The following is an incomplete list of topics covered in the course.

• Scientific knowledge
• Definitions 
• Hypothesis testing
• Observations and measurements
• Experiments
• Models
• Statistical reasoning
• Causes and explanations
• Qualitative methods
• Engineering design
• Risk and decisions of risks 
• Research ethics

After having completed the course, the student should, with regards to the theory and methodology of science, both orally as well as in writing, be able to:

• Identify definitions and descriptions of concepts, theories and problem areas, as well as identify the correct applications of these concept and theories.
• Account for concepts, theories and general problems areas, as well as apply concepts and theories to specific cases.
• Critically discuss the definitions and applications of concepts and theories as they apply to specific cases of scientific research.

These learning objectives are examined in writing via a digital exam and orally via seminars. 

• Describe and apply the most common theories and methods in applied ethics as well as describe their relevance for medical ethics.
• Implement independent moral reflections with respect to practical problems in the ethics of medical technology.

These learning objectives are examined in writing via a project work.

Below follows an outline of the course learning activities. Detailed descriptions of the learning activities are found in later sections in this course memo.

• One lecture on campus: Introduction and Scientific Knowledge.
• Ten pre-recorded video lectures. Each video lecture has an associated voluntary lecture quiz and a text transcription. Video lectures are included in the TimeEdit course schedule as a planning recommendation but can be viewed throughout the course. Video lecture quizzes however, have deadlines.
• Two flipped classroom sessions on campus related to a subset of the video lectures. Before each flipped classroom session, you post a question related to the relevant video lectures on a discussion board and upvote questions posted by other students that you wish to be discussed on the flipped classroom sessions. The lecturer selects among the questions and answers these during the flipped classroom sessions.
• Four seminars on campus. Each seminar covers selected course contents from the video lectures and course readings. Before attending each seminar, you complete a mandatory seminar preparation quiz. On the seminar you work on group exercises and discussions. You take one seminar per seminar week.
• Three exercise sessions on campus.
• In period 2: A project work which includes assignments and essay submissions. After taking this module, students should be familiar with the most common theories and methods of applied ethics and their relevance for medical technology. They should be able to conduct independent moral reflections on practical problems in the ethics of medical technology both verbally and in writing. The project part consists of three lectures and two seminars. Students are expected to read the course material continually during the course and prepare for the lectures and seminars. The final product is an essay you write on an independently chosen topic in the ethics of medical technology.

Lectures

This course includes eleven lectures. Lecture 1 is held on campus and lectures 2-11 are available as videos via Canvas and can be viewed at any time during the course. The placement of video lectures in the TimeEdit course schedule is a planning suggestion for when you might view them.

Each of the video lectures has an associated lecture quiz with a deadline. If you complete lecture quizzes with passing score upon the deadline, you receive course bonus points for the exam (see section on Schedule and see Canvas for quiz deadlines). For more information on bonus points, see section on Bonus point system below.

1. Introduction and scientific knowledge (campus lecture), course week 1
2. Scientific inferences (59 minutes) (flipped classroom 1), course week 1
3. Observation and measurement (76 minutes) (flipped cl. 1), course week 2
4. Experiments (49 minutes) (flipped classroom 2), course week 2
5. Models (62 minutes) (flipped classroom 2), course week 3
6. Statistics (62 minutes), course week 3
7. Explanations and causes (81 minutes), course week 4
8. Engineering design (76 minutes) course week 5
9. Qualitative methods (93 minutes), course week 5
10. Research ethics (103 minutes), course week 6
11. Anticipating risk in science and engineering (85 minutes), course week 6

Flipped classrooms

Flipped classroom sessions function as an opportunity for receiving clarification from the lecturer on lecture contents. The flipped classroom sessions are intended for addressing questions on course topics that students find unclear, challenging or otherwise interesting.

There are two flipped classroom sessions on campus, each based on two video lectures. Flipped classroom 1 focuses on the lectures on scientific inferences (lecture 2), and on observation and measurement (lecture 3). Flipped classroom 2 focuses on the lectures on experiments (lecture 4) and on models (lecture 5).

Each flipped classroom session has an associated discussion board. Before each flipped classroom session, you post a question for the lecturer on the board related to the relevant video lectures, and you upvote questions posted by other students that you would like the lecturer to address during the session. See section on Schedule and see Canvas for further instructions and deadlines.

The lecturer selects a set of questions from the discussion board and devotes the flipped classroom sessions to answering these questions. During the sessions, you will also be invited to participate on voluntary exercise activities.

