), and the SimonsBuilding (Building 2). Less visible butequally vital, the renovation of two floorsin the Muckley Building (E40) improvedinfrastructure and addressed program-matic needs to support the Center forTransportation & Logistics as it launched anew Blended Master’s Program and thefirst of MIT’s MicroMaster’s programs.

Ongoing Construction for the Kendall Square Initiative

Site 1: Residential, retail; Brothers MarketplaceSite 2: Lab, office, retailSite 3: Lab, office, retail

Site 4: Graduate student housing, childcare, MIT ForumSite 5: Office, retail, MIT Museum, MIT Press, Boeing/Aurora

Site 6: Office, retailcontinued on next page

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The ambitious MIT.nano project estab-lished a game-changing campus resourcedesigned to support the activities of morethan 2,000 faculty and researchers in thefields of nanoscience and nanoengineer-ing. In early October, a grand openingevent marked the occasion with a sympo-sium and tours of the building. At the heart of campus, structuralreconfigurations in Building 31 addressedprogramming needs of the Department ofAeronautics and Astronautics and theDepartment of Mechanical Engineeringby improving internal circulation andadding new specialized lab spaces. On thewest end of campus, capital renewal trans-formed a former warehouse on VassarStreet (Building W97) into an award-winning new home for the Theater Artsprogram, gathering faculty offices andstudios, rehearsal spaces, costume andscene design shops, and adaptable per-formance spaces under one roof. Further enhancements to student life oncampus were recently implemented with therenovation of MIT’s New House residence(Building W70). The project included sub-stantial infrastructure upgrades, improvedaccessibility, new amenities such as kitchensand quiet lounges, and other design ele-ments that encourage community and con-nectivity among the nine cultural houseslocated within.

Construction Projects in the PipelineSeveral capital renewal projects aremoving forward through very early stages,including proposed renovations of theMetropolitan Storage Warehouse, theHayden Library (Building 14), and theGreen Building (Building 54). TheMetropolitan Warehouse is slated to serveas an interdisciplinary hub for design andeducation, providing a new home for theSchool of Architecture and Planning andfor the Project Manus community maker-space. The architect selection process forthis project is underway, with a selectionexpected this winter. The proposedHayden Library project includes pro-

grammatic and infrastructure upgradesand is currently in conceptual design. Upgrades to the I. M. Pei-designedGreen Building – home of theDepartment of Earth, Atmosphere andPlanetary Sciences (EAPS) – are in plan-ning and are expected to include a renewalof the façade and building envelope,replacement of the roof, and updates tothe mechanical systems. EAPS-related

renovations are also expected to take placeon the fourth floor of Building 4 in theform of new wet labs and offices forfaculty researchers. Due to successful fundraising efforts,planning and design activities are alsonow underway for renovations to MIT’sboathouse and the construction of a newmusic building on the West Campus. Siteselection for the recently announced MITStephen A. Schwarzman College ofComputing is also in progress.

Community Engagement and a NewDirector of Open Space ProgrammingWhile the above summary is a broadoverview of current capital renewal effortson campus, more detailed information isalways available on the Capital Projectswebsite (capitalprojects.mit.edu). As anadditional communications measure, theKendall Square Initiative posts biweeklyconstruction updates and responds tocomments from the community via acoUrbanize web profile (https://courbanize.com/projects/mit-kendall-square/information).Other recent outreach efforts, including

events like the Hubweek KendallSquare/MIT Innovation Playground, haveprovided social opportunities for ourcampus community, local residents, andmembers of the Kendall Square community. Overall, MIT is endeavoring to designbuildings and open spaces that similarlyinvite and welcome the community. Inthat spirit, we introduce Jessie SchlosserSmith (smithjs@mit.edu), recently hired as

MIT’s Director of Open SpaceProgramming. Smith has come on boardat MIT specifically to think about the newopen spaces in Kendall Square. Her goal isto gather input from a range of collabora-tors and then design public programs andspaces that engage the community andencourage people to connect with MITand one another. Some of these activitiescould advance academic or research goals,and she is eager to meet with faculty todiscuss possibilities. We hope you willconnect with her. Additional resources for details ofcapital renewal projects can be found at:

• Capital Projects:http://capitalprojects.mit.edu/• MIT News:http://news.mit.edu/topic/campus-buildings/• Spectrum Magazine:https://spectrum.mit.edu/issue/2018-fall/

Update on Construction Across CampusVliet and Sharon, from preceding page

Kendall Square Site 1 Rendering

Krystyn J. Van Vliet is Associate Provost andProfessor of Materials Science and Engineeringand Biological Engineering (krystyn@mit.edu);Anthony P. Sharon is Deputy Executive VicePresident (apsharon@mit.edu).

MIT Faculty NewsletterNovember/December 2018

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country when it is committing war crimesand causing what the United Nations hasdescribed as the world’s worst humanitar-ian disaster? What about engagement with otherproblematic regimes such as China, Israel,or Russia? China is running concentrationcamps for its minorities, while artificialintelligence is used by its secret police tocontrol its second-class citizens, a fact wellknown to researchers. Israel remains inserious and continuing violation of inter-national norms through its illegal occupa-tion and armed conflict, while Russia tooengages in massive and systematic harass-ment of any independent voices, while ille-gally annexing territory abroad. Is itnormal to engage with parts of the U.S.government itself which are responsible formassive abuses and outlaw behavior,including complicity with the Saudi regimefor its atrocities in Yemen or with impris-oning children at its border? More contro-versially, if individual faculty memberspublicly support or belong to supremacistor violent groups – such as the KKK or theRSS in India – is that acceptable? What arethe ethical obligations of universities and ofindividual academics with regard to theirtransnational (or, for that matter, domes-tic) engagements? Taking the Khashoggi travesty as alesson, universities such as MIT will, Ihope, ask: On what basis should it engagewith all atrociously bad regimes andorganizations, not just Saudi Arabia?While high ethical standards are sought tobe enforced for all research through IRB(Institutional Review Board) protocols,and many universities call for adherenceto a code of ethics, the fact remains thatthere is currently no proactive due dili-gence or monitoring mechanism forensuring that universities do not assist orlegitimate odious regimes, organizations,and practices in their transnationalengagements. Strategic calculations about whether toengage with other countries or organiza-tions rarely check, proactively, what their

human rights records are. Credible infor-mation on human rights conditions existglobally, and many organizations – globalbusiness houses for example – increas-ingly engage in or are expected to complywith due diligence or establish mecha-nisms of monitoring their compliancewith human rights law. The conversation

about ethics in universities such as MITtoo often stops with the ethics of researchalone, as in the IRB protocols which tendto be narrowly focused. It does not have tobe, and should not be, that narrow. Thereis no reason why a proactive due diligenceprocess cannot be established by universi-ties to ensure that they are not complicitwith human rights violators. There is a serious reputational risk touniversities when they engage withhuman rights violators. Instead of wel-coming every chance to accept themassive influx of money from oil-richkingdoms, companies, and authoritarianstates, universities should have their guardup and ask if there is a reputational risk inthese engagements. The reputations ofuniversities such as MIT are among itsmost precious assets, built over time, butcan suffer significant harm if more care isnot taken in how and whether to engagetransnationally in specific cases. The evolution of recent human rightslaw also strongly indicates the possibilitythat universities, and the states in whichthey are located, bear legal obligations –for example under the Alien Tort ClaimsAct, Torture Victims Protection Act, or therecent Justice Against Sponsors ofTerrorism Act (JASTA). To avoid moral,and possible legal harm to themselves, it isincumbent on universities to verifywhether well-documented allegations ofhuman rights exist with regard to acountry, organization, individual, orresearch collaborator before they signagreements or announce joint initiatives.They should also commit to a meaningfulmonitoring of their relationship over

time. Such a commitment to a due dili-gence process will in no way detract fromthe ability of universities to engage with adiverse set of countries and collaborators.Indeed, it will enable them to engage glob-ally on a more ethical basis. Individual faculty members have aright to decide if and when to engage with

particular issues, collaborators, or coun-tries, as part of their academic freedom.However, this right is distinct from theobligations that attach to institutionalengagements – through labs, centers, ini-tiatives, and the university as a whole. Asan institution, universities have a respon-sibility to ask if their engagements mayend up bolstering those who violate uni-versally held norms. Similarly, while indi-vidual faculty have the freedom to belongto any organization or to support cause oftheir choice, such choices are not entirelyfree of the moral obligations that areinherent in being a faculty member of auniversity which hosts people of diversebackgrounds and is committed to makingthe world a better place. Such moral obli-gations have to be anchored in humanrights. To ensure that such obligations willamount to anything more than words, acode of ethics for faculty members whichlays out the minimal obligations inherentin maintaining a free learning environ-ment seems essential. While the end of Mr. Khashoggi’s life isterrible, there are many regimes and enti-ties in the region and elsewhere withequally bad or worse human rightsrecords. I hope MIT and other universitieswill evolve towards a meaningful processof ethical international and domesticengagements which will draw lessonsfrom the Khashoggi episode. There is adire need for an institution such as MIT totake the lead.