If you complete the flipped classroom activities, you receive course bonus points for the exam. For more information on bonus points, see section on Bonus point system below.

It is possible to attend flipped classroom sessions without having posted on the discussion board and without participating on exercises in the classroom, but this will yield no bonus points.

The flipped classroom sessions are taken together with students from other, similar courses.

Bonus point system

Completing video lecture quizzes with a passing score, as well as participating on the flipped classroom activities, gives course bonus points for the exam. Bonus point activities are voluntary, optional activities intended at incentivising students to engage with the course contents continuously throughout the course.

Each video lecture has an associated video lecture quiz, comprised of 15 questions. If you complete a quiz with a 14 point score or higher, All video lecture quizzes have deadlines (See section on Schedule and see Canvas for deadlines). There is no limit on number of attempts up until the quiz deadlines.

Course bonus points can also be awarded for the two flipped classrooms. Attending the flipped classroom session and carrying out tasks as per instructed by the lecturer results in 0.5 course bonus points per each of the two flipped classrooms.

In order to make the number of bonus points fit the exam format, course bonus points are scaled in the following way before the exam (C = course bonus points, E = exam bonus points): E = C * 5/6, rounded up to the closest .5-value. Example: 4.5 course bonus points will be scaled as 4.5 * 5/6 = 3.75, then rounded up to 4 exam points. You can maximally obtain 5 exam bonus points.

Exam bonus points are added to part 1 of the exam. For example, if part 1 has a maximum score of 15 points, then 3.5 exam bonus points plus 10 points on part 1 results in a total score of 13.5 points on part 1 of the exam. 4 exam bonus points plus 13 points on part 1 results in a total score of 15 points on part 1 of the exam.

For more information about the exam, see section on Examination and completion.

Bonus points collected during one and the same course period are valid for, and only for, the scheduled exam and the corresponding re-exam for that period.

Seminars

The course includes a mandatory seminar series comprised of four seminars. Each seminar covers selected course contents from the video lectures and course readings, and following the first seminar, each subsequent seminar connects to the previous seminars. Seminars are intended as a collaborative learning activity where you practice critically discussing course contents and practice applying course contents to cases, with instruction and support from teaching staff. The overall topics covered during the seminar series are as follows:

1. Definitions, operationalizations and hypotheses (course week 3)
2. Designing a scientific study (course week 4)
3. Interpretation, analysis and evidence (course week 6)
4. Risk and research ethics (course week 7).

Since completion of the seminar series yields course credits, the seminars feature mandatory activities: (1) preparing and passing a seminar quiz, and (2) actively participating on the seminar. Missing activities result in seminar incompletion and thus no seminar course credits.

Before each seminar, you read the assigned readings (reading instructions available on Canvas). Before attending each seminar, you must also pass a mandatory seminar preparation quiz (See section on Schedule and see Canvas for deadlines). There is no limit on number of quiz attempts up until the quiz deadline. You must complete the quiz with a passing score of 14 points before the deadline (indicated in Canvas as “Passed”).

The preparation quizzes are intended to ensure that all participants come prepared to the seminar for a more rewarding seminar learning experience. If you attend the seminar without completing the preparation quiz beforehand, you will not be marked as attending.

On the seminar, you will be working together with other students on exercises as per instructed by the teacher. The exercises are formulated in such a way as to promote critical reflection and discussion, as well as to practice application of course concepts to case scenarios.

You are expected to engage actively with the course contents and work on the exercises during the seminar. Passive attendance on the seminar will be marked as not attending. Active participation on the seminar does not mean that you are expected to demonstrate full proficiency of course contents. Rather, it means that you are expected to have properly engaged with the relevant course material beforehand and made an honest attempt at understanding it. Arisen questions and reflections can be addressed on the seminar.

For information on what to do if you have not completed a preparation quiz or actively attended on a seminar, see the section on Examination and completion.

Note that the TimeEdit course schedule shows multiple seminar slots for every seminar week. The different slots correspond to different seminar groups. You will join only one seminar group upon course start and your group takes only one seminar per seminar week. Instructions on how to join a seminar group as well as a seminar group schedule will be available on Canvas after the course starts and before the start of the seminar series.

Seminar 1 – Definitions, operationalizations and hypotheses.