Ethical Obligations of UniversitiesRajagopal, from page 1

Balakrishnan Rajagopal is an AssociateProfessor of Law and Development in theDepartment of Urban Studies and Planning(braj@mit.edu).

There is a serious reputational risk to universities whenthey engage with human rights violators.

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Eduardo KauselPhilip M. GschwendJohn R. Williams

Lamenting MIT’s New Web Portal

OVE R TH E COU R S E OF D ECAD E S,

MIT has consistently strived to reinventitself. It has always sought new directionsand attempted bold changes that have keptthe Institute at the forefront of science andtechnology, not to mention a leader in edu-cational policy. But change also brings aboutthe risk of unintended setbacks and harm toinstruments that have worked well before.An example of the latter is the recent anddrastic change to the MIT web portal, whichhas been unanimously disliked by both thecolleagues we have consulted as well as thestudents we polled. Not one of themexpressed either support or liking of the newpages. Indeed, some colleagues were quitevisceral in their expression of dislike, evenwhile asking us not to quote them by name.We shall argue herein that the old formatwas highly functional and very welldesigned. If so, the old dictum should haveapplied: “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Wewonder then why it is that the MIT adminis-tration felt the urge to change these pages,and to do so without extensive prior consul-tation with, and counsel from, the faculty. Let’s first begin with a review of the old,classical MIT home page. It had all of thefollowing excellent features:

(1) It occupied just one page in the browser.No scrolling needed, and the page loaded inan instant. It also changed daily, which hadno counterpart at other universities that, tothis day, have an unchanging look.

(2) It contained links that gave the users amental model of the entire MIT structure, withall of the important and relevant paths to infor-mation directly available. For example, if youwished to go to the libraries, there was a directlink. Or if you wished to go to either academicor administrative offices, these were directlyaccessible from that main page. In addition, the

graphic was in most cases a photo of theperson-of-the-day that loaded without delay,and at the same time it also referred to the latestnews with links to appropriate stories andvideos on current research, as well as findingsand discoveries at the Institute. TheCommunications Office loomed quietly in thebackground and not overtly in the foreground.

(3) The small search window at the top rightof the page led to either direct searches bytopic or searches of faculty, personnel, orstudents. It was operated by the familiar andvery effective Google search engine, whichprovided a long list of relevant results inlittle space, often finding the sought afterresults in the very first search, and displayingthese in appropriately colored highlights.That engine was also very tolerant of mis-spellings, which is crucial when searchingand the user either makes mistakes or usesimprecise names, or fails to use the exactname of an MIT office or entity.

(4) The old page was also a clear signature ofMIT, with a centered spotlight, clear func-tionality and a unique personality, and thegravitas reflecting the long hours studentsand faculty spend on cutting edge research.

By contrast, the new page has all of thefollowing shortcomings:

(1) The familiar MIT home page is nowgone, replaced by a rather dull, run-of-the-mill web page that is similar in manyrespects to that of many commercial web-sites. No originality there.

(2) The portal displays in excessively largefont over several pages, and it is necessary toscroll. It is also needlessly animated, whichslows down loading considerably, especiallyover slow Internet connections. What for?

(3) That main page is now an informationdesert providing tunnel vision. It includes adysfunctional search engine that displayssuggested search terms in a kind of popular-ity contest. One can only wonder if groups,desiring to be “popular”, might game theengine by employing Amazon’s MechanicalTurk or some other campaign services todrive users to their pages.

(4) What previously we could see in just onepage is either not there, is less complete, orrequires scrolling. What for?

(5) The complete organizational structureof MIT that was visible previously is nolonger there, and has been replaced by alarge search window together with a fewperfunctory links. There is an assumptionthat visitors to the new portal already knowwhat the MIT structure is, and what to lookfor. If one doesn’t know what to look for,one cannot find it.