Texts:

• Grüne-Yanoff, Till – Justified Method Choice, chapters 1, 2, 3, 13
• Optional reading: Hansson, Sven Ove – Art of Doing Science: sections 2.2-2.8, 3.1-3.2, 5.0-5.1, and 5.8

Topics relevant for the seminar: 

• Stipulative and lexical definitions
• Narrowness and broadness (as applied to definitions)
• Vagueness
• Hypotheses (and their quality criteria)
• Direct, aided and indirect observation
• Operationalization
• Accuracy and precision (as qualities of observations and measurements)
• Measurement error (random and systematic error)
• Convergent validity and divergent validity

Seminar 2 – Designing a scientific study.

Texts:

• Grüne-Yanoff, Till – Justified Method Choice, chapters 4, 5.
• Optional reading: Hansson, Sven Ove – Art of Doing Science: sections 3.7, 4.2-4, and 5.1-3.

Topics relevant for the seminar:

• Experiment, observational studies and model studies
• Mill’s method of difference
• Internal validity and external validity
• Experimental control
• Constancy, elimination and effect separation
• Randomization
• Control group and treatment group
• Observer influence
• Confirmation bias
• Blinding
• Epistemic virtues of models (Parameter precision, Similarity, Robustness, Simplicity, Tractability, Transparency)
• Analogies (positive, negative, neutral)

Seminar 3: Interpretation, analysis and evidence.

Texts:

• Grüne-Yanoff, Till – Justified Method Choice: chapters 2, 6, 7.
• "Seminar 3 Case", see below.
• Optional reading: Hansson, Sven Ove – Art of Doing Science: sections 1.6-7, 3.7, 3.9, 5.3-5, 5.7, 7, 8 and the box on p. 24.

Topics relevant for the seminar: 

• Repeatability, reproducibility and replicability
• Statistical evaluation
• Statistical significance
• Correlation and causality
• Explanatory virtues (Accuracy [of explanations], Non-sensitivity, Precision in the explanans, Precision of the explanandum, Cognitive salience)
• Duhem-Quine thesis
• Ad-hoc hypothesis
• Falsificationism (Popper)
• Inductive and deductive inferences

Seminar 4: Risk and research ethics.

Texts:

• Grüne-Yanoff, Till – Justified Method Choice, chapters 8, 9, 11, 12.
• “On Being a Scientist: Responsible Conduct in Research”, National academy of Sciences.
• Ahlin, Jesper, “Ethical Thinking”.
• Optional reading: Hansson, Sven Ove - Art of Doing Science: Section 9.

Topics relevant for the seminar: 

• Functions (assigned and ascribed)
• The design process
• Qualitative data
• Controlling observer effects
• Case study
• Gift authorship and ghost authorship
• Scientific misconduct (falsification, fabrication and plagiarism)
• Informed consent
• Deontology, consequentialism and virtue ethics
• Precautionary principle
• Decision making (under certainty/risk/ignorance/deep uncertainty)

Plagiarism and References

All texts are automatically checked for plagiarism, and high plagiarism percentages are then also manually checked. If we after this suspect actual plagiarism, we are obliged to report this to the disciplinary committee. All sources should be stated using any standard referencing system (see the KTH library). 

If suspected plagiarism is detected, a manual inspection will be performed. If a manual inspection indicates plagiarism, the assignment will not be corrected, and a report to the disciplinary committee will be filed. If two or more submissions are too similar to each other, none of them will be corrected and reports will be filed with regards to all students involved.

Given this, it is extremely important that you make sure that any text is written by you. This is your responsibility. We will make no exceptions for so called “accidental plagiarism”. 

You are allowed to cite sources. Such citations should be put in quotation marks (“ “) and a reference to the original source (using any standard system) should be given immediately after the quote. As a simple rule, consider five words or more directly from a source, a citation. These citations will not be included in the assessment, and the content will not increase your grade. Just what you account for, or discuss about the citation, will be graded. A possible use for a citation might be when presenting, addressing, or discussing a particular statement, or claim that is made in your assigned article. 

To avoid suspicion of plagiarism, a tip is to make notes when reading a text, and write your assignment by looking at your notes instead of the text.

When working with references in general, it is good to use footnotes, where you can indicate what the original sources are that you address or discuss, and also for writing useful comments. This could for example be when addressing some paragraph and page of a particular text you are working with, or referring to some TaMoS course material (say, if you are accounting for, or making some evaluation using a TaMoS concept). This will (again) help you to avoid suspicion of plagiarism, and also help us to quicker and easier understand and check if needed, where the original sources are for what you address and write in your text. You do not have to overdo it, and have references everywhere, but please be sure to have them where they might be needed.

Exercise sessions

The exercise sessions are extra opportunities to practice on the course content. They are held on campus and shared with other course codes. They are voluntary and have no associated submissions. The format is tested for the first time this semester. More information will follow on Canvas.