(6) As we already mentioned, the searchengine must be tolerant of mistakes anderrors. The new search engine is not. Forexample, try entering “huminities” deliber-ately misspelled. The new search enginefinds nothing. But enter the same in Google,and it asks you “did you mean: humanities?”together with the results for that search. Infact, we now can often find material faster atMIT by directly using Google instead of thenew search engine. Or say you rememberthat MIT has a digital library – calledDSPACE – that you would wish to access,but can’t quite remember its name. Goodluck with finding it.

(7) The new site is an uphill battle to findinginformation. Yes, the old links are stilllurking somewhere, but now they lie somethree or four clicks deep. In modern sites

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that is a very large barrier. People don’t wantfour clicks to find something – they will justgive up.

(8) Try finding a colleague or person insome department, perhaps his or her email,telephone, or office number. That is now anexercise in futility and frustration.

Now, if MIT decided to abandon its oldweb pages, an important open question iswhy? As of now, those reasons are obscure tous and remain to be articulated. Thus, theexplication should elaborate on the purposeof the new site, the planned architecture andspecifications for the new site, and themetrics that will be used to measure theintended success of the new pages – or thelack thereof. These should include standardindustry tests (A/B tests) that might revealwhether or not the pages are serving theirultimate purpose. We invite the teamresponsible for the new website to elaborateto the Institute on the rationale for the newpages and to articulate the design processthey followed in comparing the perform-ance of this new site versus the old one. Didthey, for example, consider two websites,one “outward” and one “inward” facing? A central issue in either the continuationof the old pages or the development of thenew web pages is a thorough understandingof the purpose served by those pages. Evenbefore the change, MIT was already runningGoogle Analytics that collected informationon the geographical origin of the visitors,the pages visited by them, the duration oftheir visit, the links or parts of the pages thatthey clicked on, and miscellaneous othermetrics and statistics such as papers copiedfrom the personal web pages of the faculty,or from DSPACE, or application forms andinstructions downloaded by prospectivestudents. We understand that top class consultantswere used to redesign the site, but the resultssuggest that their terms of reference andscope might have been unclear. Forexample, there are many functional require-ments for MIT’s web pages. Which one is ofoverriding importance to MIT? Potentialundergraduate and graduate applicants?Users of remote education such as edX and

Open Courseware? Faculty, researchers andstudents at MIT as well as at other institu-tions of higher learning and research?Funding agencies? The press and the mediain general? In short, who is MIT targetingwith these new pages, why the emphasis onsome specific targeted group, and whodecides on the appropriateness and desir-ability of those targets? Our sense is that thenew pages are mainly targeting the mediaand information industry, not the faculty,staff, students, or prospective students. And what makes the CommunicationsOffice think that having a visually animatedpage is a marked technical improvement? Itmay cater to young people who are used tovideo games, but not necessarily to serioususers. A visual effect is necessary only whenit conveys important information that can’tbe provided otherwise. It should not just bevisual candy. To make an analogy, considerthe old version of the TV documentary,Cosmos. In it, Carl Sagan shared his conta-gious enthusiasm for astrophysics and cos-mology with serious and at times complexthought-provoking ideas and explanations.It was brilliant. You will surely recall thememorable punch lines “Extraordinaryclaims necessitate extraordinary evidence,”and “Absence of evidence is not evidence ofabsence!” By contrast, the new version ofCosmos was dumbed down considerably,and contained many silly animations as wellas video and acoustic effects that conveyedno useful information and had no relation-ship to planetary science. An example of thatwas that silly spaceship, which was theremerely to entertain and keep the attentionspan of those who grew up with Star Trek, orplayed for hours on end with Pac-Man (orsome other video game). To us, much of thenew web page design seems to place exces-sive value on the visual impact of thewebsite, and much less on its usefulness andpracticality. One additional related observation.Together with the new page, theCommunications Office began sending us adaily news brief (MIT Daily). What for?Previously, there was a link to the latestnews of the day, often illustrated with smallphotos or diagrams as bait. Perhaps one outof 10 or 20 times, i.e., about twice a month,