Expected workload

Expected workload is calculated based on number of course credits per period.

7.5 ECTS one period: 20 h /week

Schedule

The course schedule is available in TimeEdit via www.kth.se/schema. To find your schedule, log in and choose "Course" in the drop-down menu and search for your course code. Here you can also see what type of course activity it is. For example if it is a Digital Pre-Recorded Video Lecture, or Digital on Zoom. If the course activity has a room name or code (e.g. F1 or L43) then it is on Campus. Note that this schedule does not include submission deadlines, nor seminar group schedule. The TimeEdit course schedule displays all seminar slots. The seminar group schedule with one slot per group will be determined after student group sign-up upon course start. Instructions for sign-up and group schedule will be available on Canvas.

Your course shares seminars with other courses on theory and methodology of science. If you have scheduling issues, there may be other sessions that you could attend. Contact your course coordinator if you wish to attend another seminar slot.

Overall information on essay/project part submission deadlines, seminar preparation quiz deadlines, video lecture quiz deadlines, and deadlines for posting questions before flipped classroom sessions can be found in this document. The exact dates and times for submission deadlines are available on Canvas.

All the course material is available on the Canvas course room. The following literature has previously been used:

• Till Grüne-Yanoff ” Justified Method Choice – Methodology for Scientists and Engineers” (Compendium).
• The Art of Doing Science by Sven Ove Hansson.

In addition, there are three supplemental texts:

• Some Issues in the Philosophy of Technology, by Sven Ove Hansson.
• On Being a Scientist: Responsible Conduct in Research, which is an excerpt from a text by the National Academy of Sciences.
• Ethical Thinking by Jesper Ahlin.
  
  
• Articles and other texts will also be distributed during the course.

All the course material is available on the Canvas course room. It cannot be bought as physical books, but you are welcome to print them.

Students at KTH with a permanent disability can get support during studies from Funka:

Funka - compensatory support for students with disabilities

A, B, C, D, E, FX, F

• PRO1 - Project, 1.5 credits, Grading scale: P, F
• SEM1 - Seminars, 1.5 credits, Grading scale: P, F
• TENA - Examination, 3.0 credits, Grading scale: A, B, C, D, E, FX, F

Based on recommendation from KTH’s coordinator for disabilities, the examiner will decide how to adapt an examination for students with documented disability.

The examiner may apply another examination format when re-examining individual students.

TENA is examined via a digital exam. The examiner decides, based on recomendation from KTH’s coordinator for disabilities, if a custom-made examination for students with documented disabilities is appropriate.

Examination ( TENA )

There is an online exam at the end of the course. It will be available on a separate Canvas course page during the scheduled exam hours. To take this exam you need to register for it on kth.se during the exam registration period.

The exam consists of three parts. Part 1 is a multiple-choice part, primarily examining the first learning outcome. For each question there can be 1-4 correct options and you need to select all correct options and only the correct options to get 1 point. Partial points are not given. Whenever you start part 1 during the exam, you then have one hour to complete it. The bonus points collected during the period are then applied to the score on part 1 in 0,5 increments up to a score of 15.

Part 2 consists of two essay questions. You are here asked to explain and discuss, in your own words, the meaning of some of the course concepts and apply them to specific situations. This part tests the second and third learning outcome, up to grade level C. Each question is graded between 0-5 points, in 0,5 increments.

Part 3 tests learning outcome two and three, on the grade level between C and A. Here you are asked to explain and critically discuss the course terminology in an independent way. You do not have to complete part 3 to pass the exam, but the maximum grade is then C. Completing part 3 cannot increase your grade from below C. This part is graded C, B and A without the use of points, and bonus point cannot increase the grade above C. You have three hours to complete parts 2 and 3.

During the exam you are allowed to access the course material. Each submission will be reviewed for plagiarism. Note that you will not have enough time to complete the exam unless you have studied during the course. You can give your answers in English or Swedish.

Fullfilled seminar requirements, project requirements and written exam.

The grading criteria for the parts of the course graded pass or fail are the same as the fulfilment of the course learning outcomes, in the way stated above. Below are the grading criteria for the exam, in Swedish, with English translation. The letter grade is determined by the fulfilment of all required criteria for each grade. Grading tables will be available a couple of weeks after the course starts.

• All members of a group are responsible for the group's work.
• In any assessment, every student shall honestly disclose any help received and sources used.
• In an oral assessment, every student shall be able to present and answer questions about the entire assignment and solution.