there was a story of interest to us which wewould click on to learn more about thelatest news. In its current incarnation, thenewsletter overflows our inbox with largelyuseless or irrelevant information, compet-ing for our attention with all sorts of otherpushed news and punch lines, not tomention emails and social media. And thisis not counting the newsletters that wereceive regularly in connection with ourown specialties. In summary, the newslettermay well be MIT’s, but it very much feels tous like junk mail. Thus, we have proceededto unsubscribe. We surmise that the restructuring of theMIT web portal was not an inexpensiveproposition, and those involved in its devel-opment and implementation have vestedinterests in continuing that effort, rain orshine. This makes us think that the oldformat is now defunct, and that it shan’teven remain available as an installableoption to its users. If this is indeed the case,we mourn the passing and loss of a formerlyoutstanding resource. Needless to add, weno longer have the MIT portal as our homepage, since Google does a far better job. To conclude, it seems to us that theCommunications Office ought to clarifyand respond to at least the following points:

• Explain why this was done and how muchit cost (compared to continuing the oldwebsite).• No good engineer would suggest a newdesign without testing it on a representativegroup of users. Was that done?• MIT should recognize this inadequateproduct and revert to something with thefunctionality closer to that of the old site,unless someone explains cogently and con-vincingly why that would be a mistake andshould not happen.

Eduardo Kausel is a Professor Emeritus in theDepartment of Civil and EnvironmentalEngineering (kausel@mit.edu);Philip M. Gschwend is Ford Professor ofEngineering in the Department of Civil andEnvironmental Engineering (pmgschwe@mit.edu);John R. Williams is a Professor of Civil andEnvironmental Engineering and EngineeringSystems in the Department of Civil andEnvironmental Engineering (jrw@mit.edu).

MIT Faculty NewsletterVol. XXXI No. 2

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To The Faculty Newsletter:

I N T H E S E P T E M B E R / O CTO B E R

2018 issue there was an article written byDr. Emeritus Beaver on “The Transition toRetirement.” My first thought is the adviceI give to students: “Never trust somethingwritten by someone unwilling to use theirown name.” As I read further the articledescribed the need for a faculty memberof age 70 or older to retire and make wayfor younger faculty. I have offered MITthis option for the past 16 years but it hasfallen on deaf ears by our administration.MIT does nothing to make retirement arewarding experience and wonders whysome faculty stay on past normal retire-ment age?

The article went on, retirement offers:

(a) liberation from classroom teaching,

(b) renew or strengthen family ties,

(c) removal of the pressures to remaincreative, raise summer salary, secureresearch funds, etc.,

(d) find new adventures.

I could not disagree more with Dr.Beaver. I enjoy teaching; it has always beenwhy I have stayed at MIT. I find no pres-sure to “remain creative.” I find my creativethinking is enhanced by the MIT environ-ment and only grows stronger over time. Itnever has been a burden. Raise summer

salary: who needs it? I could make a muchgreater salary outside of MIT. Secureresearch funds. I admit that for my firstfew years at MIT I felt this pressure, butnearly 40 years ago I decided not to stressabout funding and I have been happierever since. Find new adventures; I havebeen looking for these since I came as afreshman 50 years ago. Strengthen familyties. It is a bit late to start this in retirement. So, Dr. Beaver, you are out of step with whythe faculty stay at MIT. We stay because we canand because we learn to enjoy what we do.

From the other beaver,

Thomas W. EagarProfessor of Materials Science andEngineering and Engineering Management

lettersOn The Transition to Retirement

To The Faculty Newsletter:

I E NJOY R EAD I NG EACH issue of theFaculty Newsletter, and so was surprised toread an article making unsubstantiatedinsinuations about Stephen Hawking(“Stephen Hawking: The EminentPhysicist vs. The Media Myth,” Vol. XXXINo. 1). I have no dog in that particular

fight, but the article contrasted particu-larly strongly with the piece just a fewpages earlier about “beliefs based onobjective truth rather than on volitionalbelief.” Any writer is entitled to his or heropinions, but it seems curious to publishthem without having provided some basisin fact.

Nonetheless, I remain an interestedreader.

Respectfully,

Ian CrossfieldAssistant Professor Department of Physics

Hypothesizing About Stephen Hawking

To The Faculty Newsletter:

I AM A LON G-T I M E S U B S CR I B E R

and a reader of the MIT publications andjournals. I have read the Institute’s onlinepublications for a long time and also haveprovided online feedback about websiteimprovement. Being an international sub-scriber, I have found that the university

has reduced RSS feeds by a major percent-age and for that we miss a lot of importantnotifications. The previous website hadlots of sub-feeds that were useful inwebsite navigation and information gath-ering, but as of your new website it hasbecome time-constraint in looking fordata on sub-topics on the site. Due torestrictions in availing publication of

your university activities, I am interestedin seeking to avail your printed publica-tion for general reading.

Looking for your communication inthis regard.

Arijit Mukherjee

Questioning the New MIT Website

MIT Faculty NewsletterNovember/December 2018

17

Faculty Policy Committee

The Faculty Policy Committee has the following duties and responsibilities:

a. Formulate policy on matters of concern to the Faculty, for approval by the Faculty; interpret and implement policy asapproved by the Faculty.

b. Coordinate the work of the other Committees of the Faculty, establishing liaison with them, providing guidance anddirection, and referring issues to particular Committees or establishing Ad Hoc Committees as appropriate.

c. Maintain a broad overview of the Institute’s academic programs, coordinating and reviewing proposals from theStanding and Ad Hoc Committees for presentation to Faculty meeting.

d. Maintain a broad overview of the activities of the Office of Corporate Relations and other similar efforts as theyrelate to the activities of the members of the Faculty.

e. Keep informed of new problems of potential conflicts of interest and recommend appropriate modifications of poli-cies and procedures to the Faculty.

f. Communicate with the Faculty as a whole on important matters of policy, reporting regularly at Faculty meetings.

g. Meet periodically with the President, Academic Deans, and others to enhance the interchange between the Facultyand the Administration on matters of concern to the Faculty.

h. Consider issues involving relationships between Administration and both Faculty and other academic staff withteaching responsibilities.

i. Establish the manner in which the academic program is presented in official Institute publications, delegating toother Standing Committees such parts of the responsibility as deemed desirable.

The Committee is comprised of the Chair of the Faculty; the Associate Chair of the Faculty; the Secretary of the Faculty;the Chair-elect or the immediately preceding Associate Chair (in alternate years); seven elected Faculty members; oneundergraduate and one graduate student; and, ex officio nonvoting, two members designated by the Provost, and onemember designated by the President.

Prof. Susan S Silbey, Chair (June 30, 2019)Anthropology Program

Prof. Sandy Alexandre (L) (June 30, 2019) Literature Section

Prof. W Craig Carter, Secretary of the Faculty (June 30, 2019)Materials Science and Engineering

Prof. Rick Lane Danheiser, Associate Chair of theFaculty and Chair-Elect (June 30, 2019)Chemistry

Prof. David M Geltner (June 30, 2020)Urban Studies & Planning

Prof. Charles F Harvey (June 30, 2019)Civil and Environmental Engineering

Prof. John H Lienhard (June 30, 2021)Dept Heads Vice President for Research

Prof. Haynes R Miller (June 30, 2019)Mathematics

Prof. Georgia Perakis (June 30, 2020)Sloan School of Management

Prof. Patrick H Winston (June 30, 2021)Electrical Engineering-Computer Science

Ms. Kathryn Jiang, Student ’20 (June 30, 2019)

Mr. Connor Coley, Student G (June 30, 2019)

Prof. Cynthia Barnhart, Designated Representative,President #Chancellor’s Office

Prof. Pablo Jarillo-Herrero, Designated Representative,Provost # (June 30, 2019)Physics

Prof. Kristala L Prather, Designated Representative,Provost # (June 30, 2019)Chemical Engineering

Dr. Tami Kaplan, Staff to CommitteeOffice of the President

Note: Data in parenthesis designated term expiration.Legend: * Ex Officio Voting; # Ex Officio Non-Voting; L On Leave

MIT Faculty NewsletterVol. XXXI No. 2

18

Committee on the Undergraduate Program

The Committee on the Undergraduate Program exercises oversight for the undergraduate academic program including thefreshman year, the General Institute Requirements, and other interdepartmental educational activities. The Committee consid-ers proposals that would establish or change educational policies related to the undergraduate program, and it makes appro-priate recommendations on these proposals to the MIT Faculty. One of the CUP’s particular responsibilities is in encouraginginnovation and experimentation in undergraduate education and therefore, it has the authority to approve limited educationalexperiments and grant exceptions to existing policy and procedure in these cases.

The Committee on the Undergraduate Program consists of seven elected faculty members, the Associate Chair of theFaculty, four undergraduate student members, and, ex officio, the Chancellor (or designee), the Vice Chancellor, and onemember designated by the Vice Chancellor.

Prof. Duane S Boning, Chair (June 30, 2020)Office of the Provost

Prof. Joshua Angrist (June 30, 2019)Economics

Prof. Arthur Bahr (June 30, 2021)Literature Section

Prof. Nergis Mavalvala (June 30, 2019)Physics

Prof. Elizabeth Marie Nolan (June 30, 2021)Chemistry

Prof. Roberto Rigobon (June 30, 2019)Sloan School of Management

Prof. Kristel R Smentek (June 30, 2020)Architecture

Ms. Divya Goel, Student ’19 (June 30, 2019)

Mr. Noah McDaniel, Student ’20 (June 30, 2019)

Ms. Mary Jane Porzenheim, Student ’19 (June 30, 2019)

Mr. Jason Seibel, Student ’20 (June 30, 2019)

Prof. Rick Lane Danheiser, Associate Chair of theFaculty * (June 30, 2019)Chemistry

Prof. Dennis M Freeman, Guest # (June 30, 2019)Office of Undergraduate Education

Prof. Jeffrey C. Grossman, Designated Representative,Vice Chancellor * (June 30, 2019)Materials Science and Engineering

Prof. Krishna Rajagopal, Guest, Office of DigitalLearning # (June 30, 2019)Office of the Provost

Prof. Ian A Waitz, Vice Chancellor *Chancellor’s Office

Prof. Maria Yang, Designated Representative, Chancellor * (June 30, 2019)Mechanical Engineering

Ms. Kate Danahy, Staff to CommitteeRegistrar’s Office

Ms. Genevre Filiault, Executive Officer #Registrar’s Office

Note: Data in parenthesis designated term expiration.Legend: * Ex Officio Voting; # Ex Officio Non-Voting; L On Leave

MIT Faculty NewsletterNovember/December 2018

19

Committee on Campus Planning

The Committee on Campus Planning serves as the standing Faculty advisory body to the MIT administration on campus plan-ning. It provides Faculty perspectives and counsel on campus planning issues, including, but not limited to, future academicand research needs of the community. The committee seeks to understand the needs of the Faculty for the campus environ-ment and ensure communication with the Faculty on important matters related to the MIT campus and surroundings. Thechair of the committee serves ex officio on the MIT Building Committee, and members may be called upon to serve on taskforces and/or other ad hoc committees concerned with campus planning.

Prof. Deborah G Ancona, Chair (June 30, 2021)Sloan School of Management

Prof. Jonathan P How (June 30, 2020)Aeronautics and Astronautics

Prof. Heidi Nepf (June 30, 2020)Civil and Environmental Engineering

Prof. Lisa Parks (June 30, 2019)Comparative Media Studies/Writing

Prof. Brent Ryan (L) (June 30, 2019)Urban Studies & Planning

Prof. Boleslaw Wyslouch (June 30, 2020)DLC Heads Science

Ms. Sarah Edgar, Student ’19 (June 30, 2019)

Mr. Jonas Brunschwig, Student G (June 30, 2019)

Mr. Jon H Alvarez, Director, Campus Planning *Office of the Executive VP & Treasurer

Prof. Peter H Fisher, Designated Representative, Provost *DLC Heads Science

Prof. Erica C James, Designated Representative, Provost *Urban Studies & Planning

Prof. James Wescoat, Designated Representative, Provost *Architecture

Ms. Amy J Kaiser, Staff to CommitteeCampus Planning

Note: Data in parenthesis designated term expiration.Legend: * Ex Officio Voting; # Ex Officio Non-Voting; L On Leave

For a complete list of Faculty and Institute Committees and Councils see the MIT Faculty Governance website at: facultygovernance.mit.edu

MIT Faculty NewsletterVol. XXXI No. 2

M.I.T. NumbersMost Popular Undergraduate Majors 2005-2018

Source: Office of the Provost/Institutional Research

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2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018Electrical Eng & Computer Sci Mechanical Engineering MathematicsPhysics Biological Engineering Chemical EngineeringAeronautics and Astronautics Materials Science and Eng ManagementBrain and Cognitive Sciences Biology

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